After an unprecedented year and a half, we are facing another admissions cycle. The summer, no longer a respite from stress, is filled with test prep and conversations about positioning for college applications. College counselors are needed now more than ever before. For the first time in years, admissions forecasting is based less on recent history and more on a deeper understanding of the system and of psychology, both of the applicants and of colleges. The college admissions process is in flux. Malcolm Gladwell’s latest podcast calls sharply into question the entire college ranking system. The US News and World Report has been simultaneously challenged to abandon any reliance on SAT and ACT scores in its rankings. Nevertheless, application numbers to highly-ranked institutions soared last year in the wake of the pandemic and left other colleges wanting.
Families on the brink of the admissions process understandably have many questions with few reliable answers. Will the ACT and the SAT continue to matter? Probably. Will college rankings continue to sway students? Yes. Will National Honor Society membership matter? Probably not. Should I fence, play squash, or row crew? Do you want to?
Although I am not a college counselor, I often rely on college admissions experts and counselors for trends, and through the years, one magic formula remains tried and true: authenticity.
In my experience, parents far too often abandon who their child is in favor of what they or the system wants them to be. No wonder our children are facing an anxiety crisis and have self-doubts about who they are: We have placed demands upon them constantly about who they should be, and our demands are often miscalculated. Parents’ attempts to pave a guaranteed path for their children are futile.
The irony of parenting is that our expectations about who children should be rarely synchronize with who they truly are. I have written before about my perplexity that many students do not even know what they enjoy doing. They simply cannot answer that question, because the answer to that question has so very often been supplied for them.
It’s time that we allow our children, within reason, to determine their own interests and fate. One of my favorite movies, I admit (to the chagrin of many), is The Sound of Music, and the lesson Captain Von Trapp learns is not to treat his children like soldiers but, rather, to get to know them and their feelings – to listen to them. We are raising future leaders, and we need them to develop their own voices.
An experienced college essay reader can always detect when students do not authentically feel their essay topics or when their school records seem aimless or disingenuous. This year, let’s vow to be better listeners and supporters and less heavy-handed in issuing GPS instructions for our children, especially when the proverbial rainbow’s end is a moving target.