A Life Changer -- let us all praise Helane Linzer and Ivy Maven
A few years back, I wrote a movie script for a studio about a father and his offspring looking at colleges and in researching the subject matter, got a peak at the madness of this process. I thought that might help me deal with this easier in real life when it was my daughter's turn. But frankly, the process has gotten even more insane, and the stress-level in our house was threatening to do us all in. We had visited so many schools over the years, thinking we were ahead of the game as we had gone to NYU, Vassar, Princeton, Swarthmore, Duke, Yale, Sarah Lawrence, Harvard, Barnard, and Stanford over the years. Looking back, it was a little like rounding up the usual suspects (where were the so-called safety schools?) and frankly, our daughter was not "in love" with any of them. She thought she wanted to go to a big school in the city, but was not sure. And despite her good grades and extra-curriculars, she was skeptical about getting in anywhere. Besides, she had done her extra curricular activities to be a good person and because she was interested, not to pander to any college. It was us who began to pander and prod and drive our daughter crazy. My wife and I just couldn't seem to get out of our daughter's way, and the pressure about where she should or should not go, grades and scores and extra-curriculars, had turned us from the "we're cool" parents to the hovercraft people we had always made fun of. Just as all our nerves were about to break, I googled Ivy Maven. It was a total shot in the dark-- though I would later found out friends had used the amazing Helane Linzer. We literally had our daughter go meet Helane before we did-- figuring this really should be our daughter's decision. So what if it might determine her life's course and the decision would cost more than the average American home. And that I could not even decide what to wear when I was 17, much less what school to go to. So, our daughter comes back, visibly relieved. She had always loved psychology and perhaps it was that Helane had that as part of her background that helped. We tried not to pry too much, but our daughter eventually described sitting on the floor with some cards and Helane and talking about what she loved and what she was passionate about and also what she was afraid of. My daughter knew she wanted a liberal arts education, and though she had had some success as a performer in high school, wanted to have a sold degree to be able to go to graduate school as a psychologist or a psychiatrist-- fully aware that any of this could change. After another session with Helane, our daughter confidently told us she was thinking of taking a gap year to pursue acting in New York, but going to apply to a couple of colleges early decision which Helane had recommended would be a good fit. She applied to Wesleyan and Bard. (It was the year of "Hamilton" and Wesleyan was the only college tour which didn't let parents go with their child.) Frankly, the only thing I knew about Bard was that Steely Dan song "My Old School" with the chorus, "I'm never going back to my old school." Helane masterfully guided our daughter through the application process, giving her great feedback on her essays, recommendations, and how to present herself. Helane was also realistic about how competitive and unpredictable the process can be. Our heart sank a bit when our didn't get in ED to Wesleyan. Rejection is hard and we were looking into other options when an admission came into Bard. Frankly, the Bard application was more under the radar from us, and Helane had literally worked with our daughter until the last moment on getting that submitted on time. We didn't even know much about the school and so when the admission letter came, we started reading the Bard website, and soon realized what a wonderful fit it was-- learning for learning's sake. Students spend weeks before school starts reading and thinking. It was small school with a great teacher/student ratio, and students their sophomore year had to defend their majors to faculty instead of blindly choosing one. Helane knew our daughter better than we did in some ways. We eventually did get up to Bard on an afternoon where it was pouring rain. We tried to give our daughter her space. She seemed to really like the kids and the stories of how even registering for classes was more human there as you had to go to the professor's offices to sign up, and it was done in "hunger games" style, the student tour guide with a faint grin. On the tour was a psychology major who was taking along with her younger sister who was considering going. She talked to my daughter honestly about the pros and cons of the school and her senior thesis which our daughter really appreciated. . We went to a classroom and talked with the student guide around a table with the other parents and she took us through what her classes were like and how the teachers challenged the students in a good way. By the end of the day, it felt like a place our daughter wanted to be. It wasn't a big school or in a big city like she first envisioned-- but it was a 2 hour train ride to NYC and she liked the feel of it for many of the reasons she and Helane had talked about. Our daughter is now in the middle of her gap year, which she did in part, buoyed by her sessions with Helane. And as she predicted, Bard was very accommodating about that. Our daughter is living in NYC, taking some classes, and was recently cast in a musical workshop with a bunch of alum from NYU and Wesleyan. She is also volunteering for a hospital and looking forward to going to Bard in the Fall which will be all the more appreciated we hope from having had some real world experience she was looking for. So thank you, Helane. I have only hesitated posting this because I didn't want to jinx anything. But we so appreciate you making one of the most difficult decisions for a family manageable, and putting the joy back into it. You work wonders, and we would unabashedly recommend you to anyone going through this decision making process. Helane knows her stuff and uses her psychology background to provide guidance far beyond what others might offer. And these days, we think that is so worthwhile and important. We couldn't recommend Helane more strongly.