It’s that time of year.  The energy of the new school year has faded, and first quarter grades are out.  Do they meet the expectations of you as a parent, and of your child?  Despite what may sometimes look like evidence to the contrary, most children and teens really want to do well in school.  Many of them are more capable than it appears.  So what’s getting in the way?  It could be a lack of sense of purpose, or perhaps not being able to manage time, or not knowing how to study for tests and navigate other educational tasks.  Would you like to have someone to work individually with your child to get him or her on track to success?  Consider a free one hour consultation with SupportEd.  It could make the whole family happier.

If you answered “yes” to that question, how about these?

Where will my child attend college?

Where do we begin to look?

Is s/he ready?

How will we get through all of the paperwork?

What tests and other requirements do different colleges have for admission?

Does s/he need an interview?

How important is the college essay?

What’s the difference between Early Decision and Early Action?

What are the deadlines?

How does s/he find scholarships?

How do we apply for financial aid?

Linda Barnes of SupportEd. is a licensed guidance counselor who can work with your child individually to answer all of these questions and more.  College is a huge investment, so finding the right fit is more important than ever.

Contact Linda at lindabarnes@supportedllc.com of (802) 578-7023.  Spaces are filling up fast!

The United States was rocked to its core by the attacks of 9/11.  It was horror beyond imagination.  Yet years later, we are experiencing the escalation of Americans being “terrorized” right here in our free country.  It is becoming apparent that although we are free to go where we please, at any moment we could be subject to a senseless, violent, heinous act of terror.  At school, work, in a shopping mall, in the movie theater.

How can this be happening?  Does anyone notice when something is about to go so terribly wrong that another citizen is making a plan to shoot at innocent people?  It’s not just a question of guns.  It’s so much bigger than that.  A focus on guns is misguided, and has everyone in the country arguing about the wrong problem.   Though I have never touched a gun and never hope to do so, I grew up in an era when my father had guns, and there were guns in nearly every pickup truck of my high school parking lot.  No one worried for their safety.

I boldly suggest that one of the biggest problems is that people are becoming “disconnected” from real live human contact.  Not only is no one noticing individuals going so far astray, but no one who has true human connections could take the lives of other humans.

It seems as though we are all in terrible danger.  Now our enemies are not only beyond our borders; our enemies are an American culture full of excess, self-absorption, out-of-control media messages, loneliness and despair.  Our enemies are apathy and desensitization to violence.  How can we not be outraged?  We are not free as long as there are people in our country who feel that they are free not only to carry weapons but to open fire at will.

It’s not just on television and in the newspaper.   In a very real way, we could be terrorized anywhere, at any moment.  This mortal danger is around the corner, beyond the next door that we open.  The senseless killing is real, and it is not just happening in far away countries.  We need to work together to find a way to reconnect as humans and take back our country, a country that is truly the land of the free, where every human being is treated like a true human being.

In our current age of technology, we find many people, particularly adolescents, rapt in their laptops, cell phones, and video games.  Does “screen time” diminish the amount of time available for reading?  Does it diminish the desire to read?  Reading is a critical skill to master and retain.

Even as I write this blog, I am cautious of its length, knowing that many people will not read beyond the first paragraph.  Please read a little further.  Dana Gioia, former Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts had this to say about reading in 2006.

“Franz Kafka once said that the book is the axe by which we break open the frozen seas within us. That metaphor is very true. We tend, by our very nature, to be encased in our own egos. What literature does – nowhere more powerfully than in fiction (the novel and the short story) – is put us in the inner lives of other people in the dailyness of their psychological, social, economic and imaginative existence. This makes us feel, more intensely probably than anything else, the reality of other points of view, of other lives. That is obviously in jeopardy if we now have a society in which the majority of adults are no longer reading.”

Think about it.  Not only does reading build vocabulary, enhance creativity, develop confidence, increase knowledgeability and improve our ability to find new solutions, reading has a major impact on who we are in the world, and who we become as a society.

 

 

 

 

Are you the parent of a high school junior with college looming on the horizon?

Don’t know where to begin?

Don’t know how you are going to get your child to complete the requirements?

Thinking about a competitive college?

Consider SupportEd!

During your free consultation, I will help you determine what your child needs – college search, walking through application completion, college essay writing, SAT or ACT preparation, college interview preparation, scholarship search.  Then we will set up an individualized plan and  schedule that works for your child, and we could be finished before senior year begins!