Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship

Navigating Friendships During the College Admissions Process: Kate Proger

• Kate Proger • Season 1 • Episode 112

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This week's friendship topic is the frenzy of college admissions and how it affects friendships between teens and how it potentially affects friendships between those teens' parents, too. Most importantly, we discuss how to approach the college admissions world with a level head!


Meet Kate Proger:

Kate Proger, is a college planning consultant and admissions expert. With degrees in both psychology and educational testing, as well as executive function coach training, Kate has helped hundreds of students find the university that is their perfect fit. (We discuss at length that there is more than one "right" fit.) Find Kate on her site: Kate Proger College Consulting.

We discussed:

  • Book mentioned---Where You Go Is Not Who You Will Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania by Frank Bruni 
  • Sharing information or not about where you're applying--privacy vs. intimacy
  • Understanding that everyone has reasons for their list (budgets, distance, etc.). We cannot assume we know what's going on behind closed doors 
  • Being happy for your friends (or your friends' kids) when admissions decisions arrive
  • The potential for parents to make some new friends in this next stage of parenting
  • New social opportunities for college students to seek more of what you liked socially in high school and less of what you didn't enjoy
  • The reality of kids "soiling the nest" before they leave or sometimes the exact opposite happens (glorifying the next)
  • And more!


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* All transcripts are available on the main Buzzsprout "Dear Nina" site. Click on any episode and find the transcript tab.

Let's connect over all things friendship!

[00:00:00] Kate: When it comes to college admissions, though it feels like we're all a little bit pitted against each other, everybody is putting forth such a different application. Colleges didn't pick you because they liked you better. They picked you because you filled a need for that college. And maybe your friend didn't in that case. But at the next college, your friend filled that need. And maybe you didn't. It's the idea that finding your right fit place, everybody's going to have one. Everyone might even have more than one right fit place. 

[00:00:37] Nina: Welcome to Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship. I have a topic today that comes up in a lot of communities. And it won't apply to everybody. I know that. And that topic is college admissions and how it affects friendships for teens, how it affects friendships for parents, and how to approach this process with a reasonable mind and attitude. There's obviously a lot of personal examples that could have been used, but neither I, nor my guest, who is Kate Proger, and I'll tell you more about her in a second, really wanted to get into too many personal examples.

I mean, she has clients and she isn't gonna, give examples from her clients lives. And I have my own children and their friends, and I don't really want to give super personal examples from their lives. So there is definitely a general sense in this episode, and I think you'll be able to, think about your own lives for sure, and how college admissions is factoring into your social world. 

For some people, this is just not a thing in their life. And even if they do have a high school senior or a junior, or they have just finished this process, it might not apply because not every community of people is as intense about college as others, which does come up in this episode.

College is an intense, intense time. I was really thrilled to have somebody who's right in the mix of it to speak to. Kate Proger has been in the business of college planning, as a consultant for about eight years. She has a degree in psychology and educational testing. She works with people on executive function. She's an ADHD coach too. She's really a great resource. She lives in Bethesda, Maryland, but she works with students from all over the country because she does a lot of remote work. And this isn't meant to be as an advertisement for Kate, although she does seem amazing. I would love to have worked with her as a student. just to talk about this process in general, again, how we can have a level head. With that, I am excited to welcome Kate to Dear Nina.

[00:02:40] Kate: Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

[00:02:42] Nina: As many of my listeners know, but not all, I have four teenagers. I basically say teenagers because they're from 12 to 20, but now the 20 year old and the 12 year old are slight outliers, but being a youngest of four, he has a lot of teen qualities. And my oldest, took a gap year. So he's a freshman in college. I have been through it. I'm going to go through it again. I have a senior I do see how a lot of the college admissions process, both for parents and for kids can affect relationships. I'm going to have you start if you don't mind. How did you get into this business?

[00:03:15] Kate: like anything good in life, I pretty much kind of fell into this backwards. My mom has a very dear friend who's a college advisor in my area, which is Rockville, Maryland. and she needed help getting through a college admissions cycle, reading essays and kind of, Just with the nuts and bolts of the application. And so I went to work for her, and I never left. I found my aha moment working with teenagers, mostly because I myself didn't have the smoothest path through college. And so I find a lot of meaning in helping kids find their right fit school. 

[00:03:55] Nina: I've seen just a little bit on your website about how you didn't have the right fit at first and you transferred. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Because I actually don't think people, appreciate enough that a lot of people transfer. 

[00:04:06] Kate: It happens all the time. It is not the end of the world. Look, it's not ideal. It's not the most fun thing to do, but it's totally normal. Happens all the time. So, I started at the university of Wisconsin it was just not the greatest fit. I was super distracted by the social scene. And then the final nail in the coffin was it was September 11th and it was the Jewish holidays and I was supposed to be able to come home and there were no planes, no trains, no cars.

I could not get back to the East coast and it just was not the right place for me. So in the end I transferred to the University of Maryland, which is my state university. A school, by the way, where I said I would never go. You know, like angels singing. It was perfect.

[00:04:52] Nina: Oh, that's great. I think that's not an uncommon thing where people don't want to go to their home university with a big chunk of people from their high school. They don't want to, and then it turns out, you know, maybe it's not the worst choice and the price is usually a little better too. 

[00:05:04] Kate: Yeah, it's really tough. We're asking 17 year olds to make really big decisions and 17 year olds, as we know, don't always make the world's greatest decisions. So, you know, learning how to say like, okay, this is not right for me. And moving on is a life skill. 

[00:05:20] Nina: One thing I want to caveat, I think it's important, I actually just had a friend in town visiting who's from your neck of the woods, she lives in Bethesda actually as well, and she works in education policy in high schools. She was pointing out to me, because we both have seniors, she was pointing out how this little subset that she and I are both talking about and that, you know, really you and I also will be talking about of kids where the college admissions process is really intense and competitive is actually a minority of high school seniors and a lot of high school seniors are on a path of going to the least expensive easy to get to. I definitely have listeners who aren't in this, what feels can feel, and I know you're here to speak to it, like a rat race sometimes. 

[00:05:59] Kate: There's a really great book called Where You Go Is Not You'll Be. And that is the whole premise of the book. And I love it.

[00:06:05] Nina: Okay. So with that in mind that we aren't speaking to everybody, but I do think we're speaking to a good chunk of my audience. I put this in my Facebook group, Dear Nina: The group. It definitely got more comments and conversation than a lot of other upcoming episode ideas I put out there. So I know people feel it. They’ve been part of it. Their kids are part of it. So I would just love to hear what you're seeing out there.

[00:06:27] Kate: It's interesting because at least from what I've heard, kids seem to be doing better with it than parents do, which is both good news and bad news, I guess, depending on how you look at it and who you are. The kids come at it, from a perspective, it feels like that everybody's going through it at the same time I will say the caveat is social media is it's bad. And we should probably get to that later.

[00:06:52] Nina: That's a good point. Yep.

[00:06:53] Kate: the kids tend to do better. Parents at least have told me, that anxious feeling that we talk about when we talk about college admissions seems to be more ratcheted up, when parents are talking to each other.

This is one of those moments that parents might feel like this is a culmination of all this work and all the hopes and dreams that they've poured into their kid. And then it feels like a competition at the very end where, almost at whatever they're deeming the finish line.

[00:07:22] Nina: do you think parents shouldn't talk about where their kids are applying?

[00:07:27] Kate: Oh gosh, that's such a good question. I think it depends who they're talking to.

[00:07:32] Nina: Cause it can be awkward by the way, to not. Well, I'll tell you a little incident I had. I remember a couple years ago now when my son was applying. Somebody asked me, where's your son applying? Now I'm kind of an open book mostly because my kid doesn't care. If he said to me, mom, I don't want people to know, of course I wouldn't say, but he didn't care. It was a connecting point for me and other moms for better or for worse. And I answered, you know, here I am, like giving the full list and I'm like, Oh, what about, you know, your kid? And she's like, Oh, he's not sure yet. Which I took to mean she doesn't want to talk about it. He doesn't want to talk about it. And I'm thinking, why are you asking me then? I really left that conversation kind of irritated. I should give you all the information yet you already know that you're not going to? That left me with a bad taste in my mouth. 

[00:08:17] Kate: I don't think that's an uncommon experience. I'm also probably an overshare or too. I think people like us often are like, well, what's the harm in sharing that information? And other people are a little bit more closer to the vest. Again, I don't know that my kids care the same way as other kids might or might not.

I think it depends who you're talking to. Are these people who are asking that question, are they your intimate friends? Are they your grocery store acquaintances? I never get more phone calls than the day after I can tell when people have all gone to dinner together. 

The parents will be out to dinner and someone will say something like, you know, well, I heard at XYZ university, you, you need a, this, ACT score, or I heard that so and so has three internships this summer. And that that school does not accept you if you don't. They're working with bad information.

So I can tell where the information's coming from, and I do think that most times people are well meaning. But that kind of bad information being passed around really does just amp up the anxiety for everyone and it makes conversations like that should be casual, like where is Sam applying so much more fraught than maybe they need to be. 

[00:09:32] Nina: Is there anything else you see among parents? Let's stay with parents before we get to kids during this application process that would affect friendships because I think it does. Anything I think where you're doing something at the same time as someone else. That even happens, people are engaged at the same time and they're both planning weddings or people like are having babies at the same time or applying to preschools or we don't have that issue here in Minneapolis like people aren't applying to preschools. But, what is it a scarcity thing?

[00:09:58] Kate: I think there's a sense that the kids are pitted against each other and that scarcity really is driving nerves. We're all having kids apply to the same 25 schools 30 schools. And that has led to a real scarcity issue. Like you said, and If we could convince people to apply to different schools, that'd be great because I think that would turn down the heat on all of this so much.

[00:10:25] Nina: and there are so many schools out there. But yeah, there seems to be this belief that, only, quote unquote, certain schools are acceptable ones. I saw a college counselor talking on Tik Tok. And she was wondering if the applications are so far up in certain schools because of social media, back to social media for a second. And this might not even been the angle you were thinking of more just like announcing where you're going and all that, but Madison, for example, she was using as an example.

Now Madison's always been popular in my neck of the woods. I'm from Chicago. I live in Minneapolis. We have reciprocity with Wisconsin schools, so it is a great price point not far to get to. She was thinking, I don't remember where she was from, that the popularity of certain schools have only become more so because of the way admissions officers and maybe students talk about them on social media. Do you think there's anything to that?

[00:11:11] Kate: Oh, absolutely. I actually am going to tour two schools next week that would never have been on my radar, but for kids asking me about them because of social media.

[00:11:22] Nina: Can you say what they are? Or do you not

[00:11:24] Kate: Yeah, no, I do. So I'm from outside Washington D. C. and kids from our area just were not going to Clemson or the University of Tennessee. It never came up before. But in the last 12 months, over and over and over again, I've gotten questions about it to the point where I feel like I have to go put my feet on campus. 

[00:11:41] Nina: Oh, that's a fun part of your job. So you get to go to schools and get a tour and all that. Do you act like you're a parent or you. You are an admissions person like that. They know that's what you're doing. 

[00:11:51] Kate: I go as an admissions person. Actually, I took my daughter who's now in high school on her first college tour. And that was like, Oh my gosh, I'm doing this from the other side of the desk. yeah, no, normally I go and I tell them who I am.

[00:12:04] Nina: I think a lot of people probably think that they would like your job, if you went to college or you remember having a good experience with some sort of college advisor, it feels like a job that a lot of people I know I think would enjoy, but I wonder if they really would. What do you think it takes to handle the parents like you do?

[00:12:20] Kate: Oh gosh. and I love my clients, but 

[00:12:23] Nina: I know you do.

[00:12:24] Kate: a lot of patience, and a deep understanding that this anxiety level is because you love your kid. You want what's best for your kid. I think when you've seen someone grow and mature and learn the way that we have about our own kids, it feels heavy, it feels consequential.

This big decision. So I am acutely aware of that. I'm also acutely aware that there is a financial component and pouring 200 plus thousand dollars into college is an investment, and I do think that is an interesting part of the parent journey when it comes to college admissions, right?

We don't know about other people's intricate details of someone's financial needs. And so we don't know what's happening behind closed doors. And what someone's motivations are for their college list or for their, where they're applying or where they're ultimately going to go. And so I think a lot of people make assumptions that are incorrect and those assumptions lead to miscommunications and that can affect friendships.

[00:13:24] Nina: I think another kind of detail in there in terms of poor communication or misunderstandings. I see it a lot in the various Facebook groups I'm in for college, for parents of seniors. The concept of a safety school, I think that's really to people. I've seen fights devolve over this, what some people call a safety school, someone else would be like, Hey, that's my kid's dream school or reach, or maybe again, bringing the finances into it. you know, maybe what somebody is going to as a school is a financial decision, which I think is actually a smart decision. It's sort of ironic that some people look down on certain schools and yet ultimately, if those kids are going to come out debt free or they're getting a really great financial package, frankly, that's the smarter decision. That's me, you know, putting my opinion in there, 

[00:14:10] Kate: I wonder if we are making judgments all the time. And so friends are making judgments all the time. Is that a smart decision? Is that a good school? Quote unquote. And so I wonder if that plays into the parent relationship. You know, friendships too, those little micro judgments and like, we all do that. 

We all do that. I think it's especially hard when it comes to our kids to keep those in check.

[00:14:35] Nina: a lot of the conversations that happen among parents also happens among kids. So back to the keeping things private or not, the interaction of oh, where are you applying? Where am I applying? What's your dream school? If somebody is really cagey about it, it could be awkward and maybe it would be nice and ideal. I'd like to deal in the real world. In an ideal world everyone would understand that some people are just more private than others. The way it comes out feels like you're trying to be secretive in order to not have someone apply to your same school or use your same counselor 

[00:15:05] Kate: Yeah. I don't disagree. I think it feels, well, the person who's receiving that information can receive it a million different ways.

 I think that we need to recognize the difference between intimacy and privacy and choosing who you share that information with. Even your mom said it in one of your earlier shows that we are entitled to our secrets and you have to be careful about who you share your private information with.

[00:15:29] Nina: That's so my mom. I love that you, picked up on that. I'm much more of an overshare than my mom is. I would say my mom might even be an under-sharer if there's such a thing. I really like what you said about how we put so much into our kids anyway. And then they get to this point and it's like, ah, you know, there's something scary about, letting them loose in this process. And maybe I did a bad job of this with my kids. College was the first time they really had to fill out a lot of their own forms. All of a sudden I just, there was no way I was going to do that for them. Of course. But when I thought about it, they had never filled out a single sports, that was my bad. And I, four kids, I have the opportunity to do it better with each one. But by the time my son was applying, I don't think he had ever seen like his health insurance card. 

[00:16:12] Kate: so common. I'm going to tell you a funny story. Last year, I was helping a kid fill out the common application, which is how you apply to colleges. we got to the part where they had to fill out their parents information. he's filling in his mom's name.

And then he got to the section where it said maiden name. he goes, what do I put here? And I was like, well, you put her maiden name and he was like, we don't go to Renaissance festivals.

[00:16:37] Nina: No, stop it right now, that's Amazing. Oh my gosh, that could be like a meme I don't think my parents were very involved in my college application process or really a lot of processes. I'm the youngest of three. So I just think they were a lot more hands off and it was a different time. 

[00:16:53] Kate: I think it was less expensive when we went to college. So it didn't feel like the same financial investment. I think our parents in general were just more hands off, they didn't need to be as involved. But yeah, now I often have parents who will try and fill out their college applications for their kids.

And that's where we have to put a stop to that because you can't go off to college not having filled out a form.

[00:17:17] Nina: Yes. Do you have to stop parents sometimes and say, listen, your kid has to do this?

[00:17:21] Kate: we'd be here all day if I was going to tell you stories 

[00:17:23] Nina: Yeah, I guess we shouldn't. Cause you have real clients out there in the world and I get that. Do you ever get kids, I'm so interested in your work, who come to you like real out of sorts about where their friends are applying and nervous about the competition within the school? I don't know if this is a rumor or if it's true that, schools will only take so many kids from each high school. Is that, real?

[00:17:43] Kate: So schools don't have quotas. and I think that that is a definitely a misconception about the college admissions process, right? University of Michigan is not saying we're only taking 15 kids from that school, but that being said, they're likely not taking 80.

There is a little bit of that going on and yes, kids do come upset and want to talk or maybe don't want to talk. And then I have to sort of pull it out of them a little bit. I think the benefit of having someone like me for your kid is that there is an emotional detachment maybe that I can offer that a parent can't necessarily offer in the same situation. A 3rd party sounding board. I've seen it over and over and over again has been really helpful.

I will hire someone for my own kids, even though this is what I do for a living for that reason. kids are mostly upset, honestly, on the day after colleges have made their admissions decisions and kids have been notified and social media. It's a real big thing for the kids to post where they got in on social media, to post little videos of them opening their admissions notifications, that's really hard.

That's really hard. 

[00:18:56] Nina: I don't think it's going away. So it's almost better to help kids deal with how do you encounter news like that, as opposed to us hoping that it would go away. Instead it's like we need to empower them with how do you handle disappointment? It's like helping them feel okay when your friend has succeeded and, you know, succeeded in this one little measure.

You both wanted this thing. One friend got it and one friend didn't, that is something that's going to happen throughout your life forever. Do you end up dealing with that in part of your practice?

[00:19:24] Kate: So I definitely end up dealing with that in part of my practice and this is I guess where I'm gonna put my mom hat on for a second. I definitely deal with that in my personal life, too. I mean, I have three kids, so we always say around my house, blowing out somebody else's candle doesn't make yours shine brighter.

So you should cheer for your friends when something good happens to them. be that person, Other people are eventually going to be able to do it for you. So modeling that behavior as a parent is really important to me. cheering for my friends, cheering for my kids, friends.

[00:19:55] Nina: Yes, I have said to my kids too, you should be looking for opportunities to lift your friends up. Don't be the first person to cut your friend down. You need to be looking for opportunities to cheer them on. Be the first, be the first to like the post, even if we're talking about something as social media. Lift them up.

[00:20:11] Kate: And when it comes to college admissions, though, it feels like we're all a little bit pitted against each other. Everybody is putting forth such a different application and keeping an eye or just getting a better understanding. I should say that college admissions is a business. Colleges didn't pick you because they liked you better. They picked you because you filled a need for that college. And maybe your friend didn't in that case. But at the next college, your friend filled that need. And maybe you didn't. It's the idea that finding your right fit place, everybody's going to have one.

Everyone might even have more than one right fit place.

[00:20:51] Nina: That's important message that you can be happy more than one place. There is a little bit of and I wonder how you feel about this that concept of wherever you go there you are. I do think there could be a not good fit. You experienced it yourself, So there's probably better fits. worse fits, but I don't know that there's just one perfect school.

[00:21:08] Kate: yeah, I totally agree. And I think you and I were talking offline about how to make your student successful, or if you're that student, how to be successful socially in college. The way to do that is a way that we look at college applications. One of that is something it's called metacognition.

I'm not saying it the right way, but metacognition it's thinking about your thinking and being able to evaluate a situation stepped back from it. When you are thinking about your high school experience, socially, what went right, What do you wish you changed a little bit? And then finding a school that fits those qualities or those needs.

And working from your strengths.

[00:21:47] Nina: I would love to hear some examples I mean, I know you can't talk about real kids. What would a conversation like that look like in terms of, wanting to change some things that you did in high school, for example. I love this idea.

[00:21:57] Kate: well, again, I always say you work from your strengths. So maybe don't start with the question of what went wrong. Start with the question of what went right. 

Let's say you found three really good friends in high school and what you love to do with them is play Dungeons and Dragons. Maybe don't look for your people in college at the gym. Maybe your people are in their dorm room on Friday night, or in the, you know, finding games to play or movie nights in the dorms, you have to know where to look for your people, and the kinds of people you're looking for. So, when you're thinking about maybe what went wrong, were you trying to fit yourself into situations in high school that weren't really a good fit for you?

[00:22:37] Nina: This is actually perfectly timed. I just recorded an episode on Enneagram, which, our common friend, Rebecca Jacobs, who's also my assistant producer now, loves. She's like way into Enneagram. I didn't know much about it. But the message on that is very similar to what we're talking about here, which is to know yourself. And to know that there are all different kinds of people. A person who wants to stay in and play video games versus a person who wants to go to a football game. There's no better or worse. It's just knowing who you are and who you connect with. It is a lot to ask in some ways of a 17, 18 year old to kind of be that self aware and be comfortable, 

[00:23:11] Kate: yeah. I often will say to kids this year at school, what filled your cup? What made you happy at school this year? And so for some people it'll be running cross country. For some people it will be, you know what made me so happy? I got to quit the wrestling team. That was not it for me.

For some people, it's going to be, I got an A on my English paper. What filled your cup? Figure out what those moments are, and then seek out those experiences, or seek out ways to replicate those experiences in college.

[00:23:39] Nina: And I see that, in your business in particular. I feel like you're looking at it all holistically and not just what is the quote unquote best school I can get you into. But it's more where can we help you find the right fit. You see parents appreciating that in kids?

[00:23:53] Kate: I hope so. I wish that more parents thought of it that way, that maybe there's a more than one right fit school. The definition of what the quote unquote best college is, is going to be different to every person. To me, the definition of the best college is the college where your student is available to grow socially, emotionally, academically, personally, professionally.

I mean, I could go on and on. That, to me, is the best. I don't care what the college board says.

[00:24:24] Nina: okay kate, in our emails and, you know, kind of pre discussions, you had mentioned something called soiling the nest, which I have not heard, and I want you to explain it to me and to my listeners.

[00:24:34] Kate: soiling the nest is a phenomenon where, and kids will do it at home and with their friends outside of the house, where right before this big transition of leaving for college, it is not uncommon for kids to pick fights argue with, or say they don't like anymore, you know, basically to pull themselves away from their friend group.

And sometimes even from their parents a little bit. it's kind of like testing the waters before that big transition to college.

[00:25:05] Nina: Oh, I definitely know what that is. I think there's another term for it. Separation anxiety, I guess, right? But I like soiling the nest because it's like a great, image as opposed to the empty nest. that makes sense. I had an opposite experience when my son went for his, gap year. 

We were more just extra attached at the hip. And when he left, It was a little challenging because his friends all left for college first. He didn't leave till the end of August and they left more like mid to late August So first of all, that was hard. He was just kind of here Minneapolis watching his friends kind of have the experience that he knew he would have eventually, but it felt very far away.

When he left, I cried, like I'd never cried before, but so did he, we were just, and my husband, we were just crying and crying, my eyes hurt. And I'm not a big crier. Like I couldn't wear contacts for days because I could not stop crying. It was such a strange, it was like, I guess that's maybe a different separation anxiety. We glossed over any negative stuff when we were just like, you're the best mom, you're the best son.

[00:26:00] Kate: Well, I am a crier, so what's going to happen to me?

[00:26:03] Nina: scared. I'm scared for you. 

[00:26:04] Kate: You're proof that the transition is good on the other side. 

[00:26:07] Nina: You know one positive on college admissions. I just want to wrap us up with, I put it on my Facebook group. Like I said, and I just want to read a couple of comments there. Well, there's positive ad negative in here. I just thought it'd be interesting to hear, from some of my listeners.

One listener said in my experience, some people get very strange around this stuff. I have some friends who won't talk about it, claiming their child doesn't want them sharing where they're applying or other details, which you and I covered knowing their personalities, there's the possibility they just don't want to mention it because it gives my child the idea who to work with, what to What test tutor to use, might apply to the same school. It might be a spot taken. these friends approach many things in life with the attitude that there are only so many opportunities to go around. I don't join in on it and I roll my eyes and when that happens and move on. So that's a good attitude. She has, she said, I have another friend. I think this is relatable, not something we really touched on. I have another friend whose children are very high achieving and she didn't want to talk about it. Which I think was largely because she felt it would sound like bragging. I totally get that. 

[00:27:07] Kate: Yeah. 

[00:27:07] Nina: so I think that's actually socially aware and sensitive of that friend. my reader or listener said, I've told her a hundred times. I'm so happy for her kid. It, does not, change the way like I see her or anything, but she doesn't want to talk about it. So I have dropped it. for the rest, which is the majority. It's been a good bonding experience. As we move through the next season of life, talking about the stress and craziness at the application process. Tours, making a selection, it's cathartic. And one other listener said something similar, which I thought was nice. And I've mostly experienced it too. She said, in my experience, I think of bonds more than it divides. We parents are all going through it together, just like many parenting milestones. After acceptances, it further bonds people. People I knew as acquaintances are now in text groups because we are now networking about hotel recommendations, flights home for Thanksgiving, rides home, et cetera. I love that point. I think it's nice to end on the positive. 

[00:27:58] Kate: Well, you know what? That comment made me think of that we're also going into a different phase of life. as our kid leaves for college, we, as a parent, as a couple, you're going into a different phase of life. And so you kind of get new friends for each phase of life. Don't they say you get new friends every seven 

[00:28:18] Nina: seven years.

[00:28:19] Kate: Seven years. So like that would kind of make sense, right? That your kid is transitioning you're transitioning too..

[00:28:25] Nina: Yes. And I think it's a good, Attitude to go into the college application process with as a parent that there's an opportunity for you to grow as a parent. And, be open to these new relationships. Because I will tell you, I get a lot of letters, from people in their, 60s, 70s, 50s also, depending on, if these are parents when you had kids who just feel really lonely, in this post raising kids era, they, the sports friends are gone. The school friends are gone, and maybe this is a place to start meeting people from other parts of the country. Just meeting other people in your town who you didn't know before because they have kids going to the same place. So these are the positives Kate and I want to leave you with. That's not all competition, jealousy, and negatives.

[00:29:06] Kate: Nope. It's all exciting. The applications are the messy middle, but going off to college is the happy exciting part.

[00:29:14] Nina: Well, your students are lucky to have you. You seem just like a very balanced, reasonable, positive person to work with. Do you work with people around the country? 

[00:29:22] Kate: I do. It's probably about 50 50. And some of the kids are so busy. They'd rather not leave their room anyway, even if they're in Maryland.

[00:29:30] Nina: thank you so much for your time, Kate. I really, really appreciate it. And I hope, you have a good, application season. I know you're in, you're busy, you're busy time now.

[00:29:39] Kate: Nina, thank you for having me.

[00:29:41] Nina: All right. Listeners come back next week when our friendships are going well, we are happier all around. Thank you. 

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Nina Badzin

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