During the college admissions process, families are managing uncertainty, not simply making educational decisions. Adding complexity, parents and teenagers often approach dealing with ambiguity from two different time horizons.
Parents often approach college planning from a long-term perspective, what Lewis Lapham called, “the wisdom of earned experience”. Parents may act based on regrets of missed opportunities, wanting something different for their children. Many worry how today’s choices will more likely result in future economic stability.
Teenagers, however, often prioritize more immediate concerns, still developing their unique identity. They’re unsure which choices are right for themselves, so choose to not “stand out” from their peers.
Parents may be frustrated, concluding a teen “lacks motivation”, when they disengage from conversations about their future. Yet, students may be protecting themselves from imagining a future which seems out of reach.
Thus, families are attempting to answer complicated, emotional questions, during the college admissions process, such as:
– What educational choice, in major, in campus, will more likely create financial security?
– How do we define “success”?
– How much uncertainty is acceptable?
– Is the student ready to make independent choices?
As such, families sometimes select colleges less because of institutional fit and more because the institution symbolically resolves anxiety, a deeply human choice. Thus, many students may struggle in the first two years of college while transitioning from externally defined achievement toward internally owned direction.
At the heart of the college admissions process, families are seeking to help a young person navigate the uncertainty that adulthood inevitably entails. Yet, defining such a unique path often is messy and fraught with emotion, which ironically, is the “earned experience” that teens need, long after graduation.
Creative Marbles was founded by teachers who appreciate helping students (re)discover their aptitude, first in the academic classroom, now as part of the complex college admissions process. For more information, please contact us.
