College hoopla. All last week. After all getting word about which colleges they all got into (or didn’t), my son and all his friends (many kids I’ve known since kindergarten) are all kind of sitting back now – away from the web sites where they’ve been scanning for their names – and restructuring their lives in their heads. Very few got their first-choice schools, or even any school they’d been picturing for the last several months. All the schools were so impacted, and students in the top 5-10% of their class weren’t getting their first picks (or sometimes even their second or third), or weren’t even getting into the California University system where they thought they’d be. Their visions are all shifting: from palm trees to pines, from private to public, from living at home to being away, from being away to living at home. … They all look a little shell-shocked.
And while the kids all stare off into space, trying to wrap their heads around schools they hadn’t pictured, Moms and Dads are freaking out over the money. Most of us haven’t gotten Financial Aid letters yet, so we’re all looking at sticker prices: $12,000/year tuition, plus $12,000 room and board. Or $24,000 tuition, plus $8,000 room and board. Or $30,000 tuition, plus $12,000 room and board. The shell-shocked looks go both ways, for sure. …
Once the dust settles, we’ll all come up with a plan. Ricky got: University of Oregon (yes); UCLA (no); UC Davis (no); UC Santa Barbara (waitlist). All those honors classes, AP tests, all-nighters and exams started to become meaningless when he was turned down by his favorite schools. This seems to be the month of shock and awe, followed by some decisions by the end of the month, when deposits have to be put down.
In the meantime, I’ll be staring at Nathan’s army men set up across my dining table, still feeling a little shell-shocked. …
