Tips for Parents: Early College Entrance for Profoundly Gifted Students

Dr. Jon Reider, director of college counseling at San Francisco University High School and former admissions officer at Stanford University, led an informational seminar for parents of profoundly gifted students considering early college entrance.

The following are questions presented to the participants by Dr. Reider at the beginning of the seminar:

1. What preparation do most colleges want?
2. How is standardized testing (SAT, ACT) used?
3. What is all the fuss about the SAT about anyway?
4. How important are college courses taken in the high school years? Are these more important than honors courses (or AP, or IB) courses taking as part of a regular high school curriculum? (What are these terms anyway?)
5. Why are some of the top colleges trimming the amount of credit that they offer to entering students?
6. What is all the fuss about Early Action and Early Decision about? (lots of controversy about this just this past week)
7. How early is too early to go away to college? Why are colleges not always excited about enrolling a 15 or 16 year-old, or younger? How do we convince a college that it is NOT too early for our child?
8. How does Homeschooling work when applying to college?
9. Do colleges know what a PG child is?

The following points emerged from the discussion:

1. Unquestionably, one size does not fit all. Different colleges may have widely differing policies about admitting students who are much younger than the normal age of enrollment, which begins about 17. Some may be encouraging, others discouraging. You have to do your own homework about this.
2. Many of you are either partially or entirely homeschooling your children. This practice too is subject to wide variations as to how colleges evaluate it. The literature on homeschooling is vast and growing, as you surely know. The issues are connected to those about very young children, but there are also discrete questions such as the importance of standardized test scores, transcripts, recommendations, and activities that apply to homeschoolers of any age. A good, straightforward approach to selective college admissions can be found under "homeschooling" at the Stanford University website www.stanford.edu.
3. Local colleges where the young student can live at home, under parental supervision, tend to be more open-minded and flexible about admitting very young students.
4. Many parents are justifiably hesitant about having their children go to college away from home at too early an age. They believe that younger students (e.g., in their early teens) still need the guidance of their families. These families believe in an approach that balances their children's need for intellectual stimulation and psychological development.
5. Similarly, residential colleges are risk-aversive in their admissions processes. They don't want to take unnecessary risks by admitted students who are not yet for the pressures and temptations of college life. Much of this is borne out by folk wisdom and common sense, even though concrete studies of how very young students fare in these kinds of colleges may not be definitive. ALL colleges like very bright young people, but the more competitive the admission process, the less leeway the college is likely to give since they have many more qualified applicants than they have room for. To the parent, the child may seem truly exceptional, and with good reason, but it is important to try to remember the institutional interest of the college that can see these children as potential problems.
6. Most families have stitched together imaginative solutions to the dilemma of the school system not being a perfect match for their children. Some take a mixture of classes from different grade levels; some supplement the school classes with online education at an advanced or college level (e.g., EPGY); others prefer actual classroom instruction and have found ways to use courses from local colleges, both 2 and 4 year.
7. Many, but not all, of the Young Scholars are relatively more advanced in Math and Science than in English skills. Difficulties in writing expository prose are prominent, and the children find that that comes much more slowly for them. Reports of their being disengaged and struggling with writing are frequent. We discussed possible reasons for this pattern, differing layers of cognition, differing ages when children can handle contradiction and subtlety, even whether it is related to the age of crawling.
8. Being bright is not enough to get into selective colleges; they don't care about IQ scores and similar measures. Rather, they want evidence of intellectual vitality, that the child is genuinely interested in learning for its own sake.
9. Everyone agreed that it is important for young scholars to be exposed to peer group activities such as music, athletics, religious groups (if the family leans in that direction), scouts, etc.
10. Everyone also agreed that these children develop so quickly and unpredictably that it is probably a mistake to plan their educational programs and possible time for college entrance too far ahead.
11. How to approach a college?
    Treat admissions professionals with respect; make an appointment to see someone in their office, preferably someone who specializes in working with younger applicants, if there is such a person, but it doesn't hurt to ask. Bring academic records, but not IQ results or similar kinds of testing. Only a trained psychologist finds those useful. Discuss your child's academic history, why he or she has exhausted or is about to exhaust the other options available. Provide any examples you can of his or her ability to relate well to adults and to older students, and of leadership or contributions to the broader community. You are trying to dispel the stereotype that younger, home-schooled students are weird, asocial, or immature. Simply denying that is not as effective as providing evidence.
    The admissions officer will want to try to assess how well your child can do the work at their college. Be straightforward about your child's age and educational experience. They will appreciate that you are not playing games with them. These initial conversations are not formal interviews: many colleges, including almost all public schools, do not even use interviews as part of the admissions process. Your child does not have to perform or make a good impression: it is not an audition. The meeting is for the purpose of learning what the school wants to see in a younger applicant, and what you will need to do to make that happen. Your child doesn't even have to be present. That is up to you. If they want to meet your YS, you can always bring him or her another time.
12. There are several good books to read about college admissions:
    
    • By: J.Steinberg, The Gatekeepers.
      This is a detailed study of one year in the life of a Wesleyan admissions officer and his friendship with a high school counselor he knew in college. It is well-written, factually accurate, and even suspenseful. Even Chelsea Clinton has a cameo appearance.
    • By: B. Mayher, The College Admissions Mystique.
      There are a number of books by experienced high school counselors. This is the best of the lot: sane, careful in its use of language, readable without being too jazzy or hip. An honest book. (Disclaimer: He is a personal friend of mine, and I provided a blurb for the cover, but I don't get a nickel from him.)
    • By: W. Montauk & K. Klein, How to Get Into the Top Colleges.
      This is a handbook, a thick one, which is true to its title. What is best about it is that the authors interviewed over a dozen college admissions officers and quotes them on a variety of issues. The result is that, while there is a fair degree of commonality on many questions, there is also a good deal of variation. It is a good caution to not assume that all colleges do things the same way.
    • By: R. Light, Getting The Most Out of College.
      This is a humane book by a Harvard statistician, an unlikely combination. The conclusions are mostly common sense, but how they are drawn, through well-told anecdotes and interviews, makes it worthwhile.
    • By: M. Edmundson, Teacher.
      This is a memoir by a college English professor about a high school teacher in his blue collar high school who changed his life. It's about what it means to really learn something and how true learning can take place in the most surprising of settings.

The important part about college for everyone, and especially for children of this caliber, is to sustain their intellectual enthusiasm, not to search only for a name brand or prestigious college.