A Sun Valley Community School education builds a solid foundation for the post-secondary educational experience. Our students are well prepared for college or university.
At Sun Valley Community School, we want our students to grow up naturally, “to grow wild according to their natures” (Thoreau), and to appreciate life in and beyond our remarkable Wood River Valley. We do not want them to be constrained by the anxieties and prescriptions that accompany “college preparation” in so many other parts of the country, so we make sure that they are aware, early on, of what they need in order to be admissible to the colleges and universities that are appropriate for them, ask them to be actively engaged in the process, and help guide them as they navigate the path toward their educational goals.
Ninth and Tenth Grades
Our goal during ninth and tenth grades is principally to assist each student to establish appropriate “habits of mind” (good organization, time-management, goals, and objectives) and to embark on an academic trajectory that not only meets specific graduation requirements (Writing Across the Curriculum, Computer Science, and Fine Arts), but reflects one’s curiosity and thirst for knowledge and challenge.
During this time, we encourage students to get involved in the life of the school and the Valley in genuine ways—whether through athletics, clubs, community service, local nonprofits, or part-time work—and to find relevance and enjoyment. Knowing our students live busy lives, we emphasize “depth over breadth” and “less is more” in one’s choices.
By the end of the sophomore year, a student should consider where they are heading and understand who they are as a student and young adult. (If you do not like where you are now, now is the time to change.) In addition to taking the PSAT in ninth and tenth grade, we introduce students to a variety of self-assessment and career-oriented activities to assist them in discovering traits and career interests they may not have considered.
Ninth and tenth grades are a time of asking questions and opening oneself to a wider discourse.
Eleventh and Twelfth Grades
As students enter the eleventh grade, the academic rigors of upper-level courses and the college search process start in earnest. In the college search process, we ask each student to take ownership of their plans and for parents to play a supportive and “backstage” role. We encourage parents to help their student find their “voice” in the journey and to teach the value of good process.
Students begin to define their ideal college characteristics during this phase of the process, using a combination of intuition and activities through online resources like College Board's Big Future, and/or individual college websites and their social media accounts. All of this online research is done in conjunction with college campus visits in order for each student to continually test their personal assumptions and build their final application list.
Starting in January, we meet with juniors and parents to discuss their hopes and dreams, and to outline a tentative list of colleges and universities based on academic profile, standardized testing data, and special interests to date. Students and parents typically join the mass migration of college visits during spring break and the summer months. Armed with notes from those visits, our conversations continue into the fall of the senior year, when we work with each senior to hone their college lists, seeking a balance between likelies, possibles, reaches, and far reaches. We ask each senior to “fall in love” with several colleges across the admission selectivity spectrum and to avoid letting stereotypes and outdated information and impressions steer them away from a college.
Our message to students: There will be many college fits out there for you. Be who you are, not who you think you should be.
We are happy to report that not only have our seniors met with tremendous success in the college application process (70-80 percent of past graduating classes have been accepted into their first- or second-choice school), but that over the past several years the number of applications our seniors submit has averaged eight-to-10, validating the fact that the choices seniors make are appropriate and not simply random fishing expeditions that too often play into the hyper-activity and paranoia of college admissions today.
In the end, our ultimate objective is to have each student and family feel a keen sense of satisfaction with their Sun Valley Community School educational experience and to view their next chapter—college—with excitement and to know that it is a good fit and outcome.
