Mother Knows Best: Parents’ Takes on the College Process

Editors Note: A fragment from the original article was removed due to a misinformed interview source.

High school, college, and everything in between.

Though this point in students’ lives is seen as the juncture at which students assert their realized independence and handle their own affairs, in such a high-stakes academic environment like Stuyvesant, the parents in the community are more than just involved. Most parents play a large part in their children’s education and the direction it may head beyond graduation. Acceptance to Stuyvesant is an achievement celebrated by families across the city, but the focus often shifts quickly to something bigger: college admissions.

Li Xiao, freshman Ian Buchanan’s mother, has been proactive in assuming the responsibility of gathering information on future steps for Buchanan to ensure his academic success leading to senior year. “I have been trying to join all of the informational calls provided by Stuy [...] about college admissions to U.S. schools and also international schools [...] to get information to prepare what we need to do within freshman and sophomore [year],” Xiao said. “It’s hard to have a total comprehension of what’s coming up in two years, but in general I would say [by senior year], Ian will have already established a strong interest in one area.”

This awareness and involvement seem to lead to an unspoken agreement within the Stuyvesant community; college planning starts long before junior year, and professional development, such as resume planning, often starts as early as freshman year.

The calls Xiao attended suggested that college admissions have shifted priorities in recent years to focus on student interests and development rather than standardized testing. “Nowadays, a trend in colleges is that [...] SAT scores are not required,” she said. “You can tell that the admissions officer[s] don’t want a kid just checking the boxes. They want to see kids really work on their own interests and try to create something.”

Parents’ diligence may be related to their feelings that Stuyvesant isn’t offering college preparation early enough. “I think that that’s a missed opportunity for Stuy. How do we get all Stuy students, well in advance—ninth, 10th grade—thinking about strategies for applying to college?” Mona Bijoor, sophomore Jaya Bijoor’s mother, asked.

Bijoor proposed the idea of starting a club in order to introduce underclassmen to the college process earlier, hopefully pushing students to start working on resumes and applications in their freshman and sophomore years. “A club that would prepare you, right off the bat, in ninth grade, to start even just putting a draft of your resume together. Even if it has nothing on it, it would at least be so powerful, because it kind of says, ‘OK, I need to fill this page,’” she said.

For the most part, parents are also well aware of the pressure that comes along with being surrounded by passionate students who are all competing for the same colleges. “It’s totally toxic [...] You end up just [loading] up your day with classes and work, and you literally don’t have free time for yourself. And not only that, you worry about your GPA,” Xiao said. “So you just have to maybe balance your kids a little bit, [to not take] too many crazy courses.”

Xiao acknowledges the influence that she has on her son but hopes to serve as a guiding force rather than a decision-maker. “Inevitably, at home, everybody would say, ‘Oh, I’d like you to stay in the U.S. [...] It would be interesting if you could [be an] entrepreneur.’ Those comments inevitably come from parents at the dining table or just casually. He definitely hears, but I really think he has to find his own interests,” Xiao said. “I’m trying to gather information on summer [internships], anything, just have him do it [...] and try to give him chances.”

Even parents who have past experience in specialized high schools, such as Darius Nemati, senior Francesca Nemati’s parent and a Bronx Science alumnus, are sympathetic to the modern process, which seems to be very different from that of years past. “There are more opportunities now but a lot more work for the college application than in my time,” Darius Nemati said.

He found the process at Bronx Science to be more streamlined and is critical of the college office at Stuyvesant. “Our college guidance counselors [at Bronx Science] were a lot more helpful than what I have seen at Stuyvesant,” he said. However, he found value in the process at Stuyvesant in other ways, specifically noting the seminars by the Parents’ Association.

A similar sentiment was echoed by Bijoor. Though she applauded the variety of extracurricular activities at Stuyvesant, she believes that the counseling department is often overwhelmed and subsequently unable to provide individual attention to students. “[There’s a] lack of communication and lack of resources, and I don’t think the guidance counselors really talk to the kid proactively until they have to, because they’re stretched so thin.”

Like Xiao, Todd Kaloudis, junior Hana Kaloudis’s father, noted the challenge parents face in adjusting to their children’s needs while also letting their children take charge. “It’s a very slippery slope. I think some parents do this or may be tempted to––they sort of feel the responsibility themselves through their children to think about college,” Todd Kaloudis said. “I don’t think it’s healthy for parents or their kids to go into high school thinking the goal is just to get into college. That may be one of the goals, absolutely, but it’s important to grow as a person in high school and to enjoy the journey, which is definitely going to be different for each student.”

Darius Nemati agreed and placed an emphasis on the fact that his primary goal is for his daughter to be happy. “I just hope she is happy wherever she ends up going,” he said. “We are not overbearing. We are not pushing her to do anything she doesn’t want to do.”