Home school and preparing for college - part 1

Preparing for college is stressful for any parent.

First of all, you are admitting that your baby is growing up.

Second, you are admitting you are old enough to have a college age kid.

Third, there is SO much to think about!

If you have a child in elementary school, start looking.  If you are dealing with a jr high student - you're running out of time.  Get busy!  If you are like me and have a high schooler (freshman here) HURRY UP!  With my son being the oldest ad my 'guinea pig' I am learning a lot. I know that there is no reason to re-invent the wheel, and I don't want to.  I am not the first home school mom to send a child off to college.  There is so much more information available now than when I was in high school looking for college info.  That many years ago (not admitting how many!) we didn't even have internet at home!

 

Step 1:  What are you (your child) interested in?

Step 2: What scholarships are available?  Is there something you     should get your child interested in? 

Step 3: What obscure scholarships are available?  Is there something you and your child could become interested in?  (ie golf - do you know how many golf scholarships there are?!)

Step 4: apply apply apply

Since we home school, there are even more opportunities, I believe, to get involved and get qualified for scholarships.  In public school you are limited to what is offered, and what activities you can participate in outside of school.  Being home schooled, your school day/year can revolve around those activities.  For instance; my son is a boy scout. Don't get me started on the changes to scouting - that's a whole other convo.  There are more than 100 merit badges he can work on.  As a freshman he took Literature, Biology, Geometry, and History/Geography.  His electives were art and chess.

Two possible merit badges he could earn are..... art and chess.  Next year he will take chemistry.  Again, there is a merit badge for that.  I could focus his entire h.s. curriculum around boy scout merit badges and he wouldn't miss a thing!  There are fun adventure badges too; camping, hiking, canoeing, engineering, entrepreneurship, life saving, shotgun shooting, archery....  The list is never ending. 

While we know LOTS of boys in public school who are scouts, I just fully believe that because we can make the time, my son has more opportunities to work on those merit badges - which lead to scholarships.

Along with scouts, there is CAP, canoeing classes, 4H, music lessons, art lessons, private lessons for baseball, college prep math, English and science.... Not just one or two, but all day everyday we do all these things.

I know a lot of people who can argue home vs public school.  It is a personal choice.  The point is Apply now!