Tuesday, April 24, 2018

The Accepting Parent: the adventure of Accepted Students Day

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Over the years, dear readers, it's been my pleasure to be your guide to all things collegiate, from taking tours to moving-in-day, from having your university student home for the holidays to having her home for good (or until she moves in with her boyfriend, which may FINALLY be happening next month. Don't get me started.)

I'm back with another adventure in the fields of academe: the Accepted Students Day. That's right, Youngest, who first made her appearance in this blog at the age of ten (she had just started reading the Harry Potter series) is headed off to college this fall. The lucky institution? The Honors College at the University of Maine, which offers a core civilization and classics curriculum, its own dorms and classroom spaces, and - this is the part I get a little dizzy over - enough in grants and scholarships that Youngest will be able to graduate debt free. I'll give those of you who are still paying off loans a chance to sit down and breath it through.

Before making that decision, though, she wanted to get an in-depth look, so off we went to Orono, Maine (an almost three hour trip, which reassured her I wouldn't be "too close" to, I don't know, pop over and tuck her in at night. My children have always deeply overestimated my interest in what might be going on in their dorm rooms.)

Accepted Students Day is to the campus tour as a full-blown wedding vendors fair is to skimming The Knot. Every kid there has gotten that lovely fat envelope, and every parent has seen the financial aid offer, and the university is there to seal the deal, with administrators, deans, professors and some VERY peppy students all showing up to tell you and your child in detail why this is the Best of all Possible Schools. Here are a few tips to make the most of your day:

1) Embrace the schmaltz. Every campus has a group called Key Club or Student Ambassadors or such, comprised of young people who will grow up to be Realtors and run car dealerships. They are super, super excited about Accepted Students Day. (I suspect surly, disgruntled university attendees are locked in their dorms until all the guests have left.)

 At UMaine, the incoming kids and their parents walked through a crowd of cheering, blue-clad youths and a giant inflatable bear's face to get into the Performance Center where everything kicked off. The bear mascot was there as well, giving high fives and punching it out...with parents, as the high-schoolers were to a man too cool/embarrassed/jaded to give it up for the Bear. We middle-aged folks were loving it, however, and why not? We're light years beyond cool, anyway. May as well cheer and applaud and ooh and aaah. The same thing happened when the program opened with a fabulous a capella group.

 "Oh, my God," Youngest said. "Can they get more cliched?" I, meanwhile, was butt-dancing in my seat.

2) Ease up on the cheerleading.  I really wanted Youngest to like UMaine. (In addition to debt free, my "parental expected contribution" was $200. Parents, I'll wait a moment while you fan yourselves.) So, I admit, I went a tad overboard. I got her a t-shirt. And sunglasses. I praised the theatre. I proclaimed the blueberry popovers the best ever (they were good.) I pointed out the architectural excellence of the buildings - yes, even the brutalist library. Why is it always the library? Finally, we were walking through a green area signed "Arboretum." "Gosh," I said, "Look at all the beautiful..." before I could say the word 'trees,' we had run out of them. It was a three-pine arboretum.

 "Mom," Youngest said. "You need to cool it." She was right.



3) Remember, you're not the prospective student. The university broke the kids into groups for sessions with the professor(s) heading up their departments of interest. Since Youngest is considering International Affairs, we hiked over to a conference space inside a cool museum of Native People's art and technology ("Mom! Stop looking! You're going to get lost!") to meet with their head. His presentation was so compelling, wanted to sign up. Afterwards, we stayed behind to speak one-on-one (Youngest was great about asking questions and zeroing in on her interests. At her age, my primary question was, "Where the boys at?") The professor had mentioned the intersection of climate change with national security, and I piped up about a program I had just heard on NPR. We discussed it for a minute, and he turned to Youngest. "You're interested in the international repercussions of climate change?"

"No," she said. "My mother is." Oops. 

As an aside, they should make a college for old people. It would be all about the academics, which we're finally mature enough to want to focus on, with a really good dining hall and ergonomically correct study carrels. Bedtime at 9:30, strictly enforced.

And in that vein: 4) The things that excite you and the things that excite your student will be different. What I swooned over: the classics curriculum, the museum, the language requirement and the squishy leather chairs in the Honors College reading room. What Youngest swooned over: cute boys, an in-depth conversation with a sorority girl, the study-abroad programs and the Adirondack chairs in the park outside the Honors College.

What we both liked: lunch, the century-old residence hall she hopes to live in, those blueberry popovers (really, they were bakery quality.) Is that enough to be going forward? Yes, yes it is. We sent in the deposit after we got home. Go Black Bears!

65 comments:

  1. Congratulations to your daughter . . . this sounds like an amazing college and no doubt it’s going to be an exciting time for her.

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    1. Thanks, Joan. I know it will be. UMaine is four times as large as her sister and brother's schools, and I was impressed with the opportunities the size difference offered.

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  2. Congratulations, youngest - it's a beautiful campus, and you look like you are having a great time already - enjoy!

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    1. We do have a good time together. Not shown: us stopping on the way out and getting GIANT chocolate milkshakes for the road.

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  3. That is truly great news, told as funnily as always, Julia! And to get out debt-free is absolutely a gift. My sons had the same, for different reasons - their father was a professor at Boston U and so they didn't paid tuition. He and split the room and board and they worked for their own spending money. It gave at least one of them the freedom to pursue a passion career that doesn't pay much, and the other to sock away money for travel, a wedding, and a even house one of these days. All the best to Youngest!

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    1. Thanks, Edith. She's seen her sister and brother dealing with debt (and both of them have LESS than the national average) and she already knows she wants to travel abroad and get a Masters. I'm glad she's made the smart decision.

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  4. Julia, that sounds exactly like the dynamic between my daughters and me. And I so wanted to attend then-new Olin College of Engineering when I took my middle kid there for a visit. Their programs were so innovative, and yes, the dining is now recognized as one of the best in the country.

    My two youngest both won academic scholarships, and they are grateful still, in their 30's, that they are debt-free, while most of their friends are struggling with student loans. There's no way they could have gone to exotic places like Bangkok and Sydney for semesters abroad, otherwise.

    Best of luck to Youngest! And to you, with your impending empty nest, Julia.

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    1. I'm actually looking forward to it, Karen. As I said to the girls, "How can I miss you if you won't go away?"

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  5. Congratulations ladies, what fabulous news! I hope she has the best four years ever. And I will definitely attend your college for elders with the 9:30 bedtime. Can we read in bed?

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    1. Yes, and there will be Sealy Posturerpedic mattresses for proper back support, since the administration knows we won't go crazy and try to throw them out the windows at the end of the school year.

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  6. congratulations to both of you! Looking forward to parents' weekend next fall?

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    1. I LOVE parent's weekend. Just like at the accepted students day, I am way more enthusiastic than my kid!

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    2. I was all set to attend Parents weekend at BU the fall of my older son's first year. He said, "Really, Mom?" He basically grew up hanging around campus, so he didn't care. So I didn't go...

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  7. Congrats to you both. I can vouch for the excellence of the library collection and the beauty of the campus, and the hockey games aren’t bad, either.

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    1. It was pretty even at the tail end of mud season. I can't wait to see it in the fall.

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  8. This is all so different these days. I went to college back in the day when applications weren't a big deal. Where I was going was decided by my parents, and the paperwork was minimal, sent in accompanied by a check from my parents. The tuition, private girls' school, which included residence hall, three meals a day and BOOKS (!), was $1050. A year.

    When my children went off, they applied to the nearest state university, tuition was minimal, books a bit more, and a dorm room very reasonable. I don't recall providing them with meals, but I must have.

    And no one had any post graduation debt.

    On the other hand, none of us graduated from Ivy League schools.

    I can't imagine the debt load most students face these days, terrifying. Even if they get a free ride for tuition, text books now cost thousands, and living expenses even more. I applaud your daughter, Julia, for having her act together, for earning her education through her hard word in high school, and for landing a spot in a prestigious school. You must be bursting with pride. And all of you deserve a good year. Or fifty.

    My grandson, Zach, and his wife, Alexandra, are arriving tomorrow. Ally just graduated from NYU with a masters, physician assistant. I shudder to think of the debt. Even coming out with a high paying job, still it has to be a seemingly endless burden.

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    1. Ann, part of the issue is that college tuition/room and board has increased much, much faster than inflation. It's easily outstripped stagnant wages, as well. I started Ithaca College - a private, liberal arts school - in 1979. Tuition, room and board was around $7500. According to the US Dept of Labor inflation calculator, that amount has the same buying power as $25,000 today. However, in the 2018-2019 school year coming up, tuition, room and board at IC will be a tad over $59,000. That's insane.

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    2. Also, back when we were of college age, the minimum wage was a living wage, gas was cheap and so was rent. I started college with a full academic scholarship, and $100 in my bank account. I finished--having worked minimum wage on-campus jobs for three years--with $1000 in the bank. You can't do it that way now.

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    3. My oldest graduated from high school in 1989, when a year of tuition at our local state school, University of Cincinnati, was $3,000. When my next graduated, in 2002, that same school's tuition was over $20,000 a year, and ivies were costing upwards of $35,000.

      That's an enormous increase, especially at a time when wages have been stagnant for decades.

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    4. When I went to college, my mother was making 40 bucks a week as a secretary to the president of the local bank. My dad was a school superintendent, and I am thinking that paid maybe $5000 a year. My mother's entire salary went to my tuition, so I'm guessing I went to a high priced school, now that I think about it. I had a couple of scholarships that amounted to maybe $300 a year, if that. Was glad to get them. BTW, we had indoor plumbing and electric lights. LOL

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    5. When I went to the University of California, tuition was $600 - a year!

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    6. In 1969, a month after my high school graduation, my dad died. Mother was making below $3,000 a year, as a clerk at an insurance company, and was the sole support of herself and four kids. They'd been divorced for two years, and my dad never paid child support.

      I worked, starting at the end of my freshman year of high school, to pay my own high school (Catholic) tuition of $400 a year. After graduation, I helped my mother out, and paid my own college tuition.

      Kids couldn't do that today.

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  9. This is so fabulous! this is such a joy! I love you and I love her and I love everything about this. Xxxx yaaaay

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  10. We did this at the beginning of April for DePaul in Chicago. Yes, you've pretty much summed it up.

    Us: Wow, the class sizes are awesome. You'll know your professors by name.
    Her: Meh.
    Us: ????

    Because we are Bad Parents, we were not at the Admitted Student day for Pitt. The Girl said if you committed that day, they had a cheerleading squad to cheer, they blew gold confetti over you, and took your picture in front of a giant banner.

    She did not commit that day.

    Congrats and good luck to The Youngest!

    Mary/Liz

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    1. I'm a Bad Parent, too, Mary, because this is the first one I've been to. The Smithie and the Boy had overnight visits - no parents wanted!

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    2. I think the only reason we were tolerated at DePaul was we had to drive her to Chicago!

      Mary/Liz

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  11. I had one at Barnard in NY (my alma mater) and one at Cornell (my husband's) and I do not remember Accepted Students day... maybe because they'd decided based on a prior visit and were just thrilled to be accepted to one of their top choices. I do remember first day, driving up with the car loaded... looking forward to the next chapter, zin the fall when you deliver The Youngest. But brace yourself for the summer. Mine, at least, made it very easy to embrace the emptier nest I was coming back to. But you already know about that.

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    1. God save us all from 17 and 18 year olds the summer before college. I nearly took an axe to the Boy before we dropped him off.

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    2. I have a funny feeling my summer is going to be a nightmare. She's going to be 18 and all "I can do whatever now because I'm in college" and we're going to be all "Heh, not as long as you are living under our roof and driving our car."

      Mary/Liz

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    3. It's even worse when they turn 18 before they graduate. My oldest has a November birthday. Her senior year was rough.

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  12. Oh College!! Sign me up! This weekend I am attending the 50th reunion of the class of 1968, Albertus Magnus College. I have been organizing the reunion and I could not be more excited!

    When each of my daughters went off to college, I just wanted to go with them!

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    1. You appreciate it more when you're older, Denise Ann!

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  13. Loved your commentary about your college visit. I was reminded of something when you mentioned classes for "old people". When I started college, I remember that there were some students who were "re-entry" students, meaning older than students in their late teens / early twenties. The U of Maine sounds awesome! When a relative was applying to colleges, she refused to apply to any schools with sororities / fraternities. I totally understood that! She chose one of the Seven Sisters colleges. And she loved it there.

    Starting college is so exciting!

    Great post!

    Diana

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    1. Thanks, Diana. The Smithie, obviously, went to one of the Seven Sisters and loved it. Youngest applied to one, but I think she did it more to please me than from any real enthusiasm. It's all about finding the right fit, isn't it?

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    2. Julia, yes, it is all about finding the right fit. So many wonderful opportunities out there.

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  14. I mentor an excellent young woman at Dallas' arts magnet high school, and she is going through all this choice-making process as well. Let me tell you, it is so much more agonizing than it was when I was that age! And then there is the nuance I have begun to see from the way different institutions approach her. She is black, and in her family, only her mother has attended college before. She gets great grades at one of the most highly rated high schools in Dallas. She will be an asset to any university she attends. All the colleges she applied to did a lot of initial wooing, but when it came right down to it, SMU took her on a tour of the oldest, crappiest freshman dorm on campus (not the new fancy freshman dorm) and offered her no money. TCU's school of music did a lot of serious romancing, but only came up with a 3/4 tuition offer. Baylor is offering a full ride, renewable over four years. She decides on Wednesday, but I'm betting we'll be saying, "Go Bears!"

    As for me, I totally want to go to Julia's college for adults, assuming I can ever afford to retire and spend time on that kind of thing. What a great idea!

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    1. Glad she got a good offer from Baylor! Did she try any of the historically black colleges? I've read that enrollment is up at HBC in part because of the sort of issues you describe.

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  15. I wish I had the opportunity to have done this! Not one of my 5 kids wanted to go to college! I, on the other hand, still want to go at age 58! I
    Great popovers, huh? Did you get he recipe?

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    1. No, but next time I'm u time I'm up, I'll ask. I have a feeling the recipe will begin "Take 5 lbs of flour..."

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  16. So excited for Youngest, Julia! And for you--because she can't really comprehend the magnitude of graduating debt-free in this day and age. And we are old enough to appreciate the programs and the comfy chairs compared to what was on offer in our college days. Best wishes for Youngest! And for you (just mutter under your breath 'it's only three months...summer's only three months...').

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    1. And she will have a job and an internship, so at least she'll be out of the house!

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  17. Any chance I can sign up? Sounds fabulous! And debt-free??? Whoa.

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    1. I know, right? She's fretting a little because so many of her friends are headed out of state, but I've told her she will be a lot happier at the end of her four years then her friends will be when they start getting their loan payment notices.

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  18. Your day sounds fabulous!

    I never heard of Accepted Students Day before this post. There certainly was nothing like that back in 1964 when I started college, but then in order to keep costs down I attended a Community College (we called it Jr. college back then) for two years and got a lot of the tough required courses out of the way so at "real" college I could focus on my major requirements. I was lucky, I came out with no debt, but back then there wasn't so much cost.

    The one thing I have long wish is that I had been a little more mature and really taken advantage of college and all it offered, instead of only doing what it took to get Bs and graduate.

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    1. Rick, that's a great way to get your degree, and one that's increasingly popular. Here in Maine, the community colleges have experienced a huge boom in enrollment, as the system allows for a seamless transfer of all credits to one of the state's four year universities.

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  19. Julia, congrats to Youngest!! Full tuition is such a HUGE thing, and the school sounds fabulous. I hope she appreciates it as much as you would:-)

    And whatever will you do with your time when she goes off at the end of summer? (Hint, hint.)

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  20. Congrats to the youngest, Julia! I will definitely attend your college as long as there is time off for physical therapy and doctor's appointments!

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  21. YAY! Congratulations, Youngest (and Mom)!!! I'm hyperventilating on the "debt free". The Hooligans are lovely human beings (mostly) but this is not their path. :( When people ask why I write so much? College. *sigh* If I want them out debt free, it will come out of my hide well the hide off the tips of my fingers. LOL. Oh, and I loved this:
    "As an aside, they should make a college for old people. It would be all about the academics, which we're finally mature enough to want to focus on, with a really good dining hall and ergonomically correct study carrels. Bedtime at 9:30, strictly enforced." I would be such a better student now that my frontal lobe is fully engaged. Just sayin'.

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  22. Congrats to both of you. Very interesting to get both of your perspectives on the day, too, even if hers were filtered through you.

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    1. We might do a hers and hers reflection on the last summer together in August, Mark. That way, we get her fair share as well!

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  23. Hooray for another UMaine student. I loved my time there. And that was before Alfond Arena and the hockey team. I was there with Stephen King though. Congratulations to your offspring and her mother.

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    1. The Alfond Arena is really first class, isn't it? I was impressed by the whole campus.

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  24. Congrats!! I’m ready to sign up for grown up college with you!

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  25. Big congratulations to G! The Honors College sounds like a wonderful fit for your brilliant and engaging youngest, and as you say, its far enough away from Southern Maine to give her plenty of elbow room when she wants it. Hooray for her.

    Your friends will be here for you during her "senior summer, a phrase my nephews used to excuse all nature of hijinks, and in September, when you will have the nest all to yourself. Hot baths when you want. Eat when and what you want for dinner. No more coordinating your plans with your kids' need for rides.

    Is that your delirious laugh I hear?

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    1. It is! And I love the phrase "Senior Summer." Now I know what to call it.

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  26. While I am glad that your Youngest found her college and got in, I never had to worry about that kind of thing.

    Despite taking what is probably now laughably considered "college prep" courses when I was in high school, I knew all along that I wouldn't be going to college.

    Besides the financial considerations, by the time I was a senior in high school, I'd had enough of school. I worked from the time I was 14 and knew I wasn't going to waste my parent's money on going to college. I went to work and started coaching "full-time" (coached from the time I was 14) after I graduated.

    Just how the cookie crumbles. Despite what some people like to feed others, not everyone is cut out for college. I knew I wasn't.

    My sister went though and from all accounts had a good time on her way to graduating.

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  27. Julia, we enjoyed parent's weekend at our daughter's college so much that after she graduated we used to think they should let us volunteer as honorary parents for students whose parents lived on the other side of the country (or the world). Of course this was Middlebury College in Vermont(where she did not graduate debt free!) and the housing for families was at the lovely Breadloaf Campus in the mountains with gorgeous fall scenery and the occasional moose accompanying you on a trip down the mountain. (there was a moose who liked to chase cars). I think we had more fun than she did.

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  28. And do ell her to go to class. Seriously. I often didn't, and I regret it!

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  29. I got through Shippensburg State College with a small scholarship and a PHEAA loan. At the time they gave you a year interest free to pay the loan off. Since I got hired at the bank when I went in to the loan paperwork, my parents and I paid the loan off in a year. My brother went to University of Miami for a year since he thought he would be a marine biologist. When he realized he didn't have the grades to go out on the boats, he switched to business administration. Mom said you can do that at Shippensburg. His one year in Miami cost more than my four at Shippensburg!

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  30. Wow! Debt free and college graduate aren't often seen in the same sentence these days. I'm pretty much blown away by that, even though my daughter graduated from college only owing a few thousand and paid that off the first year she was out. I think son owes about 6 grand more. I remember the college visits being fun and enjoying all the hokey stuff, too.

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  31. Congrats on you both finding the best of all possible worlds: a great education and the ability to avoid financial ruin. 😆 And YES! to college for us "old folks"! Am I showing my age by admitting that I now know what is meant by "youth is wasted on the young"?

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