Fifth Form and their families kick off college application journey

Fifth Form families gathered on the Circle February 2 to 4 for Groton School’s annual Kickoff to College Counseling event, marking the informal start of the college application process for their students. 

More than sixty families joined College Counseling Office staff for the event, which included workshops and panel discussions, a keynote speaker, one-on-one meetings with counselors, and lunch with Headmaster Temba Maqubela.

Groton students meet with the College Counseling Office in the spring of their Fourth Form year to look ahead at courses they might want to take, but the college application process begins in earnest with the Fifth Form. After the Kickoff event, counselors will have regular meetings throughout the rest of the year to get to know students better, learn what they’re looking for in a college, and start building an initial list of potential targets. 

The support follows through to Sixth Form, as students complete their applications and start thinking about things like early decision and financial aid. 

Kickoff workshops focused on such topics as Putting Together an Application and Making the Most of the College Visit. In addition, current Sixth Formers CJ Armaly (who acted as emcee), Kritika Aryal, Sheena Bakare, Afrika Gaye, Arjun Ray, and Ellie Smith shared their advice on how parents could best support their students during the college search process in a special “Lessons Learned” panel discussion.

Friday night’s keynote speaker was Doug Christiansen PhD, Vanderbilt University’s vice provost for University Enrollment Affairs and dean of Admissions and Financial Aid. Before his presentation, Dr. Christiansen said the key to a successful college application experience is balancing support for your student with empowerment of them. 

“I hope parents understand how important it is to let their child be empowered. This is one of the first major decisions their student is going to make, and they’re part of it,” he explained. “It is a student decision, but a family discussion.”

Parents, while well-intentioned, can sometimes add anxiety to the admissions process by having outsize expectations of what’s realistic or right for their students, Dr. Christiansen added.

“Parents can be part of the hysteria that happens in the admissions process,” he said, “and we need them to step back.” 

Approaching the decision-making process without focusing solely on outcome can help take some pressure off a student, Dr. Christiansen said, as can scheduling designated times to talk about college.

“From a mental health perspective, I tell parents all the time—and I’ve been doing this for thirty-four years—‘Plan a time.’ Once every two weeks, spend a half hour and talk about your process. 

“If you’re talking about it every second, then it starts to become adversarial. Not in a bad way, but it starts to become, ‘I don't want to talk about college. It’s stress.’”

Dr. Christiansen said events like Groton’s Kickoff not only help parents better understand the process, but also their place in it. 

“Parents want the best for their child, but sometimes they don’t know what best is,” he said. “And so having professional people like Peter [Newcomb, Groton’s director of College Counseling] and others that are able to help say, ‘It’s going to all work out. Your kids are going to go to college’ really helps.”