Transfer Students

              When students begin high school, the path they will take through senior year is somewhat predictable. There are graduation requirements and schools have protocols that are designed to meet those requirements. In addition, schools understand the varying goals students and their families have so there is room built into those protocols to meet those goals which are often college acceptance. However, sometimes families need to change schools in the middle of high school and that can mean switching from one school’s graduation requirements to another’s.

           This can throw even a great student a little off course for graduation and towards meeting their goal, but rest assured all is not lost. To begin, this is a fairly common occurrence and any guidance counselor or registrar worth their salt is going to be able put a student back on track. However, that doesn’t always come without some speed bumps. This often means taking something out of sequence. At my school, for example, freshman typically take biology and it’s a graduation requirement in my state. If a junior or senior transfer in without it, I’m going to enroll them in biology. That will mean that the junior or senior will participate in a class otherwise full of freshman. That can be a little awkward but it’s one of those speedbumps a transfer student must endure.

           I find that these types of things are often quite alarming to students and families. The path they were on is suddenly flipped upside down. “What do you mean I have to take biology with a bunch of freshmen? I was supposed to take AP Physics this year at my old school. Now I’ll never get into college!”

The new school might not even offer the classes a student was “supposed” to take. The job first and foremost is to make sure the student can graduate high school then those post-high school goals can come into play. Sometimes a new school doesn’t even offer a whole program a student was involved in. I enrolled a student this summer who came from an International Baccalaureate (IB) program and was devastated to learn we did not offer IB. Families need to understand that school transfers are survivable. Life happens, people need to move, and it throws off the schedule. Colleges understand this. Frankly, it happens all the time and colleges are very used to seeing it.

In that regard, the key is to communicate with the colleges about the transfer. You might be able to do this within an admissions essay or a letter of support from your school. If all else fails, pick up the phone and call the college. Remember, real human beings make admission decisions. Just call and say, “Hey, I just wanted to let you know there is a good reason my transcript looks like I changed direction halfway through high school.” They’ll understand and will make a note in your file.

When I talked to my student who could not continue in her IB program I explained it to her like this. In some ballparks a home run is 400 feet, in other ballparks, it’s 350 feet. Don’t worry about your home runs being discounted in a shorter ballpark. Just hit home runs in the park you’re in, and you’re going to be just fine.

The New FAFSA

In September of 2015, President Obama announced some significant changes to the FAFSA that will go into effect in the fall of 2016. If you’re new to the college admissions process, FAFSA is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid through which all financial aid is funneled. The change here relates to the timing of when the FAFSA needs to be filed.

In the past, the FAFSA was filed using a family’s financial information from the calendar year prior to a student’s high school graduation. So a student who graduated in 2016 would have used their family’s 2015 tax return to complete the FAFSA. This created a time crunch for many people. Colleges liked to see the FAFSA filed as early as possible, sometimes as early February, in order to process the information and turn it around into the financial aid packages they awarded their students. This meant that between January 1st when the prior year had ended and those early priority financial aid deadlines, families had just a few short weeks to collect all the required information required to complete their tax return and get it done.

The new FAFSA rules allow a family to use what they are calling the “prior prior” year’s financial information. Besides this confusing moniker, this is great news for families with high school seniors. It means that a 2017 graduate will be able to use their 2015 tax return to complete the FAFSA. No more sweating out it in January waiting to get all those little forms in the mail and from work so you can rush through your tax return in order to get the FAFSA filed.

The FAFSA now opens October 1st and you can use the information you should have finished up by last April.

I am still seeing a short window by the colleges to get the FAFSA filed. I’ve heard several colleges communicate that they would like the FAFSA filed by October 31, leaving just a month to get it all done. If there is a downside to this new rule, it’s that FAFSA now coincides with students working to complete their college admissions applications. I used to tell families that we would spend the fall of senior year filling out applications and getting students into college and we’d spend the spring working on the FAFSA and figuring out how to pay for college. I need to adjust my tune going forward.

There’s no doubt that the pros outweigh cons with this new rule though. An earlier FAFSA filing will translate into the colleges sending out financial aid packages to their accepted students earlier. That financial aid package can be a very important tool for a student to use as they select which college to attend. This will allow more time for them to deliberate over that decision. Of course, if a family’s finances have changed significantly between the prior prior year and the beginning of college due to circumstances like the loss of a job, a family can always pick up the phone and contact a school’s financial aid office to explain those special cases.  

The Gap Year

As high school draws to a close, many students are interested in pursuing further educational interests but only after a gap year. A gap year is time spent away from school--an extended break between high school and college. Students choose to take a gap year for a number of reasons. The most obvious is that the student is simply burned out. They’ve been in an academic setting essentially their whole lives and while they recognize the value of furthering their education, they just need some time on the sidelines before they do that. Some students see a gap year as a way to find themselves. They want to take some time contemplating careers and opportunities before they commit to one at the college level. There are also students who want to spend a year working full time in order to save money and build a nest egg before beginning more school.

I can see the rationale in each of these, but I am not personally a fan of the gap year. I think they are momentum killers. For most students, graduating high school is the biggest lifestyle change they have faced in their lives. Graduation often means moving, it means increased work expectations and responsibilities, and it means more “adulting” in the form of paying bills, cooking, and just generally taking care of one’s self the way a parent might have done before. For a new graduate, it takes a little work, mental and physical, to get those things sorted out and to get to a point where they are comfortable doing all those things. So to me, graduating high school and transitioning to adult life, then just a year later uprooting and going through another major lifestyle change by starting college sounds like an incredible expenditure of emotional energy as a doubling of the same effort.

Many of students will work during this gap year too. In that case, it’s pretty easy to become a slave to the almighty dollar. Maybe now they’ve got a car payment, or rent, or an insurance bill, or credit card debt, or feel like they can actually afford to go out to dinner on Friday night. Maybe they say they’ll work one more semester then start school in the spring. It’s the same scenario in the spring and they wait until fall. One gap year turns into two, or three, or four. It’s just so hard to pick again and go back to school when you’ve stopped.

Finally, it’s worth noting that most high school students have pretty sharp student skills. They are used to writing papers, listing off the parts of a cell, and deriving quadratic equations. They’ll need to do these types of things in college but those skills will grow rusty as they’re not used.

There are certain students with some special circumstances for whom I think a gap year is a great fit. However, I’ve come across too many former students who just wanted a little time off after high school and are still trying to get back to school. I think most of those students would have fared far better if they had gone straight into college. If you’re committed to a gap year, make sure you have a firm plan in place to return to school after your year off and do what you can to keep some momentum for your future.   

Freshman Year Counts

As I watched the Olympics, I was struck but how critical a good start was. In races that were decided at the end by hundredths of seconds, getting off to get a good start seemed so important. I suppose the same can be said for high school.

For high school, that start means freshman year. That sounds obvious, but I think it is lost on many of them. To a 14-year-old, graduation four years later can seem so far away. It’s nearly a third of their lifetime over again. They may feel like they can screw around a little longer then kick their post-high school plans into gear down the road. Unfortunately, that is not the case.

The key underlying principle I want my freshman to understand is that freshman year counts and here is the reason I give for that. Students apply for college in the fall of their senior year. That is before they’ve earned any senior grades of substance that actually factor into their GPA. Thus, the grades a college reviews for a student in determining their admission is from their freshman, sophomore, and junior year. Therefore, freshman year is a third of the determining factor in what decides a student’s college fate and is really more important than senior year. I tell my students as long as you have a 2.0 GPA which is the minimum required to graduate at my school, I don’t really care what your GPA is when you graduate. The single most important GPA you’ll have in high school is the one you’ll have at the end of your junior year. That will be the one you present to colleges the following fall and will be the one that represents you on your applications.Do you understand now why that freshman year is so important?

For the record, colleges do expect a final transcript upon graduation and do expect that you had a senior year with an outcome similar to your other three years. Stumbling at the finish line could result in a letter of recension where a college reverses their admission decision and denies your acceptance. In truth, those are not very common and most students hold up to where they have been. That just makes my point further that getting off to a good start and creating good habits during freshman year is quite valuable.

I should note too that the transition to high school is not easy. I never expect it to be

seamless. Adolescents have a lot of things they’re dealing with outside of school, the format is usually a little different than middle school, the subject matter is harder. It’s different and it’s normal for there to be some bumps in the road in the early goings of high school.

Usain Bolt was off the lead in the early goings of that 100 meter dash. He probably expected that though. He didn’t panic and knew his start was good enough that once he really got going, he was going to win. Still, he only won by less than a tenth of a second. If his start had been much worse he would not have had time to catch up before the finish line, not matter how fast he is. The start counts, make sure your freshman is in the blocks and ready to run.

What do Redesigned SAT Scores Mean?

In March of 2016, the CollegeBoard launched a redesigned SAT test. This test has many changes over the previous version and I’ve written about those previously. Another big change to the SAT is the results and scores that are issued. After a student takes a test, they’ll receive one Total Score, two Section Scores, two Cross-Test Scores, three Test Scores, and seven Subscores. Yeah, it’s complicated.

Let’s start with the Section Scores. These are easy and are what people are used to with the SAT. Evidence Based Reading and Writing (what some used to call verbal) is scored on a scale of 200-800, Math is the same, scored 200-800. What’s your SAT Math Score? I got a 550. Simple, right? The Total Score is just the sum of the two section scores. What’s your SAT Score? Well, I got a 550 in Math and 600 in Evidence Based Reading and Writing, so an 1150. Okay, those are the easy scores and most people are familiar with those.

Now it gets more complicated. Within both the Evidence Based Reading and Writing and Math there are select questions that are designed to not only evaluate a student’s verbal and math skills but also their Analysis of Science and Analysis of History/Social Studies. These special questions pull double duty and cross two areas. Thus two Cross-Test Scores in Science and History/Social Studies are presented on a scale of 10-40.

Next there are Test Scores. These are presented on a scale of 10-40 as well. The Math score here is really the same as the Math Section Score, just on a different scale. However, The Evidence Based Reading and Writing is separated here into Reading and Writing & Language. This lets a student see where they stand just in Reading and just in Writing & Language.

Lastly, we have Subscores. These further break down the Test Scores into little pieces. Math is broken into Problem Solving & Data Analysis, Passport to Advanced Mathematics, and Heart of Algebra.The Evidence Based Reading and Writing is broken into Words in Context, Command of Evidence, Expression of Ideas, and Standard English Conventions. These seven Subscores are presented on a scale of 1-15 and they really do help a student pinpoint their strengths and weaknesses.

It’s worth noting that the SAT also offers an optional essay. The essay scores do not factor into the above scores whatsoever. They are completely separate. The essay score has three components; reading, analysis, and writing. Each component is graded on a scale of 2-8.

It’s yet to be seen how individual colleges and universities will use these various scores or whether they will at all. Whatever the case, these detailed score reports provide more insight into a student’s academic abilities. This level of detail can be a great asset to a student looking to improve weak areas or even one who is trying to find a career field that might be a good fit. This information is going to be there on future SAT score reports. Make sure it’s put to good use.

Don't Force Career Decisions Too Soon: Part 2

Last month I began a discussion on students and choosing a career. Actually, I made the argument that it was okay for a high school student to be pretty hazy in the specifics of the direction they might take towards a career. This month, I want to discuss why I think it is okay for a senior headed off to college to be in the same boat.

        As a student applies to college, they are usually
asked to select a major on their application. Most colleges list undecided as
an option, but I think it’s bad form to select that. I would hope that students
have some inkling of what they might want to do and I think that choosing
undecided can demonstrate a lack of ambition to the college to which the
student is applying. What the student needs to understand, however, is that
checking this box in the fall of their senior year does not necessarily seal
their fate. I mentioned previously that colleges report that as many as 60% of
their sophomores are in different majors than what they applied to. It’s okay to
change and changing is actually more common than sticking to what you applied
to.

        Sometimes this change will happen over the course
of senior year, sometimes it will happen at orientation when it’s time for a
student to choose classes that they realize are going to be over their head.
For other students, the change happens after the student has been on campus and
had the opportunity to take some introductory classes in a given field. To this
point, I want to tell parents that your child might want to take a class in two
completely unrelated fields during their freshman year. If that is the case, it
is very likely one of those classes will be a complete waste in that it doesn’t
end up counting towards the major they end up in. However, if through those "wasted"
classes a student learns they really like or don’t like a particular field of
study, that lesson is immensely valuable.

        Sure, you shelled out a lot of money to learn that
but if it means your child learns in their first semester what path they should
be on, or shouldn't be on, isn’t that money well spent? Isn’t it better to find
that out after one or two semesters rather than 3 years or even a career in an
unfulfilling job? Give your child, the freedom to do a little academic
wandering (not a lot, just a little) during their freshman year.

        With that being said, be aware of too many dual enrollment or AP credits from high school. Both of those programs can be great and I think taking some of them in high school is generally a good idea. However, they do effectively work to chop off the front end of college. If you do too much of that, you chop off that opportunity for academic exploration. You’re expected to hit the ground running, sometimes starting college at junior year, at 18-years-old. I do not believe the vast majority of 18-year-olds just aren’t ready to get serious about majors and careers quite yet.

        Don’t get lost in the dollar signs and college costs at the expense of giving a
student the chance to make an informed choice. Let them make a choice they feel
at peace with and one that comes from their heart. If you do this, you’re
setting your children up to be happy, working people throughout their adult
lives and you can’t put a price on that.

Don't force career decisions too soon

Lately, I’ve started to notice a trend. As I meet with students and parents and we discuss life after high school I often sense that many parents are placing a lot of pressure on their children to identify a career path early in high school. While I believe forward thinking is valuable and students do need to be conscious of that gigantic looming decision, making that decision in the 9th or 10th grade is probably overkill.

When I say this in meetings with parents and children I usually sense some relief on the student’s part and a bit of surprise on the parent’s. So, that tells me this pressure parents place on students might be the cause of a lot of anxiety in students. The fact of that the matter is that leaving home and heading off into the wide world is scary. One’s career is at the forefront of the big wide world so talk of career forces a student to face those fears. However, that is not really my point here.

Instead, I mean to say that I’m not sure a 15-year-old is emotionally equipped to select the career they’ll be doing every day for the rest of their lives. An adolescence is still trying to find themselves as a human being and forcing them to choose a career on top of that, when there are so many over variables still in play, compounds that internal strife.

Colleges and universities tell us that as many as 60% of their sophomores are in a different major than they would they applied to. That means that most college students changed their major between their senior year of high school when they applied to college and their sophomore year of college. That’s okay!

I do think that college majors and careers need to enter a high school student’s thought process from time to time, but constantly badgering a student with questions along the lines of “What are you going to be when you grow up?” are fruitless.  There are more subtle ways to get a student to think about these things. Moreover, parents and students need to start with a mutual understanding that it is okay for these conversations, the external ones and internals ones, to be full of doubt and uneasiness. Part of that comes with the fact that students often don’t fully understand what someone in a given profession truly does on a day to day basis or the education required to get there.

That’s not a call to make your child shadow everyone in town--that’s an ordeal that most teenagers aren’t going to be up for. However, it is an opportunity for a parent to say something like the following. “I’m glad you’re enjoying your world history class so much. You know, one way you could translate a class like that into a career is through anthropology or archeology. There are people who go out and find old things from these old cultures and times you are studying about. Of course, sometimes you might have to spend three months away from your family digging around in the desert for them, but it’s pretty cool if you discover something really big.” Then just leave it at that. If the subject comes back around later, you can add to it then. Or, the issue might be a dead horse not worth beating. The point is to give your child little pieces of information and give them the opportunity to learn and explore about a variety of careers without forcing them down their throat. More importantly, don’t make them choke on the need to make that decision before they even leave high school in the first place. I’ll continue this topic with a discussion more centered on life in college next month.