College, gap year and internships - one family, three paths

This is from a phone interview with Debbie I., mother of three Churchill alumni. 
Josh, the family’s oldest Churchill alumnus, graduated from Churchill High School in 2008 and is graduating from George Washington University (GW) in Washington, DC this spring. When applying to college and deciding where to study, Josh's two first choices were GW and Trinity College in Hartford, CT. After a second visit to both colleges, Josh felt that he would be happier at the larger GW. The location and wealth of opportunities at the school and in the city also factored in.  When not studying, Josh has been busy working at Obama's favorite burger joint, Good Stuff,  and is currently apprenticing at 1789, an upscale restaurant in the center of DC. Josh has also worked at other restaurants during school breaks and plans to attend the Culinary Institute of America, CIA, after college graduation. 


At GW Josh is receiving great LD support, and has had a positive four year college experience, Debbie says. GW accommodations include early registration, before all other students including the athletes, extra time, and an adviser at the LD center in addition to his academic adviser. At the beginning of each semester, the LD center adviser writes letters to the professors of the classes the student has registered for explaining the student’s accommodations. The student then picks up the letters and delivers them to each professor.


The process leading to GW included some detours. Debbie recalls visiting the LD center at Cornell University and asking about whether readers were offered. “They didn’t know what a reader was,” she says. LD support can vary tremendously from college to college.


The middle child, Emme, attended Columbia College in Chicago, IL after graduating from Churchill in 2010, but did not feel at home and decided to take a gap year after her freshman year. At college she took a music business administration class, which inspired her gap year activities. Emme loves techno music and finding talented unknown artists with potential. Upon returning to New York City she landed an internship with the well-known record label Island Def Jam and enrolled at Pace University part time to study micro and macro economics.  Through connections she made at Island Def Jam, Emme managed to find another, equally exciting, gig after the first internship ended. She now interns at Complete Control Management, a DJ management company. At her internship she does creative work, meets fascinating people, and is at the epicenter of activities for artists such as Dada Life, Tiesto, and Dirty South. Overall, Emme is happier and more content than she has been in a long time, Debbie says.
“I am proud of her for all her hard work it took to make these opportunities materialize.”


The family’s youngest child, Sarah, transferred out of Churchill after 9th grade to Bard High School Early College, a top-rated public high school. In addition to the social adjustment that comes with entering a new school as a transfer student, she has had to work hard to adjust from the nurturing Churchill environment to the heavier work load and the harshness of some of the teachers at her new school, Debbie says. There has been an ongoing battle to obtain the necessary academic support that she is entitled to.
“You have to have a strong backbone,” Debbie says about transitioning to a public school after Churchill.
Now in 11th grade, Sarah is doing well and to the surprise of many, her favorite subject and the one that she excels at the most, is Chinese.  She'll be going to China in April for two weeks with a group from school.  Now Sarah is preparing for the college application process. She is interested in applying to Brown University, Bowdoin College, Boston University, Trinity College, Tufts University and Tulane University.

The most important advice to parents of LD students?
"Teaching your kids how to ask for and to get help," says Debbie. "We all seek help every day, via customer support, counselors, specialists, and confidants. The sooner our kids learn that it's ok to need help and to seek help, the better off they will be."