When Admissions Don’t Go Your Way (And Other Things that Feel Like the End of the World)

By Audrey and Abigail

8th graders are nothing if not dramatic. Therefore, it’s no surprise that when your teenager opens their admissions decision and it’s not what they hoped for, time may briefly stop. There may be silence. There may be tears. There may even be some declaration of “my life is over.” Similarly, if your child was accepted to multiple schools and now is faced with the prospect of making a decision, they might be overwhelmed and temporarily paralyzed by the big choice in front of them. 

Acknowledge the disappointment without minimizing it, and normalize rejection and resilience:

For many kids, this is their first real experience of rejection and it lands right on their identity. To help them cope, your first step is to repeat to yourself that their life is NOT actually over. Before you spiral directly into “what does this mean for college and their future” take a deep breath. Your teen is watching you and they need the message that this is disappointing and that we’re okay. 

Shift to what’s next:

Often landing at a school that isn’t a first, second, or even third choice can provide opportunities you might not have even imagined. There might be a future best friend waiting in their first period class, an afterschool club that unlocks a passion, and an opportunity to connect with a strong educator who might turn out to be a mentor. Reframing a lower choice school with possibility and hope can help your 8th grader see this in a new light, no matter how much they roll their eyes at your optimism. Remind them you’re proud of them and that this decision doesn’t determine their self-worth.  

For your teen who was accepted to multiple schools and needs to make a decision but is overwhelmed and torn in different directions, remind them that this is a huge opportunity and that choice is a good thing. There is no “wrong” decision. High school is not a lifelong contract, even if it feels that way right now. It’s a four year chapter of their story. Help them focus on what school is the most exciting for them.  

No matter what news you receive this week, we can help sort through the noise with a calm, strategic voice and empower you to feel good about the next four years. 

What You Should Be Focusing on in 7th Grade to Help Prepare you for High School

As the high school process starts to get in full swing, it’s tempting to focus on grades, test scores, and future applications. But 7th grade is also about building the skills students need so high school doesn’t feel like a shock to the system. 

1. Building friendships is seriously important to seventh graders. Kids are figuring out how to navigate changing social dynamics, occasional (or not so occasional) drama, and what it means to be a good friend. These sometimes messy lessons are setting them up for high school, where social bumps in the road happen, but kids can hopefully bounce back quicker.  
   
   

2. Executive functioning - our favorite two words! These skills become even more important in high school as homework piles up, long term assignments become more common, and discovering a project the day before it’s due becomes a big problem. Seventh grade is a great time to practice organization and time management before the stakes get higher. 
   
   

3. Experimenting with interests should be encouraged! Not every 12 year old has a passion for something. Try new activities, clubs, books, subjects. This helps kids figure out what they actually enjoy instead of what their friends or enjoy, or what they think will look good on paper. 
   
   

4. Fostering Independence this is the quiet goal behind everything else. Kids should start taking more responsibility for the schedules, schoolwork, and communication. It’s a great time to make sure your kid is emailing their teacher instead of you! Confidence grows when kids realize they can handle hard things. 

high school search mistakes you could be making in 7th grade

By Joyce Szuflita

1. Waiting until the fall, when your random number is assigned, to make your list.

2. Searching for schools using Niche, Great Schools or US News.

3. Only looking at one type of school; for example, only small schools, only screened schools, etc.

4. Disregarding schools that contain CTE programs or have very specific themes.

5. Focusing on the schools you wish your child was suited for instead of schools where they will really thrive.

To understand how to avoid these and other pitfalls, watch Joyce’s Public High School Choice: Loud & Clear on demand video.

MIT is weighing in on high school admissions

By Joyce Szuflita

OOOOWW! MIT. How fancy!

Over the years, first we were so thankful for the crumbs: the clumsy Applicant : Seat ratio to guess at our chances at popular schools that were 30:1.
Then parents forced the DoE to reveal the random number, but they didn’t build context.
NOW MIT to the rescue with a very large but (to my limited mind) not terribly complicated combination of data to tell each student if a specific school is a long shot, medium shot, or pretty good shot. (Also no guarantees in the fine print.)

They are taking the number of seats at each program, and their admissions priorities, and an applicants screened group or Ed Opt group, and their random number and whether they are Gen Ed or SWD and feeding it into Big Blue to tell us if a school is a safety or a reach.

“MySchools now projects for each applicant if they have a low, medium, or high chance of getting an offer to high school programs. This gives families more information about the estimated chance of getting an offer to each program of interest, making it easier for them to build a balanced application.”

I should be grateful, and I will be if it helps parents make a good, balanced list.

Update: so now we have one year experience with the “MIT bars” and it looks very good. It is not a very nuanced system but it turns out that knowing which programs have “3 bars” (where you have a 99% chance of “getting in” based on your tier, random number and the school’s past admissions data) is wildly helpful in making sure that a student’s list is broad enough. It also helps in ‘expectation management’. Rather than expecting and dreaming about a “hail Mary pass” that would never happen and having a stressful disappointing outcome revealed in March - students can spend the 6 months between Oct and March really vetting, and becoming accustomed to the thoughtful worthy schools where they can actually get into. The improvement in mental health is immeasurable.
Knowledge is power.

ranking more than 12 schools on your high school application

By Joyce Szuflita

The DoE has just announced that you can rank more than 12 programs on your application. A successful application isn’t necessarily about volume. If ‘more’ means lots more schools on your list that are crazy long shots, you haven’t improved your chances of getting into one of them. The thing is that it also doesn’t disadvantage you.

It is reported that only 38% of families rank 12 choices on their high school applications. I doubt that allowing folks to rank more will encourage the 62% to look more deeply.

It is my guess that the people who will list more schools will be students who are auditioning for several talents. They may be able to easily fill all 12 traditional spots with audition programs in a couple of talents. This unlimited list allows them to try for all the audition programs they want AND add some regular non audition programs to their list.

It may also encourage families to add schools that might have been considered “wasted spots” on their previously limited list. There will be beloved schools (maybe popular 6-12th grade programs or schools that give a geographic priority that you are not in) that seem like such crazy long shots it wouldn’t be worth including on a limited list. Now, why not?!

Perhaps the benefit to listing some wildly out of range schools will be that if you get placed at a school that is lower on your app, you will automatically be placed on a wait list for those crazy popular schools. The thing is that if those schools have geographic priorities and/or if they are screened, you will still be placed on the wait list in the appropriate priority and Tier.

The cruel challenge provided by the DoE is - how on earth to get a decent understanding of more than 12 schools in 8 weeks with holidays in between. Thanks a lot?!

High Schools make "over offers"

If you are looking at the “numbers” on MY SCHOOLS and the totals don’t add up, it is because the City knows generally how many people decide to take other offers. More students are placed at a school than official seats available. When the inevitable happens and kids choose to go to Specialized HS or charter or private there are not big empty gaps. This is why the wait lists may not more a lot (or at all) at many popular schools.

Here is a sample from the Directory:

Millennium has 117 general ed seats and 33 SWD seats. Total 150 seats in the Freshmen class. They made offers to 190 students last year. Even though that is more than seats available, no one will be turned away. It is very likely that a bunch of those students will decide to go elsewhere. If Millennium is very popular this year, then its classrooms will be more full than normal, and people won’t move off the waitlist.

These numbers are particularly helpful when looking at 6-12th grade programs, because they will tell you how many people, who were not returning 8th graders, were offered seats.

Good luck

By Joyce Szuflita
According to the DoE high school placements will be coming out through MY SCHOOLS on Thursday March 9. If your child took the SHSAT, the results of the test, and LaGuardia auditions as well as your main application results will be listed there. You will receive an email when your results are available. They often stagger the results because MY SCHOOLS would crash if everyone went on at the same time.

Here is the thing. Life is uncertain. You can prepare and calculate and hope. It is hard not to fall in love with one place or another, but you can’t engineer your placement. Your mission is to prepare your child (and yourself, cause you have worked hard for this!) There is no doubt that you will be disappointed for any number of reasons, possibly just because there has been so much effort and angst.

This is what I hope students will consider when they get their placement:

This school is all potential.
It will be what I make of it.
I don’t know those kids, but my new best friend for life is somewhere in that crowd.
My first love is probably in there too.
There will be a teacher that I will never forget in that building.
There will be some uncontrollable laughter.
There will be something that seemed nearly impossible that I will conquer.
I will likely be sorry to leave at the end of it all.

You can focus on what you desire, but you don’t always get it, and you might even be sorry if you did, because you would have missed the wonderful thing that appeared when you least expected it. Go out and find it.