Junior year is a whirlwind of activity, from studying for SAT® tests and AP® Exams to considering colleges to apply to and visiting campuses. On top of all that, it's important that your child keeps up good grades and continues to participate in extracurricular activities. Phew! To keep on track, follow the action items listed for each season below.
September
- This year the PSAT/NMSQT® counts! Taking it can qualify your child to receive a National Merit Scholarship. Be sure your child is signed up to take the PSAT/NMSQT this October.
- Your child should pick up a copy of the PSAT/NMSQT Student Bulletin at the school's guidance office, and take the enclosed practice test.
- Encourage your child to meet with the school counselor to compare the academic requirements for each of his target schools and his own course schedule. If necessary, he should adjust his schedule.
October
- Your child takes the PSAT/NMSQT. Be sure he checks 'yes' for Student Search Service® to hear from colleges and scholarships.
- Your child should visit the SAT Preparation Center™ to download a free diagnostic mini-SAT, and to get SAT PrepPacks™ to focus his practice where he needs it most.
- Take your child to college fairs in your area.
November
- Fall is a good time to start the college search! Encourage your child to brainstorm a list of characteristics that are important to her (e.g., location, size).
- Help your child identify test requirements for his target schools, including scores for the SAT, SAT Subject Tests™, ACT, and others. His PSAT/NMSQT scores can give him an idea of what he would score on the SAT and help him focus his practice for it.
- Tap resources at your child's high school, in the community, and online to learn how your family can finance your child's target colleges. Learn about today's college costs and how financial aid works.
December
- Help your child register online for the SAT and SAT Subject Tests, which are offered several times during the year. Many colleges require or recommend 1-3 Subject Tests for admission or placement. If your child is planning to apply early decision, he should be sure to complete required tests by the end of junior year.
- Encourage your child to find out about college firsthand from friends who are home from college for the holidays.
January
- Help your child organize a file for college brochures and information. Before you know it, they'll start pouring in.
- Talk to the school counselor with your child about local scholarship opportunities.
February
- Your child can visit the SAT Preparation Center to focus his practice for upcoming SAT tests.
- Plan to visit college campuses with your child this spring while classes are in session. Schedule interviews with admissions officers.
March
- Most students take the SAT in spring of junior year and/or fall of senior year. Help your child register online for spring and summer SAT tests.
- Your child should meet with her counselor to discuss courses to take senior year. He may want to consider taking a course at a local college, especially if he's interested in a subject for which his school doesn't offer AP courses.
- Now is a great time for your child to start looking for a summer job, internship, or volunteer opportunity. Real-world experience can give your child a preview of careers in which he's interested. This may help him focus his studies in college and when he's selecting a major.
- Encourage your child to meet with his school counselor and search online for summer learning programs offered to high school students at colleges.
April
- AP Exams are in May. Encourage your child to visit the AP Prep Center for tips and prep materials.
- Attend local college fairs with your child.
- If applicable, your child should prepare writing samples, portfolios, audition tapes, and other material for the fall application season.
May
- Your child can take SAT Subject Tests when he has successfully completed the corresponding high school course (B+ average or better).
- Help your child make a resume of her accomplishments, activities, and work experience.
- Suggest to your child that he start a summer reading list. He may want to ask his teachers for ideas.
Summer
- Visit college campuses with your high schooler. Call ahead for tour and open house schedules.
- If your child is planning to take the SAT in the fall, he should register online now.
- Discuss different college majors with your child that relate to his interests and career goals.
- To help your child start thinking about life after high school, access MyRoad. Your child will take MyRoad's questionnaire to get a detailed report on his personality type. Then MyRoad will connect him to in-depth information on careers and majors that are right for him.
- By the end of summer, your child should narrow his college list to 5-8 schools. The list should include "safe" schools as well as "reach" and "realistic" schools.
- Help your child prepare drafts of application essays for his target schools.
- If your child plans on competing in Division I or Division II college sports and wants to be eligible to be recruited by colleges, he must register with the NCAA Initial Eligibility Clearinghouse.
- Together with your child, mark a calendar with important application and financial aid dates and deadlines for senior year. Start planning for dates and deadlines with the College Application Calendar and the Financial Aid Calendar.
You want to do what? When most parents get the news their kid doesn't want to head straight to college, they're upset. The thought raises fears such as that their child may never get an advanced degree so crucial to success. In fact, experts say teenagers who take time off do go on to college—and they're usually better, more motivated students for it.
Consider This
You're about to invest thousands in an advanced education for your child. Unless he's ready to make the most of it, this money could be wasted. So, if your kid is telling you he doesn't want to go right now, it's in your best interest to hear him. Insisting a child go to college against his wishes is likely to cause resentment, failure, and more wasted cash.
Make Time Off Meaningful
That doesn't mean a reluctant student should get a free pass to lie around the house all day. Experts say the key to a successful year off lies in structuring this time around activities, paid or unpaid, that will provide a rich experience. You can discuss options for how to spend this year, but you will also want to set some ground rules, and stick to them. Will he be expected to support himself, or pay rent at home? Your relationship should change to reflect the fact that your child has crossed the threshold to adulthood. Otherwise, you risk supporting a perennial child. The key to a successful year off lies in structuring this time around activities ... that will provide a rich experience.
How Colleges View the Year Off
Letting your child coast could also hurt his chances later. Colleges will want to know in detail how the time off was spent. A year full of rich, mind-expanding experiences or solid work can mean admission, even for a student with a poor high school record. In Beyond the Ivy League, former college administrator Loren Pope notes he wanted to make a year of work a requirement for admission, because he found that students with this experience are invariably more mature and more focused.
Rita Goldman, director of college guidance at Germantown Friends, a high school in Philadelphia, agrees. She says she often suggests a year off for kids who have driven themselves extra hard during the four years of high school, taking Advanced Placement (AP®) courses and getting involved in a number of extracurricular activities in order to be attractive candidates for top colleges.
"Many of these students are completely burned out by graduation," said Goldman. "They need to take time off to find out who they are, outside all the packaging." Such students often go through the college selection process and defer for a year once accepted, an arrangement most colleges find perfectly acceptable.
Uh, I Dunno
So a year off isn't necessarily going to banish your kid to a lifetime of dissolution. But here's another dilemma: What if he doesn't want to go, but he doesn't have a burning desire to do anything else either? Don't despair. Most teenagers aren't ready to make the life-forming choices college can force on them; yours may just be more honest than most.
The only thing that can resolve this dilemma is time, and experience. Just about any kind of experience—travel, work, volunteering—can help your child through this identity crisis. If yours is an indifferent student, a year trying to support himself on low-paying work is usually a strong encouragement to go further.
On the other hand, reluctance may simply be your child's way of expressing anxiety about the changes graduation brings. In either case, it's best to follow two tracks, applying to colleges while planning for a year off. That way if your child changes his mind, he'll still have the option of school, and you can rest assured that, either way, he'll be off to a good start.
