Greenwich Education Group

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Teen Perspective: Preparing for those first few weeks

Aug 7

Posted by GreenwichEdGrp in Secondary Education | No Comments

Last year, I found myself in a bit of a pickle.  I had just started off at a new school, and things didn’t seem to be going the way I had expected they would.  I found myself taking classes where I felt confused and out of place, surrounded by people who I didn’t know.  I was close to panic.  However, with some effort, I was ultimately able to iron out most of the issues that were giving me a hard time, and I found that if I had taken certain steps sooner, I wouldn’t have had to implement them later, once I was already having problems.  Now, I’ve made the transition into a new high school twice, and I’ve figured out a few things anyone can do preemptively to make sure those first few weeks run smoothly.

1.  Review your schedule.  These classes are why you’re in school, after all.  Actively participate in selecting the courses you’ll be taking, specifically electives, choosing ones that interest you and that will continue to catapult you forward in meeting your academic goals.  Another thing to pay attention to is that many schools offer multiple levels of the same course, especially in core subjects such as math and science.  Make sure you’re placed in the right level right off the bat, especially if you want to take a higher-level course, as these classes may fill up quickly.  In my experience, it’s a good idea to challenge yourself, but know your limits.  Make sure you know any guidelines for add/drop periods or switching course levels.  If a class doesn’t feel right within the first few weeks, don’t panic.  Talk with the teacher or the head of the department.  Clearly identify what the issue is and concrete steps that you and the school can implement to help.  Push to address your concerns earlier rather than later, because that is the time when there is the most room for course adjustments, should that step become necessary.  By the first month, your schedule should be solidified and serving you well!

2.  Build a support system within your school community.  This is something that I have found especially crucial to establish at a new school, but it’s important to assess yours regardless of how long you’ve been at your current institution.  This should ideally consist of a variety of people that can help fulfill your social and emotional needs, relationships based off of mutual respect.  It’s often even more beneficial if one or several of those people are trusted adults. Last year, mine consisted of my friends, teachers, and dorm faculty, to name a few.  Many students also find it helpful to get to know the people who work in their school’s health services department.  This can be a good place to go if you aren’t feeling well, physically or emotionally, as there are trained professionals to help you get back on track.  Also, don’t be afraid to go to study skills or look into tutoring programs.  With a network of people on your side, you’ll always have someone to help catch you should you stumble and fall.

3.  Get involved outside of class.  Being probably one of the least-sporty people I know, I didn’t expect to find myself on any sort of school team, but that’s exactly what I found when I joined Theater Tech with a friend.  It was a great way to help the school community by building sets for the dramatic productions and a great way to make new friends.  Opportunities to find one’s niche are often plentiful, especially at the beginning of the year, when everyone is in the same boat and looking for fun stuff to do and a place to belong.  Some ideas of how to come across and take advantage of these opportunities can include pursuing an interest or sport that you already love, trying something you’ve always wanted to try, or following a friend to his or her clubs for a week.  It’s important to balance schoolwork with recreation and community service.  When I found this equilibrium, I felt like a cheerier individual overall, and the skills I learned in extracurriculars, such as constructively contributing ideas to a group, improved my performance in the classroom as well.

These simple steps can go a long way into smoothing the transition from summer into the school year.  With classes suited to your abilities and interests, people that will support you in your endeavors, and activities to balance work with fun, you’ll probably be off to a great start.

I wish all my readers a fun end-of-vacation and the best of luck with the upcoming school year.

Summer Education

Jul 18

Posted by GreenwichEdGrp in College, Learning | No Comments

To this young student, summer vacation seems an odd time to write a post about that somewhat lofty ideal, education.  After all, this is the time when all such ‘educational’ matters get pushed aside in favor of, to put it bluntly, lazier pursuits.  One good friend of mine went so far as to have a notebook burning, where we made a bonfire piled high with a year’s worth of composition books (filled with cramped and harried handwriting) and roasted marshmallows.

However, I nevertheless find myself employed thusly, and so will make do with what I have.  Which, upon thinking about it at some length, seems far more plentiful than it might first have appeared.  One of the greatest things about this season is that it lends itself to choice, and, by proxy, decision making.  The list of activities that young people participate in during the summer seems endless.  From summer school to sports teams to arts classes to volunteer work to lying out on the beach, everyone’s schedule seems different.  But it seems to me that regardless of what a young person does with his or her summer, a great amount of learning is going on.  From the academic disciplines to artistic pursuits and growth in the social realm, summer is a time of education, albeit perhaps of a different sort than during the school year.

Before I continue further on this subject, I’d like to briefly introduce myself.  My name is Ashley Lilien, I am fifteen years old, and I will be attending The Masters School this fall, starting my junior year.  Over the course of my high school career, I have also attended Greenwich High School and The Hotchkiss School.  I enjoy reading, singing, acting, art class (which I have somewhat of a love/hate relationship with), volunteering in various capacities, and, of course, writing.  My hair has been brown, blonde, red, purple, pink, green, and two shades of blue.  I’m very excited to have this opportunity to explore the world of education through the written word, and perhaps impart some kind of insight based on my perspective, although I’ll also attempt to be funny in case you really can’t get much else of value from a view through the eyes of an undoubtedly angsty high schooler.

I have done many things with my summers over the past two years.  The summer after ninth grade, I attended a summer arts camp in New Milford, Connecticut, called Buck’s Rock. Currently, I am participating in the Acting Intensive program at SUNY Purchase and I am also writing for Greenwich Education Group and volunteering at the Perrot Library.  In the near future, I will be interning at the Pinnacle School and visiting my extended family.  I wouldn’t trade any of these experiences for anything else in the world.  But are they educational?  As I find this particular literary device annoying, I will answer my rhetorical question for you, patient reader.  I believe yes.  They have taught me more than I could ever try to express in words.

The experience of going to art camp was perhaps more challenging for me than my first year of high school, but infinitely more rewarding.  Unlike the somewhat coldness and rigidity of the school system, this camp gave back to me not in facts and figures but in warm fuzzy feelings. Buck’s Rock is one of the most amazing places I have ever been to (I promise you that no one is paying me to write that).  Camp is an American institution and, for me, the epitome of what summer learning can be.  It will be my main focus: how did such an undeniably expensive and debatably frivolous pursuit change my perspective on my own life?

I guess I’ll just dive in.  Right off the bat, camp challenged me to juggle an entirely new group of people.  I endured the most terrifying ordeal for the socially awkward: making new friends.  But this was good for me; this is a skill that, for some of us, needs to be exercised like a muscle.  I don’t know what I would have done at my new school in this regard had I not had the practice I did over the summer.

At the same time, the right summer camp can provide an environment of unconditional acceptance, something many of my peers and I do not find at school.  This did wonders for my self-esteem.  I could stretch the limits of my personality, figuring out more about the person I was and am still becoming in a healthy and constructive environment.  And my fellow travelers in this journey and I formed many relationships that I hope will last.

In addition, of course, there was the artistic component.  Through sketching, batiking (a process of dying wax-painted fabric), sewing, and being perhaps the most annoying actor in the musical, I discovered my passion for the arts.  This was only possible because it was summer, because it was camp, and because these things gave me room to fail again and again.  I took music lessons but only practiced sporadically. I quit the play and re-joined again. I abandoned several disgusting print designs, and the one I carried through came out crooked.  My sketchbook was an abomination by any art teacher’s standards; many pages were simply filled with tic-tac-toe games I played against myself while bored.  My sister wouldn’t try on the dress I sewed her, let alone wear it.  What I’m saying is, I didn’t create anything museum worthy. In school, I would have failed at each one of these things.  But at summer camp, I could shine.  I’m not any kind of prodigy, and my experiences weren’t all sunshine and rainbows.  But through learning hands on about art, I discovered something that I had lost: how it felt to be happy with what I was doing.

I guess that’s what I’ve been driving at.  Used properly, summer can be a vehicle for learning, making and taking what an individual needs.  For me this was the illusive and yet imperative necessity of happiness.

I’ll briefly touch on further examples of summer learning I’ve discovered this year.  To start, I’m taking the opportunity to delve more deeply into acting.  I’m just one week into the program, but I hope to truly develop a skill that I simply do not have time for over the school year.  This is another way to learn more over the summer, taking a class as an extension to schoolwork.

In addition, volunteering has allowed me to develop a very necessary proficiency in helping others purely for the sake of helping others.  I am able to devote large quantities of time to this end, time needed to be spent on personal pursuits during the busy school year.

Finally, summer is when I get a chance to reconnect with my family.  Especially as a boarding school student, just hanging out with my parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents settles me and ties me back to my moral center.

I guess I won’t bore you any longer by regaling you with tales of my plans.  If you’re a kid like me, I suggest going out and enjoying some of your own!  I think this works with adults, too, although you need to try harder to get a break, which is unfair.  But take what you need from this summer.  And please comment with any (polite) feedback you see fit.

The Perks of Early Decision II

Jul 2

Posted by GreenwichEdGrp in College | 6 Comments

For some high school seniors the only thing they are certain of is of what they don’t know. Nicole Niblo was one of those students. She didn’t know what she wanted to do or even where she wanted to apply to college. Her attempts at looking through college review books were futile. She would say, “All these schools look the same. How do I really know which one is right for me from looking at a few paragraphs in a guidebook or even looking on the websites?” Point taken.

The summer before her senior year Nicole traveled throughout the Northeast touring dozens of colleges and universities. Schools that Nicole thought she’d love, she ended up rejecting. Through a process of trial and error Nicole was able to figure out what qualities she liked or disliked in a school. She wanted a small, liberal arts college, in a rural area. She wanted to go to St. Lawrence University in upstate New York.

But, Nicole has commitment phobia. She knew that St. Lawrence was the right school, but she couldn’t bring herself to sign the early decision agreement. The deadline passed and Nicole thought she was doomed. She thought, “Early Decision was my best chance of getting in and I missed it.”

Fortunately Nicole wasn’t as doomed as she thought she was. St. Lawrence is one of many schools across the nation that offers Early Decision II. Early Decision II is basically identical to Early Decision I; both programs are binding. The only difference is that you get an extra two months to look at schools. If students are deferred or rejected from a school they applied to Early Decision I, they can quickly regroup and apply to their second choice Early Decision II.

Nicole was nervous. She wondered whether it was a mistake to apply Early Decision II, not Early Decision I. She was convinced that she was going to be rejected. But Nicole got in! Even though deciding whether to apply Early Decision was the most stressful part of her college process, Nicole was glad that she took the time to make sure that she loved St. Lawrence and applied Early Decision II.

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Getting In For Musical Theater

Jun 25

Posted by GreenwichEdGrp in College | 303 Comments

A recent Greenwich High School graduate, Adrienne, who is planning to attend NYU Tisch next year with a concentration in theater. Adrienne was set on a life in musical theater. But Adrienne quickly discovered that applying to college for musical theater is a completely different process than that of her peers.

The tricky thing for Adrienne was finding a school that was equally challenging academically as it is musical theater wise. She knew NYU was the right choice for her. Although Tisch is ranked as one of best musical theater program in the country, Adrienne was also attracted to its great academics. Another major attraction to NYU was the fact that it was located in the capital city of theater. She knew early on that NYU was the school for her. That was the easy part.

If the application process wasn’t stressful enough, a complex audition process would surely turn up the heat. Because the audition process varies from school to school, Adrienne had to prepare a slew of monologues, songs, and dances for her many auditions. A couple of schools even required an interview and a music theory test.

Adrienne was overwhelmed. She hired a coach to direct her to colleges in order to organize the different components of her applications. The hardest thing about the process was the aspect of randomness. What if a girl just as good as her went before her but she made them laugh a little more? What if NYU already had a brunette mezzo soprano?

Adrienne decided to apply early decision to NYU. In Tisch’s early decision program, if students do not make the cut in the early decision round, then they are flat out rejected. Fortunately, Adrienne was accepted.

Looking back on her college application process, Adrienne thought that she handled the whole application process well. Instead of looking at college rankings provided in books, she was guided by playbills and her own needs.

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