Those who know me view me as an incurable optimist and positive thinker. For me to sound an alarm… well… there really is a fire. I started noticing pre-Covid. Students simply did not seem as well educated as in the past. Our teaching staff at The Learning Consultants noticed as well. I am always mindful […]
Read MoreMy college counseling work has evolved since Covid. Parents in our area – the Connecticut shoreline and Fairfield County – are usually well educated. So when I started college counseling in the 2000s, my work was often focused on guiding the student through the college counseling process, a reasonable amount of which the parents understood. […]
Read MoreIs your child a high school junior? What else can be done at this date to change your child’s chance of admission and your chance of securing merit aid? Do well on finals. “Deepen” your activities through leadership. Increase SATs. For most, that’s it. Yes, many schools are test-optional. But I speak to college admissions […]
Read MoreAI Generated Writing All Sounds the Same Even the best AI writing tools are programmed by people other than you. What’s more, AI-generated writing all sounds pretty much the same. It can’t possibly reflect your unique voice. No matter how “good” a piece of AI writing might be, it won’t help you stand out from […]
Read More“Are they training to become professional athletes?” My European friend – who spends his summers in Old Saybrook – asked with genuine curiosity. We were discussing some of his other Shoreline, CT friends. He was perplexed. “They spend their weekends driving to other states. They must spend a fortune.” “I love sports. But he was […]
Read MoreOur school systems are in trouble. Deep trouble. The reasons are structural: the academic subjects – “why do we have to learn this?” – are increasingly anachronistic. This is from someone who enjoyed school and has enjoyed working with students to help them do better in school. the classroom structure – “I’m so bored” – […]
Read More“College” as the predominant means for upward mobility and good life is having a bad moment. Some part is fully deserved: the cost is out of control. Other parts related to politics are really just same-same historically (take a look at the 60s -70s, related to Viet Nam and Civil Rights, the 80s related to […]
Read More“They just want me to do my best.” I asked Ted, a sophomore at Valley Regional High School in Essex about his parents’ reaction to his mediocre grades. In the “old days” – which are not too distant, perhaps 20 years ago – parents pushed their children to excel. The backlash has been so fierce […]
Read MoreThe Mental Health Crisis Facing Gen-Z is real and enormous. The data coming in – see Jonathan Haidt’s new book The Anxious Generation – is disturbing (huge understatement). There are a myriad of reasons. But I know with certainty that “uncertainty about the future” is a big one. Given that our geographic region, -coastal Connecticut (Fairfield/New […]
Read MoreFrom the New Yorker’s article on the subject:lt College admissions has always been filled with uncertainty, especially at schools like Duke where applications are plentiful and seats scarce. But when Guttentag started as dean three decades ago, the process was more forgiving: Duke accepted some 28 percent of applicants, and about 41 percent of them […]
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