A Letter to Parents

After more than twenty years of experience in college counseling, I still marvel at the ways in which the college process can stir up even the healthiest families. In the process of helping your son or daughter negotiate this important passage toward independence, you have the unenviable task of walking a tightrope. On the one hand, your child clearly needs your support, and – despite attempts to convince you otherwise – he or she also needs your wisdom.

Only you know your child’s educational history and have a complete picture of his or her personal strengths and vulnerabilities. And yet, because the college process coincides with a growing need for independence, your son or daughter may sometimes make you feel that you are needed only for your car and your checkbook!

It is a difficult tightrope indeed, and it is important to remember that – while your role in the college admissions process is invaluable – you must avoid influencing decisions based on your own needs, preferences, and experiences. One common but dangerous pitfall is for parents to revisit their own disappointments and/or successes through their child; another is to view the college process as a “report card” on the quality of their own parenting. These and other agendas sometimes find their way into the process, and they can surely muddy the waters for an adolescent. Even if you have negotiated this process several times before with older siblings, you cannot assume that the course of events will be the same this time. Every child is unique.

This is a critical time for adolescents to define themselves as separate beings and to explore their own ideas about the future. Parents whose voices are too loud or too dominant rob their children of this rite of passage to adulthood. Such parents can also hinder their children’s effectiveness at interviewing and essay writing, for until young people give thought and voice to their own ideas, they will have a hard time persuading college admissions committees of their identities as individuals.

The role of an effective counselor is to make certain that the student takes ownership of the process in a reasoned manner. In my efforts to be that effective counselor, I am happy to check in with you about how things are going, but I will work most closely with your son or daughter. I will try to get to know your child well and to arm him or her with current information about colleges and about the process. I will aim to help your son or daughter make healthy decisions based on realistic needs and well-thought-out goals. The theme that guides my work is “College is a match to be made, not a prize to be won.”

The college process is far more difficult to negotiate now than it was when many of us applied a generation ago. In fact, it is substantially more difficult than it was even ten years ago. I cannot promise that your son’s or daughter’s experience will be without difficulties or disappointments. I can only promise that he or she will have a close partner with whom to share the experience, and that I will help your family walk the tightrope.