1st Quarter
- Meet with counselor to discuss career exploration activities, goals and strategies for the Year
- PSAT in October
Meetings With Counselor
Sophomores will meet individually with their counselor in October. This meeting will help them continue their process of self-discovery, set goals, and develop strategies for this challenging year of transition in their lives.
Since performance in sophomore year classes has a bearing on curriculum options available in junior and senior years, sophomores need to reflect carefully on their study habits, time-management, and priorities. Opportunities to enroll in junior classes such as Honors English, AP United States History and AP Physics B, to name a few, hinge upon very solid, student performance in sophomore year courses. Setting goals for each sophomore course and specifying what needs to be done to attain these goals will be an important topic of this individual conference. Also, since junior year is the year that college admission testing begins, counselors will discuss the upcoming PSAT and PLAN tests with your son and how best to prepare for them.
Equally important is your son's personal, social and co-curricular development. Counselors will ask students to reflect on their lives in each of these areas and to set goals in these areas as well. Feeling connected here at SLUH is critical to student success. This meeting allows your son to fill his counselor in on what he has been involved in and allows student and counselor to explore together other opportunities for involvement. In some instances, young men need to learn to prioritize, or even cut back in some areas so that they do not become over-extended.
Finally, since the focus of junior year counseling is the college planning process, sophomores will find themselves better equipped to engage in the college search if they spend some time investigating their interests, values, and abilities and how these relate to college majors and the world of work. To facilitate this type of self-exploration, each sophomore should take one or more of the on-line, interest inventories mentioned below, before coming to his meeting with his counselor in October. This is to be done on his own time, either at home or in one of our computer centers. These inventories are quick, user-friendly surveys which link one's interests to various college majors or careers. It is not important that students identify one intended major or career (this may take until junior year in college for most students). It is far more important for students to explore a variety of ideas.
Go to the following web addresses to take an interest inventory. Your son should print out his results page(s) and bring this to his meeting with his counselor.
http://career.missouri.edu/holland/
http://icpac.indiana.edu/infoseries/is-50pl.html
http://www.edonline.com/collegecompass/carhlp2.html
Tips for Sophomore Parents
You should expect your son to have consistently more homework than freshman year! Two hours of work each night could be considered a rough minimum, with three hours per night more the norm. That's about 30 minutes/subject/night! Many of your sons will have difficulty organizing themselves effectively. Since sophomore teachers tend to place more responsibility on the students for keeping up on daily assignments, many sophomores put off their work until they can no longer catch up. Should your son allow himself to fall victim to this trap, you need to be careful in how you intervene. Ask him to set up a plan which he thinks will work. Have him establish some way to insure that he is keeping up. Talk about how he thinks you might be helpful. Then listen! If this does not seem to work, call your son's counselor, before you display your frustration as anger and try to "motivate" by punishing.
PSAT
In October, the sophomores will take the PSAT, the first of the preparatory tests for college placement. The purpose of administering this test at this time is to give our students some experience with this type of test. The results of this administration of the PSAT have no bearing on college admissions or class standings at SLUH! We encourage students to use the preparation booklets and to concentrate seriously during the test, but not to worry that their performance on this day will preclude any scholarship or college possibilities. The results of the PSAT are either returned just before or after Christmas break.
Taking the test as a sophomore should familiarize students with the test in preparation for taking it as juniors. When students receive their results, areas of strength and weakness will be identified which will allow students to prepare for the PSAT as juniors and for the SAT.
