I can still remember the days when my son started Kindergarten…..that was before the arrival of Edline and Social Media! Many times I forgot to check the calendar and missed deadlines or one of those ‘Teacher Work Days’. The struggle to stay on top of everything as a busy working mom.

With the arrival of Edline we were able to connect with schools, check grades and received alerts for events like ‘Open House’. Now we’ve  just made it through the year long college application process, and being able to connect with the College Board and the Common App helped us tremendously.

We were getting notifications of SAT dates coming up, application deadlines and other news. If your child is only applying to one school it is complicated enough to keep an eye on scholarships, financial aid forms and transcripts. Now if you multiply that by 10 or more schools, you have your hands and your calendar full.
It is time for our students to step up to the plate themselves, but as my son put it ” I am the athlete and you are my manager, Mom!” So we try to help them with the process.

Once we had narrowed down college choices to a list of schools to apply to, we liked their Facebook pages and followed their Twitter accounts. It gave us a chance to get a feeling for the school through their posts of activities and events. Also it kept us up to date of various application deadlines as each school is different.

Over the course of the next months we filed paperwork, submitted tax documents, planned campus visits and talked to admission officers and alumni. Acceptance letters and offers started to come in.

Our student made his decision, and during his orientation, while attending a parent event, we connected with several parent groups on Facebook and Twitter. It was funny to read on the timeline a parent tweeting about the temperature in the ballroom being cold enough to hang meat while sitting there shivering myself!

After orientation we exchanged info with other parents about the registration process for classes, details about the dorm rooms and move in day. People connecting to help each other out, find others in their area to car pool and get together.

I also found a few very interesting Twitter accounts that are run by student groups giving incoming freshmen advise what to wear to bars and how to tip their bartenders! I hope they are serving fruit juice and soda! Should I worry? No, but it is funny to see what else is going on besides studying and grades!