The most difficult aspect of the college application process? There are two of them.
One is the knowledge, as your child struggles to complete forms and essays and pull all the materials together, that she is about to be assessed by groups of complete strangers who will then determine what choices she will have for the next four years of her life. The first two times that I went through this (at once, since I have twins), I was staggered by that realization. This time it was a bit easier -- I've done it before and, since this particular child is a singer and sometime actor, she has had enough audition ups and downs that I am more used to it with her. But it's still not a pleasant feeling.
The other most difficult part? That I DON'T GET TO GO TO COLLEGE NOW! That old saw about youth being wasted on the young? Truly, that is truly true. Yesterday I estimated that in the last three years, I have investigated about 100 colleges in depth and that, between us, my husband and I have been on 30+ college campuses. (And our efforts were minimalistic in comparsion to those of many of our friends and acquaintances.) Some of my impressions:
Kalamzoo College in Michigan has one of the most involved and caring admission staffs around ~
Kenyon College in Ohio has the most beautiful campus in America ~
Davidson College in North Carolina is in the perfect small-town setting ~
Lewis & Clark in Portland has the perfect Hansel-and-Gretyl campus ~
George Washinton University has amazing indoor athletic facilities ~
The University of Michigan has the most beautiful law school ~
The University of Chicago has the best city neighborhood ~
If I were doing it over again for myself? Reed College in Portland.
I went to high-powered schools in the East, mainly because I had been to a high-powered boarding school there. If I could do it all over, I'd take the advice of one of my teachers from North Carolina. I'd shake the dust of New England provincialism off my feet and head to the other coast.
I was a mediocre student at best, in high school and through the first two years of college. I have turned into an adult who is endlessly curious, loves to write, and reads hundreds of books a year. Had I been able to unearth that self in late adolescence, I would have recognized a professor in the making, and gone to a school that heralds the individualistic intellect. Not that my schools didn't -- but hey, it was the 60s, and my level of maturity had risen to maybe that of a three-year-old. Not exactly prime college material.
I majored in English. Don't ask me why. I got really excited about biology after Jane Goodall came to speak, and I got really excited about music after Yo-Yo Ma came to play. But I had wasted way too much time in high school (let's not think about how) and it took me about a decade to turn myself around. If I were doing it all over, I'd major in bio, and religion, and English, and history, and international studies, and a language. . . .
Well, it won't be me, not this time. I'll be at work, exhanging my time and labor for a modest salary that is immediately transformed into college tuition payments. Don't get me wrong -- I'm happy to be able to do it. But . . . I wanna go to college!
(I walked 2 miles last night and 3 this evening.)
7 comments:
You and me both!
I hear you!!
Your enthusiasm is admirable! I really don't want to go back to college though. I guess I'm too lazy. Pamela
I think our school system, thirty years ago AND moreso today, doesn't prepare us to know what the hell we want to do with the rest of our lives by the time we're sixteen. We're just too YOUNG at that age to make those kinds of momentous decisions. One of the reasons I didn't go to college was because of this very thing. I didn't have the slightest idea what I would be using my college education FOR, and I knew it was going to cost a great deal of money that my parents didn't have. I was ignorant enough of the process that I didn't realize how much scholarship money was available to me as a National Merit Scholarship finalist (I got a vague inkling about this when I began to be inundated with letters from colleges begging me to apply...)
I think I'm finally at an age and a place in my life where I could really appreciate a college education, and it is, in the end, the money aspect that's going to keep me from getting it. Lisa :-]
Then what are you waiting for?
Best,
Judith
http://journals.aol.com/jtuwliens/MirrorMirrorontheWall
I'm an INFP and it took me years to settle into ONE thing I wanted to do with my life. In college I took so many courses in so many areas--I liked everything. I settled on English/Creative writing because it seemed the perfect way to synthesize my many interests. If you can't go to college, there are two other possibilities: 1--continue to learn and grow on your own by googling to make connections between disciplines and read, read, read, and write, write, write. 2--check into low residency programs in the subject areas you are interested in. Believe me, I understand what you're talking about!
New England provincialism? Now you've gone and hurt my feelings.
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