We got two strange letters in the mail this week with regard to my
daughter’s college applications. We still will not know which colleges
have accepted her until 1 April. While we are in the unpleasant wait-and-see
period between sending everything in and hearing back, there are still small
communications with the nine schools considering Jessica.
The first odd letter was from Rice University. Jessica and I visited Houston
18-21 January (last weekend). On Tuesday, 23 January, we received our Rice
campus visit package. It had been mailed on 10 January. Our visit certainly
would have felt friendlier and more directed if we had gotten the package
before we left. I now understand some of the Admissions secretary’s
confusion when we arrived in her office asking basic questions. Oh well.
The second strange letter was from Jessica’s high school: it contained her first
Senior semester grade report. Since these grades are the last that colleges will
see before they make their acceptance decisions, they are important. We
were very surprised to see an “I” for Incomplete instead of the “A” she was told
she had in English. I got to practice deep calming breaths while Jessica worked
with the high school administration to sort out the grades and reinstate her “A”.
All is well now.
I am reminded of a story I heard when I was a Sophomore
at the University of California, Santa Barbara. My undergraduate transfer to U.C.
Berkeley had been accepted at the same time that a dorm-hall friend had been
accepted to U.C. Berkeley’s graduate school in Chemistry. He went to the UCSB
Chemistry department office for his Senior transcript review only to find that a
whole year of upper division Chemistry class credits had been dropped from his
record and replaced with a year of Sociology credits. The department secretary
explained that my friend couldn’t graduate because he hadn’t met the requirements.
He said he would rather commit murder than take one more undergraduate class.
They came to an understanding; his upper division Chemistry class credits were
restored and he was graduated on time with honors.
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