Thursday Round Up

9 October

Photo by Konstantin Dyadyun on Unsplash
News from the Homefront: 

Fall Conferences:
On 16 October we will have our in person fall conferences. Be on the lookout for the sign up in the Notes for the Week. On 22 October will will be having virtual conferences if you cannot make it the 16th.
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School Based SAT:
On 21 October we will be giving the school based PSAT exam for all students in grades 10 and 11. 9th and 12th grades will have alternate activities during this time.

WAHS Fall Festival!*
WAHS Fall Festival Community Event – Join the WAHS Fine Arts Dept for an evening of spooky performances, trick or treating, haunted houses, good food, carnival games, and more! The WAHS Fine Arts Fall Carnival is Monday, October 13th from 4-7pm in the WAHS Fine Arts wing. Come dressed in your best costume for our costume contest and stay for the fall festivities! All money raised will go to support the fine arts programs here at WAHS, including the Eric Betthauser Scholarship Fund. Fun for all ages! 

​Fall Craft Fair and Vendor Bazaar
*Spirit, spice, and everything nice! WAHS Cheer is hosting its 1st ever Fall Craft Fair & Vendor Bazaar on October 18th from 9 AM to 1 PM in the WAHS Auxiliary Gym. Come shop unique items like permanent jewelry, hair tinsel, wax melts, Mrs. Myra Key’s famous pound cakes, tie-dye shirts, local artwork, and so much more! Plus, our cheerleaders will be offering face painting for any kids tagging along—fun for the whole family!

AP Exams
Initial WAHS AP Exam Registration will be open from October 1, 2025 - October 31, 2025.  Families have to register for their exam no later than October 31 to avoid the late registration fee of $40.00 per exam.  Families who need financial assistance can request that on the registration form. This year, we will be accepting Exam Registration through MySchoolBucks, regardless of the method of payment.  Here is a copy of the AP Exam Schedule.  Please see our school website for all information regarding exams

Governor's School
It's that time of the year! Summer Residential Governor's School offers programming in the area of academics, visual and performing arts, and world languages. Programs are prestigious and highly selective. Albemarle County pays the tuition for the program (there are usually fees for each program which run about $200). Academic and VPA are 3 weeks long. World Language is 3 weeks long. I will be having additional meetings for students interested in applying to Governor's School after Spirit Week. Please  complete this form. Governor's School is only for students in 10th and 11th grades.  I will be setting aside 2 warrior periods a week to meet with people who want help with applications. Please look for these sessions in Adaptive Scheduler.
Here are key dates you will need:
Looking for some Community Service?
Looking for volunteer hours? Arts in Western Education (AWE) is hosting an Arts Night Out for local elementary students at Crozet Elementary School on Friday, October 24. We are looking for several volunteers who can help support small groups of students as they participate in art related activities. The time of the event is 4:45- 8:30pm, and you can sign up here. 

Submit Your Work to the Myriad!
La Ofrenda de la Biblioteca de WAHS
Trunk or Treat is Coming!
Get your club or friends together and design a trunk for this great community event! Want your club to sponsor a trunk? Fill out the form today! 
​College Visits:
Sign up in Schoolinks!​​​​​​​​
  • 9 October – Guilford
  • 15 October – Elon
  • 16 October – Vanderbilt ​​
  • 21 October – CNU
  • 22 October – Hobart William Smith
  • 29 October – Randolph Macon
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Tomorrow is a(n) A day 

​Upcoming Events:​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​
  • 10 October – End of 1st Quarter
  • 11 October – ​HOCO!
  • 13-14 October – Teacher Work Day and Professional Development Day (no school for students)
  • 13 October – WAHS Fall Fest
  • 16 October – Family Conference Night 4:30-7:00 (in person)
  • 18 October – Craft Vendor/WAHS Cheer Fundraiser
  • 21 October – PSAT (10th and 11th)
  • 22 October – Family Conference Night 4:30-7:00 (on Zoom)
  • 25 October – Walk/Run for Breast Cancer
  • 25 October – Trunk or Treat
  • 2-3 November – Teacher Work Day and Professional Development Day (no school for students)
  • 13-16 November – Fall Show
  • 19 November – School Picture Make Up Day
  • 26-28 November – Thanksgiving Break
  • 7 December – Winter Band Concert
  • ​18 December – End of 1st Semester
  • 18 December – Winter Break
  • 5 January – Return from break
  • 19 January – MLK Day, No School for Students
  • 16 February – Teacher Work Day, No School for Students

Use Your Brain for Fun (&$)!

Humanities & Social Sciences

Scholastic Arts and Letters awards open today. The competition is open to students in grades 7-12. This is a very prestigious competition.

Bennington Young Writers is open for submissions. This writing contest is for students in grades 9-12. Submit by 1 November

Black and Latino Men Read has an essay contest that is open to male identifying people who also identify as Black or Latino. Submit your essay by 31 October.

Omega Psi Phi has an International Essay Competition that is worth up to $5,000. Submit your entry by 31 October.

Hey policy folks! Check out the International Public Policy Forum's current contest. Get a team together and submit your essay and qualify for the competition. 

The Writer's Eye is happening even as we speak! Head to the Fralin to check out the artworks and get writing!

The International Writing Contest invites authors in grades 9-12 to submit their writing. Submit by 25 October.

STEM

Hispanic seniors planning to study green technology, computer science, or are active in community service can apply to the Hispanic Youth Heritage Awards. Due 2 November

Are you a woman identifying person who is interested and engaged in the computing world? NCWIT wants to give you a scholarship. Open to 9-12. Submit by 28 October.

Get in on the NASA TechRise Challenge! This is a team competition to place an experiment on a suborbital mission. Submit by 3 November

Join the Presidential AI Challenge! Do you have a plan for how AI could solve a community issue? Then you have a project! 

NASA invites you to their Student Launch Challenge. This is a 9 month challenge for those interested in aerospace engineering!

Programmers, get your plans in place for the Congressional App Challenge. WAHS has had a winner in the past so we can definitely do it again! Check the contest out!
Picture
Photo by Ari He on Unsplash

Visual and Performing Arts

Scholastic Arts and Letters awards open today. The competition is open to students in grades 7-12. This is a very prestigious competition.

Frame Your Future is taking submissions beginning today. Create a piece that envisions your future and submit it for a chance at a $2,000 scholarship

The Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award is given to students ages 8-18 for music. It's worth up to $10,000. Apply by 15 November

Save the Frogs is an art contest for students of all ages. Submit your artwork to them by 1 November

Growing Up with AI is a NYT multimedia challenge. Submit your entry by 22 October.​

Debbie's Dream Foundation has an art contest for students in grades K-12. If you have been affected by cancer, submit your work by 30 October.

The Concerto Competition is open to students in 9-12 grades. Sponsored by the US Marine Band, it's worth $5,000 and due by 15 November.

Scholarships for Seniors

The NC State University Park Scholarship application is now available.  This is a full tuition/room and board scholarship to NC State University.  If you believe you’re qualified for the Park Scholarships based on our selection criteria of scholarship, leadership, service and character, we welcome you to apply. The application processes for Park Scholarships and NC State undergraduate admissions are separate, so be sure to follow the instructions below. The application for 2025-2026 is now open! 
​Eligibility Requirements: To be eligible for the Park Scholarships program, candidates must:
  • Have a minimum unweighted GPA of 3.8.
  • Be a United States citizen, permanent resident of the U.S., or graduating from a high school located in the U.S. (regardless of citizenship status).
  • Apply for fall, first-year admission into a baccalaureate program at NC State.
By 11:59 pm ET, November 1: The Park Scholarships application requires:
  • Two recommendations
  • Information about advanced coursework completed
  • Two essays
If you have any trouble accessing the application after following these instructions, please email park [email protected] and request that we have Admissions add an application to your wolfPAW portal.       https://park.ncsu.edu/apply/

Indiana University Wells Scholars Program
The Wells Scholars Program is looking for outstanding students with exceptional academic accomplishments who have shown excellent leadership, significant commitment to extracurricular activities, a concern for their communities, and interest in the larger world.   

Other Scholarship Opportunities of Interest:

The Elks Most Valuable Student Scholarship:
Eligibility: US Citizen
Judging Criteria: Academics, Leadership, Service, Financial Need.
Applications can be found here
Awards between $4,000-$30,000
Deadline: Nov. 12th.

The Flusche & Fitzgerald Undergrad Scholarship Contest Award: $500 scholarship
Deadline:  November 30, 2025
Where to Apply: The Flusche & Fitzgerald Undergrad Scholarship Contest
Self Care:

Do Good Things for People

Looking for volunteer hours? Arts in Western Education (AWE) is hosting an Arts Night Out for local elementary students at Crozet Elementary School on Friday, October 24. We are looking for several volunteers who can help support small groups of students as they participate in art related activities. The time of the event is 4:45- 8:30pm, and you can sign up here.

Support the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards with their annual tree sale this weekend
​Scholarships
Do you need money to make post high a reality? Start with these two databases!
Regeneron Talent Search is looking for your work. You must apply by 6 November. It's worth up to $250,000 for college.

The Elks' Most Valuable Student Scholarship is worth up to $50,000. Apply by 12 November

The National Space Foundation Keynote Scholar application is open for submissions. The winner gets up to $20,000. Apply by 17 November.

The Voice of Democracy is worth up to $35,000. There is a specific prompt to respond to. Complete this by 31 October.

Become a Chick-fil-A Scholar and bring in up to $25,000 for college or post high learning. Submit your application by 28 October.

The Stamps Scholarship is a full ride (tuition, room and board, and fees) scholarship that partners with various universities in the US. You must go through the partner institutions.

Dr. Pepper has a scholarship sweepstakes worth up to $10,000. 

The Jack Kent Cook Scholarship awards artists up to $10,000 for college. It's open to people 8-18 so get your fall app in! It's due by 15 November

"The Best School" and "The Best School for You" should be one and the same. You're not buying a pair of shoes. You're going to school for four years. Just because it's a good brand name, doesn't mean it fits you or that you're comfortable there. 

College Corner

Berry College

What does college actually cost?

The cost of college is a factor in making decisions about where to apply and where to attend. Things have changed since many of us were in college in the 80s and early 90s. In 1985, tuition and room and board cost about $6,500 a year. Today however, a school like the University of Richmond is $68,000. And their room and board? Another $18k.

But the cost of college is a nebulous thing. Few people will ever pay the full “sticker price” of a private college or university. But most of us are not so wealthy that we remain unaffected by the costs of college in real and often lasting ways, so having a serious and thoughtful conversation about the cost of college is important. And it should be done honestly and earnestly and as we would say of voting in Chicago, early and often.

Knowing what you can afford is important. Most of us do not have the means to pay the cost of private tuition for a full four years. Take my own alma mater who visited last week, the University of Chicago. They are saying that cost of attendance is in the $98,000 range this year. That charge includes $71,325 in tuition, $20,833 for room and board, $1,800 in books and materials, $1,623 in student service fees, and $318 for a UPASS.  That is a lot of money. Do you have that kind of money? That is the equivalent of buying a Rivian four times in four years. It’s the better part of a home. A family making $175,000 or more with a younger child and a house worth around $500,000 will be expected to cover more than $75,000 of this cost. Can you do that? And is it worth it to do?

Should you pay for Duke when UVA offers a similar educational opportunity? It’s important to think this through. We told our daughter she could go to William and Mary or to a school that cost what William and Mary cost. That was our price point and we made it clear where we were.
And indeed, like ours, most families are offered only loans as a way to offset the cost of tuition. We turned the loans down (which you can do!) because we didn’t want our daughter or us to hold $20,000 in loans at the end of four years. But what we didn't really think about fully when we agreed to send our daughter to Macalester was that tuition rises every year and usually more than salaries do. So the first year, it was only a little over a thousand dollars a year more than William and Mary. But the year after, tuition went up. And then it was closer to four thousand more. Several years ago, when the state bullied the public institutions by threatening to withhold state funds if tuition rose again, William and Mary did not increase their tuition. But Mac did. By her senior year we paid $5,000 more than W&M for her to go there. 

College has many hidden costs as well. Sports, even club sports, cost money. Pledging a fraternity or sorority? That costs money. Our daughter is a musician. New mallets for her vibes, her keyboard, and shipping these things cost money. Does your child need transportation there and back? What kind? Driving with the price of gas right now is more than it seems. Many schools’ dorms don't offer food on Sundays or only offer a single meal that day. Study abroad is important but often expensive and not covered by regular tuition. What we found was that if Teresa's study abroad was more expensive than Macalester tuition, we paid Mac tuition. Nice right? But if it cost less than Mac? We paid Mac tuition. Poo. Ka ching. Plan on paying more than what you budget for tuition and room and board because there will be expenses. Someone will break an ankle, have a performance you want to see, do an internship that does not pay, or want to go to Italy.

We were very careful, and with a business I run outside of school, my husband's keynote speaking, and saving more, we made it through, but there were other costs. We didn’t repair a leaky tub which led to all kinds of problems and we also didn’t go on expensive vacations. Our daughter totaled her 2009 Chevy Cobalt sophomore year, and we relied on the fact that her birthday is two days before Christmas for family donations to the car fund instead of being able to replace it solely ourselves. 

Are scholarships the answer? Sometimes yes. Teresa (our daughter) was lucky enough to get some excellent merit scholarships and that made a huge difference. She got into Middlebury, but ended up in a less selective school that offered her pretty great merit aid. The education was absolutely every bit as good, her classmates were outstanding and the professors were exceptional. Moving down a level of selectivity meant we could pay for a school that was as good as Middlebury but similar in cost to an in-state option. Had she gone down one more level we’d have paid significantly less than even in-state. Beloit, which is also a terrific school, showered her with merit aid and would still have been an excellent education. There are plenty of ways that private schools, with much deeper pockets can provide more aid than public schools and even be less expensive than public schools. But you have to know what you're doing and you have to be savvy about what kind of education you're looking for.

Does this mean you should turn to the Ivies for their 100% grant aid guarantee? Not really. These schools put aside monies for particular folks, and it’s not usually the likes of you or me. Their aid generally goes to students who are first generation, and have financial need, or are foreign students. Foreign students, even today? Sure. It’s a marketing thing: those students go home again with their MIT and Princeton degrees and the prestige of those schools remains high around the world. Don’t think because Yale is dripping with cash that you will be the recipient of it. There just isn’t merit aid at the most selective schools. There doesn’t need to be. You probably told your child this already: If you get in we’ll make it work. Well, 90 some percent of folks attending these schools are paying full freight just to go there so that’s why they don’t offer discounts.  

So what should you do? Talk about your finances as a family and be honest and open about it. Teresa knew what we could afford to pay and there was a little wiggle room but not a lot. She wasn’t surprised when we nixed Middlebury instantly. If your kids know what they can afford, they know where they can apply and they know what the expectations will be when they get into their dream school, but might not be able to go there. 

Use the net price calculators. They are there for a reason. Enter all the information into them and find out what you’re looking at. Remember the information is still an estimate and that that estimate errs on the side of less than what you may actually owe. If your son is dedicated to applying to the University of Denver, include all the costs: not just tuition, but also transportation, clothing (winter is different there!), your visits out, etc. A kid at UCLA is far away and the cost of flip flops and sunscreen adds up.

Be sure to fill out the FAFSA which is open now no matter what else you do. You'll need it for financial aid of any sort, merit or need based. Some schools will also require the CSS, which is more detailed and done through the College Board. The FAFSA is a little fiddly and slightly irritating, but I successfully negotiated it several years in a row, and I am not a CPA so if I can do it anyone can do it. The CSS is thankfully a one shot deal. What's nice is the FAFSA is based on last year's taxes so as long as you have them at the ready you should be just fine. Don't wait on this though, especially if you will qualify for financial aid. It's a first come first served type of pool so the earlier you file, the more aid you're likely to get.

Finally, don’t assume the tuition in-state will keep from going up. UVA is almost independent of the state as far as their operating budget goes. The state only contributes a nominal amount (maybe 6%) to running UVA. Tuition is how UVA manages to function. It’s likely tuition will continue to rise in Virginia, and it’s important to budget that in no matter where your child ends up going.

And remember you also still need to have a life with your kid in college. Family vacations may not be to New Zealand, but you'll still want to get away for a bit. Washing machines will still go on the fritz, someone may still get sick. Busting the budget with college tuition isn't a wise thing to do. Keep it within your means. And that means making choices early in the process, not after acceptances come in.

On the Town

Photo by Jared Sluyter on Unsplash
Events:​​​​