When the college advising office announced that they would be offering to meeting with sophomores for the first time, the decision was met with mixed reactions. Some argued that sophomore year is too early to begin the college process, and relatively few sophomores took advantage of the opportunity in the week it was offered.
I am of the opinion that this was the first step in the right direction. Students attend Deerfield (and parents send them there) with our impressive matriculation rates in mind and with the ultimate goal of attending a prestigious college.
Knowing this, shouldn’t we begin the process as soon as possible? I think that entering students should be assigned a college advisor right away. This way, by the time an advisor is required to write about their advisee, they have known them for longer than three months.
Freshmen would meet with their advisors only once or twice, mostly to discuss class choices or co curricular options and their significance.
I know that I would have made different class and testing choices if I had the benefit of meeting with a college advisor before my junior spring.
While I don’t see this proposal becoming reality in the near future, I am very glad to see the College Advising Office moving in that direction and I hope that the next time the offer is extended, more sophomores will take it.