Parents, imagine you’d spent three years working on a challenging project at work that, if successful, would lead to a promotion to your dream job. The success or failure of the project would be viewed by your co-workers, family and friends as a measurement of your job performance. And the bosses who would judge your final product would do so without ever having actually met you. They’d make their decision based almost entirely on a written summary, never having the chance to work along side you and see for themselves the effort you were putting in.
This is a lot like what the college admissions process is like for kids.
Whether you have a freshman just starting out or a senior who’s getting admissions news, go a little easy on your kids when it comes to their high school careers and their college admissions results. I’m not suggesting that you shouldn’t have high expectations. But it’s hard for kids to have their high school careers judged by strangers who use criteria that are sometimes vague at best.
Remind your kids that you care much more about the effort they put forth and the way they treat people than you do about their GPA, SAT score or admissions results.