There鈥檚 little disagreement that the past year-plus has had its share of challenges and obstacles brought on by the pandemic. While few demographics were spared, student were hit especially hard by the demands of virtual school and the almost complete lack of campus and outside activities and socialization with friends and classmates. Until very recently, this year鈥檚 graduating class of high school seniors were pretty much 鈥渇lying blind鈥� to quote a CDB Scholar when it came to visiting any college and university. And those rare campuses that did allow visitors on site offered no campus tours, in person interviews or informational sessions outside of Zoom webinars, with their student community attending virtual classes.

High school seniors also faced the reality that many of the nation鈥檚 highly selective colleges and universities dealt with a surge in applications, as the previously mandated SAT and ACT tests were optional for the 2021 application year. This resulted in applicants who previously would not have met test standards stipulated at certain universities and colleges took the attitude of 鈥渨hat do I have to lose?鈥� and applied to schools that in another year might have been out of reach by virtue of their test scores.

In spite of this changing college application landscape, the CDB high school seniors鈥攖he class of 2021鈥攑ersevered and figured out alternative ways to conduct their college research. As a class, they applied to over sixty colleges and universities in the United States and abroad. Many of the senior Scholars reached out to CDB alumni who currently attend the colleges and universities they were interested in learning more about from insiders at the various schools. I was delighted to hear back from many CDB seniors that the CDB alumni not only responded to their inquiries by phone, email and Zoom sessions, but also reached out to them to let the seniors know who they were and what particular schools they attend to start a dialogue. As more schools opened up in April and May, some of the seniors were able to visit the colleges where they were admitted and meet with CDB alums in person鈥攎asked and safely socially distanced.

This year鈥檚 CDB seniors will matriculate to colleges and universities throughout the United States and abroad, schools that match their academic interests and offer them the opportunity to pursue ongoing areas of interest as well as many course possibilities to explore. One CDB  Scholar will be taking a gap year and plans to pursue advanced educational and service projects before starting college in 2022. Another CDB Scholar will be attending Oxford University in England.

CDB Scholars from the class of 2021 have been recognized with multiple academic, service and achievement awards and recognition including Presidential Scholars, National Merit Scholar Finalists, Valedictorians and Saluditorians of their class as well as matriculating to honors programs at their upcoming colleges and universities.

CDB welcomed ten new schools and programs to our international list of colleges and universities attended by CDB Scholars since the inaugural class of 2002 Scholars. Here is a list of the schools and programs the CDB class of 2021 will attend this coming fall. Several Scholars are still deciding among their admission options:

• Brown University
• Brown University鈥檚 PLME program (an eight year program for students who are committed to a career in medicine and who also want a broad liberal arts education)
• Bryn Mawr College
• Columbia University
• California University of Technology
• Columbia University
• Georgetown University
• George Washington University
• Harvard College
• Macalister College
• Oxford University
• Stanford University
• University of Florida Stamps Scholar Program
• University of Pennsylvania
• University of Pennsylvania Management and Technology Program
• University of Texas  Agriculture and Mechanical Honors Program
• Washington and Lee University
• Webb Institute
• Wellesley College
• Whitman College

The 优蜜视频 and CDB communities wish our graduating high School seniors a successful and engaging next chapter of their lives and look forward to staying in contact with them as they continue to thrive.

This post originally appeared on September 4, 2012, on . It has been republished here with the permission of the author, who is a writer and mother of three. This post is about her gifted oldest son leaving home for college. While it is not an experience limited to parents of gifted children, it is an experience many of you will have. It may come when you send your child to a boarding school because it is what will best fit his or her individual needs, or it might be when your child heads off to college, or it might be after college, when your child decides to move out. After years of advocating for them in school and supporting their unique needs, your gifted children will leave home and must learn how to support these needs on their own. And no matter how much you help prepare them for that, it is still difficult to watch them set out on their own.

On the day my eldest son left for college, my youngest son got his first zit. This had to be some kind of sign, I thought. Time marches on or some such thing.

Maybe this was God鈥檚 little joke aimed at a mom whose 鈥渂aby鈥� is no longer a baby and whose first child was flying the coop. If so: not funny.

So many words have been spilled on this very subject – the first kid leaving for college – that it feels unoriginal to be thinking about it, let alone writing about it. And yet it pierces uniquely.

In the months leading up to Jonah鈥檚 departure, I鈥檇 find myself crying at unpredictable moments. I鈥檇 wander past his closed door, hear the sounds of his guitar playing on the other side, and think: Starting in September that room will be empty and silent. Cue the tears.

As Jonah and I made our cross-country sojourn from the San Francisco Bay area to Brown University in Providence, leaving his two younger brothers (17 and 13) at home with my husband, strange coincidences ensued.

Jonah has always had out-of-the-mainstream interests. Two examples: he became borderline-obsessed with Napoleon Bonaparte in middle school and is endlessly fascinated by 19th-century French history; and his favorite musician is Mark Knopfler, known mostly by people my age as the lead-man and guitarist of the 80鈥檚 band, Dire Straits.

A couple of nights before we left home, Jonah played his guitar at an open-mic night at a music club in our hometown of Mill Valley. The song he played was Dire Straits鈥� 鈥淩omeo and Juliet鈥� – a fairly obscure choice for non-Knopflerphiles.

A few days later, our rental car stuffed to the brim with Target purchases, we stopped for lunch on our way to Providence. The restaurant was playing music, 60鈥檚 Motown-type stuff. Then out of nowhere, we heard the sound of Mark Knopfler鈥檚 voice: it was 鈥淩omeo and Juliet.鈥� I burst into tears, sending our alarmed waiter scurrying away.

When we got to the Brown campus on Friday, the very first kid we met was a history-obsessed young man from North Carolina with a special passion for Napoleon who, out of a class of 1500 freshmen, also happens to be in Jonah鈥檚 history seminar of 20 kids.

On Sunday I attended a parent seminar entitled 鈥淪aying Goodbye, Letting Go, and Learning to Live with a Brown Student.鈥� Much of the discussion centered on being supportive without being intrusive. The faculty members and upperclassmen running the seminar did a few skits, re-enacting phone calls that typically occur between parents and children during the first few weeks of freshman year.

As one faculty member, playing 鈥淢om,鈥� phoned her 鈥渟on鈥� with a variation on the 鈥測ou don鈥檛 call, you don鈥檛 write鈥� complaint, parents in the audience laughed nervously. You mean they really won鈥檛 call? We were encouraged to give our kids some space; we were reassured that they鈥檇 get in touch eventually; we were instructed to let them try to solve roommate issues on their own.

As I sat in the crowded auditorium, I felt slightly better. I realized that while this experience was specific and personal, it was also universal. And it鈥檚 exactly what is supposed to happen. We raise our kids from babies to toddlers to children to adolescents to young adults, and then they leave us to begin their own lives. It鈥檚 only logical: if they never develop the skills to live independently, we haven鈥檛 done our job. Who wants to suck at being a parent?

And yet.

I didn鈥檛 feel ready for Jonah to go. I don鈥檛 feel like I had enough of his company during those short 18 years. I wish I had more time to see him interact with his brothers at the dinner table; to observe his thought process as he works through a research paper or a discussion about politics; to listen to him play guitar along with Mark Knopfler. I simply loved having him around, and the loss feels huge.

So as I watched him walk back toward his dorm before I left, his roommate鈥檚 arm slung around Jonah鈥檚 shoulder in a protective and brotherly way, of course I cried. But eventually, I had to drive away and to fly back home.

After all, I need to help Aaron with his college applications. And maybe we鈥檒l see if we can do something about Henry鈥檚 zit, like introduce him to face soap. Life goes on. As for Jonah, he can鈥檛 get rid of me that easily: I just figured out how to use Skype.

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