Colleges that change lives

Calling out Stefanik’s lies

The Front Page

Morning Update

Thursday, September 16, 2021

By Ken Tingley

It was 10 years ago I set out to help my son find a college. The goal from the beginning was not to get into the “best” or “most prestigious” college, but to find the “right” college for him.

At first, the mission was selfish. I had saved $100,000 for his college education and if I was going to spend that much money, I wanted to know what I was spending it on. I immersed myself in the college recruiting process, the ratings, the costs, the lists and how to get financial aid. I did so much research my son and wife later told me I should start a consulting business to advise other parents.

Here is some of what I learned.

Teenagers really don’t have a clue what they want at the start of the college process.

Parents are either not ready or equipped to much more than their children and many believe the counselors at school will drive the process.

Parents like myself quickly found out our experiences in looking and applying for colleges decades earlier had no relevance in the current world of online applications, essays and complicated financial aid packages.

When we started the college search the summer before my son’s junior year, it was clear he had little interest in the process. We visited with his school counselor to see if she could provide insights and advice. Her grasp of my son’s future was limited to his class ranking, grades and anything else that was in his file. But it was clear to me she didn’t know my son personally at all.

That visit left me with the belief that I had to play more of a role in helping my son find a good fit for college. I knew his interests, his personality and his capabilities.

I also discovered a book titled “Colleges That Change Lives.” For the next two years it became my Bible. It was written by a former education writer for the New York Times and included a description of 40 small liberal arts colleges across the country that I had never heard of. All the colleges seemed to determined not just to get their students diplomas, but to make them better people and citizens.

Pope talked to administrators, teachers and students at each of the colleges about their philosophy and what type of students fit in best there.

As I read the book, I found several colleges where I believed my son would thrive. I pointed out several of the schools to my son and insisted he read about them. My son later applied to six colleges, four of them were from “Colleges that Change Lives.”

The first big college visit trip was in August before his junior year. The first college was a big event with lots of students and families at a medium sized upstate campus. It was not very personal and we never heard from anyone there after our visit. The next day we visited a small liberal arts college in western New York and for the first time the admissions person was recruiting my son. He even talked about how much financial aid he could get. They also put a little paper sign in front of the admissions office parking space that said “Parking reserved for Joseph Tingley.” That was a nice touch.

The next day everything changed. Visiting a small school in western Pennsylvania, the admissions person interviewed my son for 45 minutes or so without either of his parents. Later, we were invited in and told he was a perfect fit for their college. My son beamed. As we got on the highway for our six-hour return trip we waited for my son’s response. We wanted him to initiate the discussion. He did and talked at great length about what he loved about the school.

Ultimately, there were 13 college visits and after an ambivalent start, my son became intimately involved in the process. We had some great adventures. I learned that you could negotiate for money - even though they said you could not - and was able to play one school off another.

The story has a happy ending. My son eventually went to that school in western Pennsylvania and thrived. He went on to graduate school, got his Masters and now works for the National Parks Service.

At my son’s high school graduation, I was surprised to see in the program how few of his classmates were going to school out of state. New York has many fine academic institutions, but I wondered how many students and their parents dug as deep into the process as I did. Were they attending schools that might changed their lives?

Earlier this week, I saw that Northshire Books was hosting a virtual event with the author Becky Munsterer Sabky to discuss her new book “Valedictorians at the Gate:

Standing Out, Getting In, and Staying Sane while Applying to College.” Sabky was a admissions counselor at both St. Lawrence and Dartmouth. I wondered if she was the new Loren Pope. I also wondered if I had done it right, so, I signed up.

I asked her one of the first questions: I wanted to know if she had heard of “Colleges that Change Lives” and how it compared to her book.

It was an online Zoom chat and I saw her swivel around in her chair and pull “Colleges that Change Lives” off the shelf.

“I love this book,” she said. She explained her book did not rate specific colleges it covered a lot of the same ideas that parents and students should be open-minded and think about college broadly, not just in terms of the highest rated.

It was a confirmation that we had followed the right path in guiding our son.

The beginning of a new school year means another generation of parents and their children will begin the daunting college admission process. It is a rollercoaster ride, but ultimately it is about finding the best fit for your child. They will need your help. They will need you to push and insist they participate because college costs a lot of money.

If you do it right, college will change their lives.

Attacking Stefanik

Bridie Farrell, who is hoping to be the Democrats’ nominee against Rep. Elise Stefanik next year, may be on the right track when it comes to criticizing her opponent.

She released a message this week addressing why Harvard removed Stefanik from its advisory committee. It wasn’t because of Stefanik’s politics, it was because what she said was not true.

“The Dean of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government made it clear that removing Elise from its advisory committee wasn’t about partisan politics, but instead about her lies to the American people,” it said in the release, then quoted the Harvard dean.

“Elise has made public assertions about voter fraud in November’s presidential election that have no basis in evidence.”

I think that is something every voter should remember.

Politicians have a long history of twisting the truth, but this goes beyond that.

I always return to The Post-Star editorial board’s request of Stefanik not to lie during the 2018 and 2020 campaigns.

While her opponent agreed, Rep. Stefanik never did.

That is a red flag about any person’s moral compass.

Books on sale locally

The past couple of weeks I have been making the rounds to get my new book “The Last American Editor” into local stores.

It has been great meeting those folks and learning how they help local authors like myself. The book is now in seven stores across the region and that should continue to grow. Here is the list:

Glens Falls

Chapman Museum, Glen Street

Queensbury

Ace Hardware, Upper Glen Street

The Silo, Aviation Road.

Cambridge

Battenkill Books, Main Street

Saratoga Springs

Northshire Books

Albany

Book House at Stuyvesant Plaza

Rensselaer

Friar Tuck Newsroom at Albany-Rensselaer Train Station

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