Todays Wall Street Journal’s article “ For High Schoolers, Summer Is Time To Polish Résumés:”(subscription required) is not news to those of you who have high schoolers. For me – this is scary and expensive! The article highlights what I’ve already heard around town. Super-achieving teens need to polish their elite college applications with psuedo-volunteer trips. Mind you, these are not real missions trips – they are trips where kids pay $7000 or more to bike the alps, kayak in the South China Sea or explore the Great Barrier Reef. Of course they spend a few days, or hours – painting schools, playing with children, cleaning up poor neighborhoods to rake up those community service hours.
I’m beginning to learn the college application game. My friends tell me I must start now (my son is in 7th grade). First, I need to buff up his summer resume by working on his foreign languages and get him “used to community service”. By 8th grade I need to have his entire summer mapped out – maybe a semi-rugged bicycle tour of the Canadian Rockies, or an adventure trip hiking and rafting the Grand Canyon. It can fun, but it’s time to show character building summers. By 9th grade, I better start interviewing PSAT prep firms, and narrow down my $25,000 college admission counselor. Than in 10th, it is full-court press – every minute, every activity, every move planned until ADMISSION day.
This new plan casts a new light on my summer hopes. I was hoping my son could spend his summer on the church youth group mission trip to Voice of Calvary and really learn to care and serve those in need. If time permitted he could attend Worldview Academy and began to build a Christian worldview that would serve him in college and beyond. Of course, I hoped he would earn some spending money and learn the value of work at the local grocery store (baggers are hired at 14). – that would help in the character building department. Then, there is the pool, town baseball, chores around the house and family vacation. These are our summer dreams.
Ramping up his spiritual, physical and academic resume for college admission is going to take some work. I was hoping that during the year, he would remain involved in the church and the church youth group, attending Bible study and youth missions activities. In town, he would continue working toward Eagle Scout with his Boy Scout troop – helping out with regular community service. Baseball and basketball, whether intramural or local would fill his physical exercise requirements. Studying hard, refining research skills, loving his learning would round him out academically. Most of all – he would seek the Lord’s will for his every minute, every activity, every move.
As for college admissions – we would seek God’s will, apply to the schools that seem best, and trust God. I wonder if God only works through College Admissions Counselors????
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