Anyone with high school kids will have heard that junior year is tough. I’m still recovering from my daughter’s experience three years ago. Just as it’s becoming easier to think about without feeling residual stress and anxiety creep up from wherever I tried to bury it, my son is about to start his.
Junior year really does deliver a stress trifecta: the looming pressure of college choices and applications, an increased course load (often involving college-level classes), and, for many, preparing for and taking standardized tests. And that’s without even taking into account extracurricular activities, sports, part-time jobs, learning to drive, social expectations, and pressures (promposals, anyone?). It’s a lot!
So, how can you help your child, who it seems only yesterday you were pushing around in a stroller, navigate these last years of high school while maintaining both of your sanities? I can’t promise answers, but I learned a thing or two from my eldest’s experience, and I intend to try very hard to follow my own advice this time around.
There’s no such thing as a “dream” school.
Well, there is, but only in your child’s dreams. The truth is, there are undoubtedly many, many colleges that your teen will be happy at. With that thought in mind, the beginning of junior year is a good time to help your teen put together a list of several colleges that feel like they might be a good fit.
Professional college counselors can provide an excellent service in this respect. Still, if your budget doesn’t stretch to a one-on-one counselor, there are all sorts of free resources to help with decision-making.
Start with your school guidance counselor; they will have visited countless colleges and can give you an idea of which ones might suit your child based on their interests and GPA. Another potentially good starting point is your AI chatbot – really! Although, as an English teacher, AI has often been the bane of my life, as a mom, I’ve found it quite helpful. Ask your preferred AI for a list of schools that fit your teen’s parameters about tuition costs, size, location, majors, campus versus city, average GPA, and test scores. Use the suggestions as a starting point to explore options.
Once you have a list, in-person visits to easily accessible colleges are the best way to get a feel for a place. Still, most colleges offer virtual tours (which also count toward demonstrated interest). Tackling this at the beginning of junior year can save stress at the end, when coursework pressure and looming exams start to cause the dreaded teen (and parent) “crash outs”!
Less is more.
There’s a tendency to think that your child has to be an excellent all-arounder to stand a chance of getting ahead in college admissions or the job market. As a teacher, I see so many upperclassmen burning themselves out trying to maintain perfect GPAs while captaining the lacrosse, hockey, and tennis teams and auditioning for the starring role in the school musical.
Some students actually achieve all these things, but at what cost? It’s worth considering that colleges and employers are increasingly looking for young people who can show that they have a particular passion (you may have heard college counselors talk about “pointy” applications – this is what they mean).
This is actually good news! Rather than exhausting themselves trying to be all-rounders, junior year can be an excellent time for students to focus on what they really care about – whether that’s community service, protecting the local parks, or playing the Irish fiddle – and to perhaps consider whether playing all of the sports and running all of the clubs while trying to keep on top of a heavy course load is sustainable (or healthy).
To test or not to test.
Standardized tests are still optional for many colleges – check individual websites for up-to-date information as to whether this is the case for the colleges your teen is interested in. If testing is required, or if your teen thinks it will give them an edge, the beginning of junior year is a good time to start prepping.
Practice SAT and ACTs are available free of charge through the official websites, and there are many free resources for test prep available online. Exams are offered throughout the year, but you may need to register several weeks in advance for a particular date at a nearby location. It’s a good idea to book the test and then start your prep!
And remember, if it all gets too much in junior year, or your teen feels like they didn’t do their best on a standardized test, the summer before senior year can be an excellent time to prepare for a retake. Both the SAT and ACT offer test dates in early September, with results out in plenty of time for college application deadlines in senior year.
A lesson for parents, too.
Thinking about college options and test prep before the December break, as well as focusing on those extracurricular activities that your teen really cares about, can help to avoid complete burnout by February. Still, junior year is tough, and there’s no point pretending otherwise. It’s obvious where your teen’s stress is coming from, but this can be a particularly tricky stage to navigate as a parent, too.
Our kids are starting to make real choices about their lives as adults, and this is an important time for us parents to step back and let our kids do hard things; to learn how to balance school work, extracurricular activities, and a social life, knowing that we’re here for them if they need us. We might not need to push that stroller anymore, but we can still help them up if they fall, dust them off, and point them back in the right direction.
, and, for many, preparing for and taking standardized tests. And that’s without even taking into account extracurricular activities, sports, part-time jobs, learning to drive, social expectations, and pressures (promposals, anyone?). It’s a lot!){kind=link}