The Admissions Blog with Bridget and John

Fall is here

 

             I could pretend that we are still in July. I could ignore the calendar, and force myself into the unrealistic world that summer lasts forever. This morning I realized it would take much more than ignorance of the month and day to make this charade work. On Friday, the St. Lawrence Admissions Office hosted a very successful Visit Day. Campus looked great and the weather was perfect, if not a little warm. If I had just considered the weather it was easily still summer. But as I hugged our tour guides and watched our teams begin pre-season practices, my heart told me what I didn’t want to believe. Summer is over, fall is here.

There have been other signs as well. The tree photographed is directly in front of the admissions office, and while I would like to tell you it is an anomaly, it is not. Trees throughout the ADK and the North Country are bursting into brilliance. Yesterday, I watched a doe with her twin fawns munch grass near the gates to Fort Drum. If I hadn’t looked so closely I would have just thought it was three deer congregating. But after closer inspection, the two smaller deer, and only slightly so, still had shadows of their spots; ghostly reminders of how quickly they grow. My dog’s coat is a bit thicker than it was a few weeks ago and, like her. I grabbed the blanket from the foot of my bed this weekend. In Canton, fall likes to trick you with warm sunny days that could help you live in the fantasy world of summer, but the nights cool off quickly enough that you start driving around with a sweatshirt in your car. Finally, an email that open skate is available at the rink. A true harbinger of winter!

For me the end of summer brings a few traditions. The first is the Great New York State Fair. Although, I haven’t been able to attend every year I enjoy being regaled with stories from my mom and her siblings who go together every year. Imagine for a moment a tradition that started by loading small children into vans and Suburbans, now is three siblings and their significant others loading themselves into a van or Suburban with the last few teen children or nieces and nephews, if they feel like going. In our family, the season has changed as well. The majority of us our on the other side of high school, so late summer comes with an urgency back to school for most, back on the road for me.

The second tradition is a relatively new one. It begins with emails, attempts from my friends to schedule an event between September and December. They ask for my available dates. When they receive these, they call me up making sure they are correct and ask questions like “Wait, where are you on the 19^th of October? But I thought you said you would be in Hartford, Providence, Westchester?" The cities may change but the fact that I am not home does not. To circumvent the phone calls and frustrations I now send out schedules to my closest friends and family. It lists the city names and dates I will be there. My parents very much appreciate this and kindly thank me. However, my friends are whipped into a tizzy. How can you be in Salt Lake City on Sunday and Hartford on Monday…um it is called a plane!? For most of them fall begins when they get there wool sweaters out.  While spring may be the season of new beginnings, I would confide it is my belief it is Fall when a true journey always begins. A new school year, a new adventure, the realization that while you may have left the lazy days of summer behind, the true excitement awaits right ahead.

Life here in Canton, NY to Ottawa, Ontario!

Hello everyone!

If you visited the admissions office this summer, you most likely had a campus tour led by one of our six wonderful Summer Interns. They have been very busy in the office these past few weeks! In addition to giving tours to prospective students and families, they are all keeping themselves busy answering e-mails and writing letters to those of you who have expressed an interest in St. Lawrence. You can see some of our interns hard at work below.  They even keep tallies on a poster of how many e-mails and letters they have written to students throughout the summer!

If you have questions about SLU, don’t hesitate to e-mail one of our interns or your admissions counselor.

Our interns also facilitated an Online Chat last week (and have another one on the 19^th of August.) We had several rising high school seniors log on and chat with our interns about everything from campus life to athletics to different majors and minors offered. If you can’t make it to campus for a visit, try to make it to one of our chats! It is the best way to get a current student’s perspective on their St. Lawrence experience without actually visiting campus. We will be having online chats throughout the Fall. Check the website frequently for updated times.

We do manage to have some fun around here – at the end of July we had an office-wide barbecue! There is a barbecue pit on campus (which was donated by the Class of 2005 as their senior gift to the university) next to the senior townhouses and the golf course. The barbecue pit is a great place for students to take a break from the Dining Halls on campus and enjoy the nice weather.

You can see in this picture Caitlin Malloy (center),one of our six interns, brought a book on Astrology and read all of our horoscopes once we finished eating. 

 

Here are some more photos we took during the barbecue (you can see the senior townhouses in the background):

 

Last week, I took our six interns to Ottawa for the day! Due to its close proximity to campus, our students, faculty and staff frequently pay visits to Ottawa.  (It only takes 1.5 hours to get to downtown Ottawa from Canton—you will need a passport or a birth certificate to cross the border). If you attend St. Lawrence, I can guarantee at least one of your classes will involve a field trip to Ottawa. 

Here is a picture of our six interns in a St. Lawrence van (which student groups can also rent our for trips) on the way to Ottawa:   

If you have not been to Ottawa, it is a “must do” if you visit campus and have time to make the jaunt. As you can see in the pictures, we hit the highlights of the city, visited Parliament Hill, The Canadian Museum of Civilization, and had a great dinner in the bustling Byward Market. 

For dessert, we treated ourselves to “Beaver Tails” – a Canadian specialty! They are delicious – fried dough shaped like a beaver’s tail and topped with anything you’d like…but the classic beaver tail has maple syrup and chocolate on top. Read Blake Carbone's blog for more highlights of our trip!

That’s all for now…be sure to take some time out to relax before school starts!

          -- John

A Blog for Parents

A blog for parents

It may be hard to believe but that child who you swaddled, whose scraped knees you kissed, and who ate you out of house and home is ready to leave the nest.  First let me commend you, as a recovering teenager, for helping them get this far.  However, now it is their time to shine.  For many students this is the first time they will make a decision or have a decision made for them in which you have little or no control.  As a parent, learning to let go is your mission for the college process.

You must let go of what YOU think is best and allow your child to choose what is best for them.  In the many years you have counseled, consoled, and reminded they have learned from you.  I promise, even though they still leave the milk on the counter and haven’t figured out how to clean their room, they are able to make good decisions for themselves.  When your student brings you to a college campus, allow them to experience it.  If it is your alma mater leave time after the official tour to take your son or daughter back out and reminisce but allow them just to be anyone’s child on the tour.  If you dislike the school, bite your tongue until the car and let your child express their feelings and then be diplomatic - -remember you don’t have to go to that school, they do!

You must let go of who YOU think your child is and let them be themselves.  The best interviews, essays, and short answers come from students who haven’t been coached or controlled into writing or saying what you think a college office wants to hear but who POP from the page by expressing their very individuality.   Leave your numbers and stats at home, let your student speak for themselves and then you may gush a bit when you talk to an admissions counselor but remember you are biased!  They will know what school and program is a good fit for them.  However, ask them the good questions - -Have you thought about what it will be like to take a bus from class to class?  Your teachers always recommend you speak up more in class, are you sure you want to go to a school where the classes are discussion based?

You don’t have to let go… yet!  Use the next few college visits to bond with your child or your family.  Stop along the way at farmers’ markets, a national forest, or a family member’s home.   Turn off the cell phones, the i Pods, the DVD players and talk…about nothing or about everything.  Offer to allow your child to play their music for the whole car and then play yours. Bond over this life changing experience with your child, because it probably will be the last time you have their undivided attention.  Soon jobs, families, and adult responsibilities will be crowding their lives, too, and a scenic trip through the country to look at the amazing variety of colleges and universities will be out of the question.   In a past blog, I mentioned that my grandfather accompanied me on a few of my college visits.  To be honest, he was there as a buffer so that my mother and I didn’t leave one another on the side of the road, however it worked out perfectly.  He asked those hard questions without me feeling like a parent was judging my decisions.  Think about bringing a grandparent, older sibling, or your sibling on this adventure with you.    My memories of college visits are not just of the campuses I visited but of laughter, Dixieland jazz, and my grandfather (pops) telling my mother to relax!   So in his timeless way, may I pass his advice to you.  Relax…the college process does not last forever (although it may feel like it) and you may miss it when it’s gone!