How to Decide on a College

Your high school senior will be receiving responses from most of his or her prospective colleges by the first of April, and the universal enrollment deadline is the first of May. After all the agony of completing applications and essays, and the excruciating anxiety of waiting, now the ball is in your teen’s court at last.

April carries a different kind of angst. How to decide?

I encourage you to turn to several of my posts for advice, empathy and support: Waiting for the “Fat Envelope“, Standing Out on the Waiting List,  Admitted Students Day: A Different Kind of College Visit, and Decision-Making 101. In this post, I offer three principles to keep in mind when making that final decision:

1. There is no “perfect” decision; compromise is part of life. There may have been a time, earlier in your son or daughter’s senior year, when he or she thought, “There is only ONE college for me!” Perhaps this all-or-nothing ideal has already faded, if your student was denied, deferred or waitlisted at an early notification or regular decision “dream school.” Your teen has probably become wiser and more realistic over the past few months. How nice that this painful process has resulted in enhanced maturity!

Compromise is part of good decision-making. Sometimes we can’t have everything we originally wanted, but that does not mean we can’t have anything. Hopefully, we can be resilient enough to de-invest in the original choice, process the disappointment, and redirect our energies toward another worthy option.

For example, just because the most beautiful girl in the senior class has turned you down for the prom does not mean you cannot persuade another desirable girl to go with you. And who knows, you may actually have more fun with that girl than with the original one, if you approach the situation with openness, flexibility and enthusiasm. This simple metaphor applies to getting into college, finding a job, a spouse, and many future life choices. Hopefully, it is a life lesson you yourself have successfully learned, and you will be able to guide your child in learning it.

2. The “wow” factor is something worth considering, but not everything. It is certainly desirable for the chosen college to offer a “wow” factor that gives you and your student a feeling that this long struggle has had a rewarding outcome. By “wow” factor, I mean your teen’s gut feeling that he or she can be really happy at this school, driven by the perceived “fit” from college visits.

Yes, the “wow” factor can even include jazzy features like being located in a “hot” city, offering academic prestige or a social caché that enables a kid to hold his head high among peers, and so forth. We’re all human, after all, and we don’t have to be so morally superior so as to pretend these things don’t count. It is okay for these elements to be a part of the “wow” factor, within reason, as long as they do not become more important than the student’s authentic belief that he or she will be happy and successful at the school.

So it’s desirable that the chosen college offers a “wow” factor. But just like any big-ticket, complex purchase, the buyer needs to look beyond that overall good feeling. For example, if you are buying a car, you probably want a “wow” factor, such as snazzy styling and speed, or prestigious, classic luxury. A car is more than transportation; let’s face it, nobody wants a boring, ho-hum automobile that offers no excitement.

But you also need to pay attention to attributes beyond the “wow” factor. Can you afford the car, or can you get financing that will be acceptable to you? Does the car offer the practical features you need, such as: four wheel drive if you live in a snowy, mountainous area; high safety ratings if it is for a first-time driver; large trunk if you will use it for family travel; or economical gas mileage if you have a long commute?

You and your student need to look beyond the “wow” factor for college, too. Affordability (now that financial packages are in) and numerous other dimensions all need to be analyzed now, with a much sharper pencil. You may be comparing two or more schools, and the one with the slightly higher “wow” factor may lose out once you have compared all the relevant factors in this complex decision.

Below is a checklist of the key factors to be considered, most of which you have examined before. These features need to be revisited again, however, because your teen has evolved over the past year. Your son or daughter’s perspective has changed, and priorities have most likely shifted.

• Affordability (family financial situation, need-based aid, merit scholarships, estimated future debt your child will carry under each school alteranative)

• Public or private university, or liberal arts college (visits may have shifted student’s preferences)

• Academic program (student’s likely major, changing academic interests, flexibility for further mind-changing)

• Extracurricular activities (student’s changing priorities)

• Size (visits may have shifted preferences)

• Urban, suburban or rural setting (visits may have shifted  preferences)

• Physical campus (visits may have shifted preferences)

• Social atmosphere (visits may have shifted preferences)

• Geographic region (visits may have shifted preferences)

• Distance from home (student’s tolerance for distance, transportation costs)

• Support services (for physical, learning or emotional challenges)

 

3. Remember, this is not the only important decision your adolescent will ever make.  The college choice is the first of many major, multi-factor, life decisions your son or daughter will make in the future; decision-making is a “lifetime sport.”

The beauty of this situation is that you are sharing the decision, providing guidance and role modeling, and you obviously have major skin in the game. Since you are most likely financing college, this decision will not be entirely left up to your child, no matter how autonomous, mature, or determined he or she may be. From my perspective, it should not be totally up to your student, who is, after all, only seventeen. Your son or daughter should have significant input, but I feel it needs to be a collaborative decision, leveraging the parents’ wisdom and experience.

This decision should be a participative learning experience, in my view, that will set the stage for your adult child’s optimal, independent decisions in the future. When your student chooses internships, a job, a place to live, graduate school, and other key decisions in the next few years, he or she will have a valuable template upon which to draw. Choosing one’s college, with parental support, is one of the initiating “rites of passage” to adulthood!

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Admitted Students Day: A Different Kind of College Visit

As April First approaches, your high school senior has probably already received responses from some prospective colleges. Certainly in a few weeks, all the returns will be in.  You will soon have three pieces of information on the table to help your teen make the decision of which college to attend.

1. Acceptance, Wait List, or Denial. This feedback is the college’s decision about the applicant. Obviously, acceptance means your student is in the driver’s seat.

If your student is waitlisted at a school that is still your teen’s first choice, your student should  inform the guidance counselor and communicate it directly with admissions as well. But make sure that a deposit is sent in by May 1 to a school your student would very much like to attend which has outright admitted him or her. For further advice, take a look at my post: Waiting for the “Fat Envelope.“

If your student has been denied at a top choice school, it may be emotionally difficult (although spring denials tend to be counterbalanced by acceptances, with a less “all-or-nothing” feeling than December denials). This is an opportunity to offer parental support for a painful, but valuable, life learning experience. See my posts: College Acceptances and Denials: The Best and Worst Things that Could Happen and The College Process: Dealing with Rejection.

2. Financial Packages. With the acceptance letter or shortly thereafter, your family will receive information on the college or university’s need-based and/or merit-based financial award package for your child. For most families, this information will be pivotal in determining the final choice between college acceptances. For advice on comparing packages, read my post, Waiting for the “Fat Envelope.“

3. Admitted Students Day. In April, many colleges and universities host an open house day, or even an entire weekend, for accepted students to visit the campus before making their decision. I encourage you to begin planning visits to schools to which your student has already been accepted, or where you expect he or she will gain admission (register online). Hopefully, admitted students day will not be your teen’s first visit to the campus (see I’ll Only Visit Colleges I Get Into). This time, however, the focus will be different. The college is now trying to “sell”  the admitted student and family on actually enrolling. Your son or daughter will now be in the choosing position, “kicking the tires” and making sure this is the place where he or she will really want to spend the next few years.

Admitted students day is an incredible opportunity, not only to enjoy a congratulatory celebration among fellow accepted freshmen, but to do true due diligence. Typical offerings are student panels, performing arts events, exposure to a classroom experience, student organization fairs, sports activities, financial aid discussions, and campus/dorm tours. Some schools will even allow an admitted student to shadow a current student for a day, or host an admitted student for an overnight stay: a chance to really see what campus life is all about! Take a look at schedules for a sampling of colleges: College of William and Mary, Colgate University, Skidmore College, University of Richmond, Lafayette College, Connecticut College and Emory University.

It is once again essential to play the role of an anthropologist, just as your family did during that first visit months ago, making every effort to research and observe the campus culture so that your teen can assess his or her fit, as I described in Tips for College Trips. The video below shows an example of how one student accepted at Brandeis University took full advantage of admitted students day to ask questions and learn what it would really be like to attend the school:

There are only so many weekends in April. Some schools have more than one admitted students days, and some center it around one big weekend, so it helps to be on top of organizing these trips as early as possible, saving the obvious dates and registering as soon as you can. If attending an accepted students day is not possible due to scheduling or cost, some schools offer regional receptions. Example: Vanderbilt University. Virtual contact with the school through social media has also become a great way to connect with the college and fellow accepted students. Example: Denison Class of 2015 Facebook Page.

There is another difference between an admitted students day visit and campus trips of the past. Before, you and your student were window shopping. Now, it is coming down to a decision. It can be emotionally stressful, especially if your family is comparing two or more colleges on multiple criteria, ranging from financial award packages to academic programs  to size of the freshman dorms. There may be added pressure if your student is also on a waiting list for the school that was originally at the top of his or her list. And time is of the essence, knowing the decision must be made before May First.

The decision-making process will certainly be easier if it is not the first time your student has visited the campus. As a parent, you can prepare by crunching the numbers on affordability of each acceptance option as soon as you have need and merit-based financial aid information in hand. But there will be late-April game-changers, such as your student’s reaction to new information at an admitted students event or moving off a waiting list. So stay flexible, be ready for late night discussions, and offer patient support as your adolescent makes the first big decision in his or her life.

Related posts: March Madness: College Acceptance, Waitlist, Denial…and Money,   Waiting for the “Fat Envelope“,  I’ll Only Visit Colleges I Get Into,  Tips for College Trips, Video Interview: The College Visit, Decision-Making 101, Standing Out on the Waiting List, Last Chance College Admission Opportunities, First Day of May.

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College Consultants? Who Needs’em?

Our current economy permits few luxuries. Why should families hire an independent college admissions consultant? (An encore post with the addition of my recent video interview on college consulting.)

1. Focused one-on-one attention. In the middle of this decade, studies by the U.S. Dept. of Education and National Association for College Admissions Counseling (NACAC) pointed to average public school counselor-to-student ratios in the range of 300-500 to 1. Guidance counselors can only devote part of their time to college advising, since their duties often include scheduling and discipline issues.These professionals are doing their best in a difficult situation. But for families who would like more individual attention for their high school student, an independent consultant can play a helpful role.

2. Rising college competitiveness. S. P. Springer et al, authors of Admission Matters: What Students and Parents Need to Know About Getting Into College, identify three factors that have made the college process more competitive and stressful than “back in the day”: the “echo” boom (or baby boomlet), social changes, and the internet. They describe the demographic explosion which causes students to be “edged out” of top colleges at which their parents were accepted–supply & demand. “More high school graduates than ever are competing for seats in the freshman class…In 1997, there were 2.6 million graduates…by 2009, the number of high school graduates had grown to 3.3 million…they are projected to stay at or above 3.2 million at least until 2022.” (p. 2).

Social changes have dramatically increased the complexity and competitiveness of the college process. “Application numbers have grown much faster than the age cohort…Not only are there more students graduating from high school each year, proportionally more of them want to go to college…At the same time, colleges themselves have increased their efforts to attract large, diverse pools of applicants.” (p.3).

The internet intensifies competition as well, because online applications (e.g., Common Application) have made it easy to apply to multiple colleges. (p. 3-4).

This competitive, complex landscape requires more guidance than it used to. It can be misleading, unrealistic (and unfair to the child) to rely on parental historical benchmarks: “I went to Penn and my son is as smart as I am, so why shouldn’t he be accepted?” (I went to Penn in the 70’s, Wharton in the 80’s, and Columbia in the 90’s, but who knows if I could get in today!) A consultant can provide an updated perspective.

3. Mistakes are costly. I am talking about cost in terms of student self-esteem as well as time and money. It is essential to have a realistic college list, with an appropriate number of “target” schools, not too many reaches or safes.

Unrealistic expectations may exacerbate the anxiety and stress of the college process, and result in your teen having to “settle” for a school that is not the best fit. They say, “You can always transfer,” and it’s true. But having to “start over” at a new campus can be emotionally challenging.

And don’t forget, transfer students are not always considered for many scholarships for which freshmen are eligible. If the new college’s requirements differ from the original school’s, the student may have to spend extra time and money taking additional courses. Why let a high school student go through this potentially costly “guinea pig” experience? Advice from an experienced counselor can prevent unnecessary expenditure of time, money and angst. You are about to shell out as much as $200K (for a private college), one of the largest investments you will ever make. An initial advisory service seems like a reasonable course of action before launching into such a venture.

4. A third party can help navigate the tricky parent-teen relationship. The college process creates the perfect storm in an already tense parent-teen dynamic. Your teen is legitimately struggling for autonomy, trying to find his or her authentic voice, while you are seeking to protect your evolving young adult from disastrous consequences of high risk behaviors. A third party mentor can lower tension. Often a teenager is more willing to listen to a third party than to parents!

5. An independent college consultant can help broaden opportunities for your child. A seasoned consultant has knowledge of many colleges and universities of which you may not be aware. He or she is experienced with resources (books, internet, individuals) to assist you in efficiently finding schools with strengths in your child’s fields of interest, or “great fits” with your child’s personality and social style.

An experienced consultant will also be familiar with excellent high school summer, gap year and study abroad programs. Although most college consultants are not financial aid advisors per se, they are acquainted with the process and can point you in the direction of specialists. They also can put you in touch with tutors for standardized testing and even educational consultants who can help with learning disabilities.

For information on choosing an independent college consultant, check with the National Association for College Admissions Counseling (NACAC) or the Independent Educational Consultants Association (IECA).

Any consultant you consider using in your area should be a member of one of these organizations, in addition to a professional background in counseling, school guidance, or admissions. Other credentials include the IECA Training Institute or College Counseling Certification by UC Berkeley, UC Irvine, or UCLA.

To offer further insights, I am sharing a segment from a recent interview I did on Hometowne TV, a local access cable network based in Summit, NJ, hosted by Myung Bondy. You can find additional segments of this interview covering a number of key college application topics on my YouTube.

Related posts: Your Target Colleges…And It’s a Moving Target, Parents of 11th Graders: Get Set for Junior College Night, High School Juniors Apathetic About College Applications?

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How to Plan a College Visit

It’s that time of year again. School holidays are coming up: President’s Weekend, Spring Break, Easter Break. Time for high school juniors to explore college campuses. As a college consultant, I am frequently asked how to plan and optimize college visits. So here are some key steps:

1. Decide which schools to visit. With the help of your guidance counselor or an independent consultant, you and your high school student need to be developing an initial college list. The criteria for selection should include: type of institution (public, private, university, liberal arts college, technical institute, arts conservatory); academic and extracurricular programs offered; affordability (public, private, merit scholarship availability); size; setting (urban, suburban, rural); geography and distance from home; diversity; and academic, political, cultural and social atmosphere.

Resources to generate the list can include: My own book, Navigating the Road to College: A Handbook for Parents; Lynn O’Shaughnessy’s The College Solution; Steven Antonoff’s The College Finder, or its related web site, InsideCollege.com; Loren Pope’s Colleges That Change Lives, or its related web site, ctcl.org; Greenes Guides’ The Hidden Ivies; and the Yale Daily News Staff’s The Insider’s Guide to Colleges 2012. You may also find the following blog posts helpful: First College List Question: Public vs. Private University, College Applications: Don’t Follow the Lemmings, and Your Target Colleges…and It’s a Moving Target. For performing arts or pre-medicine, check out my series on college majors listed in the lower right hand panel of this blog.

Do Internet research to whittle down the list to a manageable number of schools to visit. Besides perusing each school’s own web site, you can obtain visual impressions of the campus from sites such as: YouUniversityTV.com and CampusTours.com. College Board College Search offers free standardized facts and figures, such as size, costs, programs, deadlines and selectivity. US News & World Report offers academic rankings of schools and specific undergraduate programs, such as business and engineering, for around twenty bucks. MeritAid.com identifies scholarship programs. Your  own high school’s Naviance Family Connection will give insights into their students’ historical acceptance rates at each school. CollegeConfidential‘s forums offer opinions from students, parents, counselors and admissions professionals.

2. Set up trips that are not too overwhelming. Your teen needs to digest each campus visit, and cramming in too many schools, for the sake of efficiency when visiting a specific geographic area during a school holiday, could actually backfire. The schools might blend together too much, or the student, burning out by the end, may totally tune out the last school on the itinerary. Prioritize by making sure you hit the colleges that are absolutely at the top of your student’s list, the “must sees.” You might also try to show your student a real contrast, such as an urban vs. a rural school, early on in the spring, because it may help your student clarify what he or she truly wants and consequently narrow down the list.

3. Register for an information session and campus tour. Generally, you need to register in advance by going to the school’s web site under its “admission” or “prospective students” section and find “visits.” They usually have calendars that indicate availability of information sessions, tours, open houses, opportunities to sit in on a class, and special programs throughout the year. Sign up for special programs as appropriate, such as a tour of the performing arts facilities if your student is a musician, actor or dancer. Check out what may be going on at the college the weekend you are planning to visit, such as sports events or performances, and get tickets! What better way to get a “feel” of the college community, its talent, facilities and school spirit?

4. What to do about campus interviews? The interview is not a key deciding factor in college admissions, as I describe in my post, Acing the College Admissions Interview. Many colleges, however, will arrange a non-evaluative interview if you request it when you are visiting. Interviewing is a great way to show “demonstrated interest,” as well as getting answers to questions about the college’s programs. If your student is early in the visiting process, and is nervous about not being ready to make a great impression, postpone it. It is more important for your student to be focused on observing and absorbing, not on performing. Later on, if the school makes your teen’s short list, he or she may be able to interview, on a second campus visit, or with regional alumni. If the school requires an eventual visit for an audition or portfolio review, there is definitely no need to stress out about interviewing early on.

5. What to look for when visiting? My post and book chapter, Tips for College Trips, offers in-depth advice for playing the role of an anthropologist, practicing the art of observation, and seeking the answer to the key question: “Can I picture myself here for four pivotal years of my life?” Related posts: Why Juniors Should Visit Colleges on Winter and Spring Break, The Next Six Months of College Visits, and I’ll Only Visit Colleges I Get Into.

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College Freshmen Home for Thanksgiving

I am featuring this classic post I wrote in 2009 about Thanksgiving this week. Whether you are the parent of a high school senior, a college freshman, a college senior, or any kid in between, Thanksgiving is an important marker and rite of passage. Approach it with thoughtfulness—and gratitude.

It’s yet another rite of passage for college freshmen.

For some, it is the first time they will be home since they left for college in August. For others, it is the first time they will see their core group of high school friends. For all, it’s an opportunity to touch base with “the mother ship” before final exams, feasting on nostalgic comfort food during football halftime. And a time for “taking stock” of their freshman experience so far. What to expect? Change.

Your returning young adult is not the high school student you moved into the dorm in August. He or she has gone through an enormous level of change! Your freshman has taken many steps toward independent adulthood, ranging from waking on her own (without your nagging) to returning at night when she chooses (without asking permision, a curfew, or “reporting in” to anyone).

To prepare for your young adult’s return, I suggest reading: Don’t Tell Me What To Do, Just Send Money: The Essential Parenting Guide to the College Years by H.E. Johnson, or the classic, Letting Go (5E): A Parent’s Guide to Understanding the College Years by K.L. Coburn. If you don’t have time for a whole book, skim  “Thanksgiving Break Survival Tips” at About.com. Do your son or daughter and favor by avoiding obnoxious parentisms described from a student’s point of view in the hilarious article “Welcome Home, Honey!” at CollegeCandy.com.

How will you deal with these changes? You know you can’t freeze your freshman in time; you must respect his or her new autonomy. But you also have a right to set boundaries at home. A curfew, or at least agreement on when he or she will come home, is appropriate for holiday visits. Returning to the dorm at 4 AM may be ok, but not at home where a night owl’s schedule clashes with parents and siblings. Campus security may ignore rowdy students wandering in the wee hours, but suburban police will not. This is a great time to distinguish between college and home “house rules.”

Your freshman may be surprised that he or she  is not the only one who has gone through changes. Parents and siblings change too. Family dynamics are altered when a key player has been removed from the scene. For an in-depth look, check out my post: “When Big Brother or Sister Goes to College.” The freshman’s return may conflict with new patterns that are just being established. It may take  time for everyone to readjust.

As a parent, you may desire more “rebonding” than fits your freshman’s comfort level, disappointed when he or she wants to go out with friends rather than sit at the dinner table and recount the college experience with you ad nauseum. Or,  if  you’ve just become an “empty nester,” you may be surprised at how quickly you’ve become used to your own independence from parenthood. You’re not geared to “waiting up” at night anymore, twiddling your thumbs until you hear the car in the driveway. You no longer have patience for picking up half-empty soda cans everywhere in the family room, as endearing as they are.

Thanksgiving is classically known as a time of truth for freshmen reconnecting with high school friends. For many, this first semester is characterized by “friendsickness,” (see my post), a grieving period for friends from home. Finally having a face-to-face meeting with old friends offers reassurance that some pals are “keepers”, or the realization that it is time to “move on” from other friendships.

Dating relationships often come to a pivotal inflection point now. Freshmen with long distance relationships with high school sweethearts may decide to continue exclusively, date only when both are home, break up altogether, or morph into a friendship. A while back, a parent introduced me to “the turkey drop,” a coinage for a Thanksgiving break up. Parents need to remember that there is no “right” outcome: each relationship will run its natural course.

Be prepared for anything when your young adult comes home, from physical changes such as the “Freshman 15” to evidence of emotional crises (anxiety, depression, eating disorders, substance abuse). A good primer on recognizing adolescents’ psychological issues is College of the Overwhelmed: The Campus Mental Health Crisis and What To Do About It by R. Kadison. If you were too scared to buy it before college, read Binge: What Your College Student Won’t Tell You by B. Seaman, for a reality check about alcohol excess and other toxic elements of college life. Knowing is better than not knowing!

Be ready for bombshells, such as: “I want to transfer.”  This is common, if a student does not yet feel connected with new friends, is disillusioned by the college experience, or senses a mismatch between his goals and the school’s programs. I recommend a wait-and-see attitude, underscoring the need for a strong GPA to maximize flexibility. Often the student feels better by spring, and the transfer idea dissipates (but earned a good GPA just in case: yippee!). If the transfer need is real, it will persist, in which case you’re still glad your freshman earned that strong GPA.

One thing that does not change is your family pet’s eagerness to welcome your freshman home. When our son returned for Thanksgiving as a freshman, our Shelties were thrilled, especially the older one who grew up with him. Like the patriarchal golden retriever Shadow in Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey, our old Blaze became a puppy again when reunited with “his boy.” I know my son will come home one day to a change in this situation: one more change to process. This Thanksgiving, we’re thankful it’s not yet.

Update from my book Navigating the Road to College: A Handbook for Parents: In Eric’s sophomore year, his beloved canine companion turned fourteen. In fact, wise old Blaze chose that day for his own passing: his fourteenth birthday was also the day after our son returned to Emory following winter break. Somehow Blaze seemed to know that “his boy” was becoming independent, approaching that original goal of honorable adulthood. A class act till the end, he knew it was time for him to go.

Related posts: College Family Weekends: Forever Jung, Thanksgiving for Parents of College Kids, The Move to College as Group Therapy, College Transfers: Why or Why Not? Honorable Adulthood and Empty Nester Holiday Blues.

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Get Online College Applications Done This Summer!

Update of last year’s popular post: Your rising senior is finishing up summer camp, courses, or travel programs. And you know what’s looming up ahead: the thankless task of nagging your teen to work through the 2012 Common Application, launching MONDAY, AUGUST FIRST.

How hard can it be, just filling out a few online forms? Isn’t it the essay that’s the real killer? Depends on the student. But even the block-and-tackle part of college applications, filling out endless forms, can be a source of  tension in parent-teen relationships. At 17, an adolescent is experiencing a strong drive for autonomy, which flies in the face of a parent constantly nagging, “Finish that Common App, dear!”

Last year I wrote a post, “Senior year? Learn to paint!” with advice on how parents can engage in their own projects to ward off their own college admissions stress, stay out of their kids’ hair and keep tabs on their kids’ progress without micromanaging.

For comic relief, we can all remember the famous skit from The Amanda Show, where “The Procrastinator” superhero tells her Mom she will get to every emergency “eventually…”. For teenagers, that’s perfectly fitting for the college process.

But wouldn’t it be nice to wake up one morning and find out your kid filled out the Common App, and even a few state university online apps, and now only the essays remain? Wouldn’t it be even more of a relief to have those forms completed this summer, before the stressful senior year fall begins? If your student intends to apply Early Action or Early Decision, getting the online application filled out tout de suite is one more thing that becomes essential.

Last summer and fall, I piloted several Common Application “walk-through” workshops at our Position U 4 College office in Basking Ridge NJ. Students brought their laptops, and they were guided through the Common App. All they needed to do in advance was prepare an extracurricular activity list. Junk food was provided for fuel. Kids found it relatively painless, and parents were relieved.

I co-taught this workshop with a veteran high school teacher from NY’s Hudson Valley, Mr. Alfred “Doc” Snider. Doc’s teaching skills and knowledge of the Common App helped students get “ahead of the curve” . He introduced students to the subtleties of the Common App, such as how to do more than one version of one’s application,  arts and athletic supplements,  and much more.

In 2011, we broadcast a live webinar of this walk-through workshop. If you missed it, and would like your high school student to be guided through the Common App by experts, we offer access to a video version of that webinar, as well as other powerful information to help ace the college process, through a lifetime online membership for ten bucks. An easy way to relieve stress and get it done right.

 

Related reading: Acing the College Application by Michele Hernandez, Secrets to Writing a Great Common App by Sandy Yu et al. Related Web sites: Common Application FAQs  and Online Tutorial. Related posts: Tricks and Treats of the Common Application, Part I, Tricks and Treats of the Common Application Part II, and  PU4C Calendar for High School Juniors, Part II.

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Last Chance College Admissions Opportunities

April 1—April Fool’s Day—has arrived. Your student has fought the good fight: taken the standardized tests, applied to a number of schools, written myriad essays, and waited on pins and needles for months. There are a few decent choices, but nothing he or she is truly excited about. Financial aid packages have been disappointing. Or your kid is sweating it out on a waitlist, with lukewarm feelings about the second choice school. The college process is really feeling like the proverbial Race to Nowhere.

What to do? You have three options.

1. If your student feels that he or she really did not apply to enough schools that were realistic, many great schools have late or no closing dates for applications. Check out  4 Ways to Search for Colleges with Late Deadlines, a blog post by my colleague in Virginia, Nancy Griesemer, at College Explorations. Let me point out some openings that may surprise you:

Several late schools are among Loren Pope’s 40  Colleges That Change Lives, including: New College of Florida (Sarasota, 4/15); Hendrix (AK, 6/1); Marlboro (NH, no closing, test optional), St. John’s College (“Great Books,” Annapolis & Santa Fe, no closing, test optional); and Wabash (Men Only, IN, no closing). Two “Pope” schools require negotiating on SAT submission timing: Hiram (OH, no closing, 4/1 SAT); Hope (MI, no closing, 3/31 SAT).

Some state universities’ flagships are still open, sometimes requiring SAT timing negotiation: U Arizona, U Alabama, U Arkansas, U Maine, U Missouri, U Montana, U Nevada, U New Mexico, U North Dakota,  U South Dakota, and U Wyoming. Numerous state institutions’ satellite campuses are still open as well.

Many fine Catholic institutions are still open, such as: Loyola U Maryland (6/1, test optional); St. Bonaventure (NY, 7/1); Sacred Heart U (CT, no closing, test optional);  Seton Hall U (NJ, no closing); LaSalle U (PA, no closing); Marywood (PA, no closing); Loyola U New Orleans (LA, no closing).

In my own geographical area, some great late choices are: Richard Stockton (NJ, 6/1); SUNY Purchase (7/1); U Pittsburgh (no closing); Fairleigh Dickinson (NJ, no closing): Hofstra (NY, no closing).

If your student is an artist, he or she is in luck: School of Visual Arts (NY, 5/1); Santa Fe U of Art & Design (6/1); UNC School of the Arts (7/31); Savannah College of Art & Design (GA, 8/1); Corcoran College of Art & Design (DC, 8/1); Otis College of Art & Design (CA, 8/1); School of the Art Institute of Chicago (8/1); U of Arts (PA, no closing); Columbia College Chicago (no closing).

2. Your student could go to community college for two years, save big bucks, and transfer to a state university via an articulation agreement.A formal articulation agreement permits credits that are earned in certain junior or community college programs to be transferred to a higher college or university.

Check out Lynn O’Shaughnessy’s chapter on this popular money-saving college strategy in her classic book, The College Solution: A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price. The American Association of College Registrars & Admissions Officers (AACRAO) offers links to state articulation Web sites.

At first it seems like a foreign idea, living at home for the first two years, commuting to college locally, without the American middle class culture’s prescribed rite of passage of freshman dorm, fraternity rush, and unbridled underage drinking. But how did this impractical, unhealthy entitlement of adolescence become “normal” in our society? And how does it widely persist, despite skyrocketing college costs, high unemployment and a sluggish economy?

I would bet that college students who start at home probably have better grades, and more serious professional focus, than their counterparts of similar academic abilities and interests who are away at a university. Just a guess. And what’s college for, anyway?

3. Your student could attend his or her current best choice school for freshman year, with an open mind, but earning grades that offer the flexibility to “transfer up.” You should always encourage your teen to keep an open mind, and give the school a chance. Transferring is a stressful, disruptive process that is not ideal. However, it is often a great choice for a student who desires more challenge or programs to fit changing interests.

Your teen will need a strong GPA to maintain the flexibility to transfer; I recommend shooting for a 3.5 (higher for an elite school). Although transfer openings are not predictable from year to year, an applicant will not be so bound by the competitive freshman process that stresses high school GPA and SAT scores (i.e., colleges trying to drive up their freshman “stats”). Your student may find a serendipitous opportunity by going the “transfer up” route.

4. Do a Gap Year program. Gap year programs can be oriented toward academics, travel or service. For more information, check out The Complete Guide to the Gap Year by Kristin White.

Related posts: How to Afford College, Waiting for the “Fat Envelope”, Dealing with Rejection, College Transfers: Why or Why Not?

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Preparing for Pre-Professional Programs: Pre-Medicine and Pre-Dentistry

Your high school student has always wanted to be doctor or dentist. What guidance can you offer to help prepare for a pre-health program in college? This post is part of a series about majors and pre-professional programs.  

“Listen for the spark, then fan the flame.” Let me suggest an approach for clarifying what your student’s interest is and where it may be leading; then how to further explore it, research it, and find a college and career in which it can be nurtured, expressed, and grown into a way to contribute to the world.

1. Clarify the interest. Is your student motivated by a desire to help others, and if so, how? Probe to see what medical specialties or  interdisciplinary fields intuitively appeal to your teen, such as: surgery, internal medicine, anesthesiology, dentistry, dermatology, emergency medicine, genetics, general practice, OB/GYN, opthamology, pediatrics, rehabilitation, psychiatry, or hospice/palliative care.

Is your teen drawn to working with a specific population, such as: infants, children, adolescents, mothers, women, athletes, geriatrics, trauma survivors, people from disadvantaged communities or the third world, the mentally ill, or the terminally ill?

The population your student is drawn to help may influence the choice of an undergraduate major. (Any major is acceptable, as long as he or she takes the pre-clinical sciences required by the AAMC.) It may help your student decide on a medical specialty, or even to pursue a different career path altogether (such as psychology, education, social work, or allied health sciences).

Is your teen interested in the analytical side of medicine, solving problems, advancing medical science, or contributing to public policy, but not  interfacing directly with patients? Diagnostic specialties abound: clinical laboratory sciences, pathology, radiology, nuclear medicine, and clinical neurophysiology. Analytical specialties and interdisciplinary fields include: biomedical engineering, clinical pharmacology, disaster medicine, forensic medicine, and preventative medicine.

Inquire about your teen’s medical interests at well-chosen moments, when he or she is in the mood to open up. Your adolescent may only be able to identify broad-brush areas now. However, the path to medicine is difficult, requiring mature, serious thought and focused planning. The earlier your teen can identify interests more specific than “I want to be a doctor,” the earlier he or she can gain experience in those areas.

2. Evaluate the skill set. Does your student excel in math and science? You’d be surprised at how many teenagers say, “I want to be a doctor,” with C’s in chemistry. A parent can offer a gentle reality check for a student who is attracted by Hollywood’s glamorization of medicine (i.e., Grey’s Anatomy, Scrubs, Dr. G: Medical Examiner), but who doesn’t truly comprehend what it will take. Help your teen make the connections. If a student doesn’t thrive in math and science, he or she will not survive (or enjoy) the road to medical school.

If your teen is really saying, “I want to help people,” there are many “qualitative” helping fields. Or if your teen is proficient at math and science, but not geared for spending a decade competing in an intense academic environment, there are many rewarding, in-demand healing occupations not requiring such a long training track. Examples: Nurse, physician assistant, physical therapist, occupational therapist, medical technologist,  nutritionist, athletic trainer, or alternative medicine practitioners like chiropractors or naturopathic doctors.

3. Create opportunities to explore a wide spectrum of medical interest areas. Pre-college programs can provide great academic exposure. Brown University offers one of the best smoragasbords, with courses such as: So You Think You Want to Be a Doctor; The Body: An Introduction to Human Anatomy & Physiology; Stem Cells, Cloning & Regenerative Medicine; and Research Techniques in Biomedical Fields.

Enrichment programs can offer exposure to real-life healthcare issues. Lead America is a superb program held on college campuses. It teaches a leadership process within a context of a content area (e.g., medicine, international relations, business, defense and intelligence, journalism and communications), with speakers and field trips, and facilitates team problem-solving in response to a simulated issue related to the content area.

If your teen is drawn to the “helping” side of medicine, there are plenty of opportunities to explore settings and populations. Encourage your teen to volunteer at a local hospital; get CPR and first aid training or even EMT licensing to serve on a first aid squad; help with a blood drive; or visit disabled veterans or seniors.

Visit Web sites that match volunteer age, interests, and zip code to local needs. Good bets: Idealist.org; VolunteerMatch.org; Servenet.org; 1-800-Volunteer.org; YMCA; American Red Cross; and National Council of Jewish Women.

If your teen is interested in research, possibilities include: U Penn’s Penn Summer Biomedical Research Academy; U Pitt’s Pittsburgh Tissue Engineering Institute;  National Insitute of Health’s Summer Intership in Biomedical Research; and Drexel U School of Medicine’s Summer HS Research Internship Program.

Co-op and Internship Opportunities for High School Students 2011 offers promising links, although some opportunities are only for students in the program’s local area and others are geared to underrepresented minorities. Also check out Ultimate Guide to Summer Opportunities for Teens by Sandra Berger.

Academic enrichment, volunteer and research experience is impressive for applications. However, these experiences are also critical for helping your teen “reality test” medical interests. Maybe your teen faints at the sight of blood, or is bored stiff in a lab setting, or finds a hospital environment too traumatic, depressing, or smelly. Real countraindications for a medical career!

4. Research colleges and universities offering pre-health programs. A superlative resource is Steven Antonoff’s The College Finder and its partner Web site, InsideCollege.com. Antonoff’s “Experts’ Choice” list of schools with excellent pre-med programs includes: Amherst, Bates, Brown, Bucknell, Carleton, Colgate,William & Mary, Emory, Franklin & Marshall, Grinnell, Hamilton, Johns Hopkins, Knox, Muhlenberg, Northwestern, Pomona, St. Louis U, St. Olaf, ,Stanford, U Chicago, U Penn, Vanderbilt, Washington U in St. Louis. More “usual suspects” are on  the “Honorable Mention” list.

We all know how difficult it is to get into medical and dental school and what a long (expensive!) haul the training process is. If your student is an exceptionally high performer, he or she may want to consider a combined undergraduate-professional school program (8 years), an accelerated program (6-7 years), or an early assurance program (after sophomore year).

Some programs guarantee a place in a specific medical or dental school; some are provisional based on GPA and MCAT or DAT. InsideCollege.com lists combined medical programs and dental programs. The Medical and Dental School Help Web site also details BA/MD programs and BA/DDS programs. Books on the market are at least five years old, so Web sites are a better bet for up-to-date program information.

Obviously, it would be nice for your student to know where he or she is going to medical or dental school at age eighteen. But it is a complex decision to make as a high school senior. Here is the countervailing logic:

First, it is extremely difficult to get into these programs, especially at elite schools whose freshman acceptance rate is 10-20 percent. If a student’s credentials are sufficiently exceptional to gain entry to a combined or accelerated program, he or she may also be able to conventionally gain acceptance to a more highly regarded undergraduate institution and eventually a leading medical school. (These agreements are not binding; if a combined degree student decides to apply to other med schools he or simpy loses his guaranteed “seat” at the combined program’s med school).

Second, these institutions create  programs to suit their own needs. They are, of course, seeking to attract the highest performing students, often with specific characteristics (e.g., humanities majors, students interested in rural medicine). Some med schools offer special programs to attract the best and brightest, to compensate for the fact that they are not top ranked, not connected to world-class research hospitals, or  located in high crime inner cities.

While there are many excellent medical schools offering special programs, some of the best med schools with connections to extraordinary teaching hospitals do not. Examples: Harvard, U Penn, Johns Hopkins, Columbia, Cornell-Weill, Emory, U Michigan, Duke, and Stanford.

For student and parent discussions about combined programs, check out College Confidential or Student Doctor Network.

5. Encourage your student to explore long term career trajectories. Suggest informational interviewing with family friends who work in the field. What are the long-term rewards and frustrations of a career in medicine? What concerns should your student be prepared to encounter, such as the changing landscape of health insurance and malpractice? Urge your son or daughter to find an opportunity to shadow a doctor or even view a surgery, if he or she is volunteering at a hospital or your family knows a medical professional who can arrange such an experience.

Related reading: Planning a Career in Medicine: Discover If a Medical Career Is Right for You and How to Make It Happen by Stephen Nelson, Becoming a Physician: A Practical and Creative Guide to Planning a Career in Medicine by Jennifer Danek, The Ultimate Guide to Choosing a Medical Specialty by Brian Freeman MD, and Med School Confidential: A Complete Guide to the Medical School Experience: By Students, For Students by Robert H. Miller.

Related posts: Finding the Best College for Your Major. From my careerblog: What Is Informational Interviewing?

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What Is Important to Colleges? Top Ten Factors

This is an update of my popular post, with new data from NACAC.

SAT’s as an extra-curricular activity? Traveling soccer clubs beginning in kindergarten? Making PB & J sandwiches for the homeless? President of the varsity tiddly-wink club? Curing cancer with My First Chemistry Kit? Grade-grubbing like Summer (Miranda Cosgrove) in The School of Rock, with a lawnmower parent clearing away all obstacles in your path? What’s most important to colleges, anyway?

The National Association of College Admission Counseling (NACAC) offers guidance on this crucial question. Based on Admission Trends Surveys 1993-2009 from The NACAC State of College Admission 2010 Report, I can suggest ten priorities for your student:

1. Grades in college prep (87%). It makes sense that grades in college preparatory “solids” (math, science, history, English, foreign language) would be “Number One.” In NACAC’s survey, this factor drew the highest percentage (87%) of colleges attributing “considerable importance” to its impact in admission decisions.

Grades are a “cross country run” while test results are a “sprint”. Across four years, grades show a student’s “true colors,” not only the smarts, but the work ethic, discipline, and ability to deliver over the log haul.

2. Strength of curriculum (71%). Straight A’s are great, but is your student enrolled in honors, AP (Advanced Placement) or IB (International Baccalaureate) courses? Colleges want students that seek to challenge themselves. High schools’ advanced course options vary widely, but admissions officers want to see that your teen took advantage of the offerings in the school he or she attended.

It’s a two-edged sword! Some elite high schools with splendid AP offerings raise the bar for entry so high that above average students have little access. Late bloomers cannot  “jump on the train” half way through high school. Parents need to be aware of the curriculum from 8th Grade on, and urge the child to “board the train” (consistent with aptitude) before it “leaves the station!”

$64,000 question: “Is it better to get an A in a regular course, or a B in honors?” Wiseacre answer: “A in an honors course!” But seriously, if a student excels at a subject, he should be in the honors course. All honors is not necessary, but at least a few is advisable.

3. Admissions test scores (58%). Test scores are the “sprint”, but still trés significant, let’s not kid ourselves. Yes, many colleges are now “test optional”. But particularly if your kid applies to large state schools, expect standardized tests to play a key role.  Public universities claim to be shifting toward holistic admissions, but that shift will be labor-intensive and will not happen overnight. For distinctions between public and private institutions in the Admissons Trends Survey, read my post Public vs. Private Universities or Liberal Arts Colleges.

I am a proponent of testing, but not timed (topic for a future post). If you suspect your child has a learning  challenge that may require testing accommodations such as extra time, address it early. Using our “sprint” analogy, don’t insist that your child leap over hurdles in the race that others don’t have, to be “treated like everybody else.” Maybe your child isn’t like everybody else.

4. Grades in all courses (46%). Grades in electives count, too, especially if electives are in subject areas in which your student plans to major.

5. Essays (26%). As a college consultant who spends the lion’s share of my time helping clients with essays, I’d love to say essays are the chief factor in college admissions. They’re not. It varies by the school: a small test-optional liberal arts college weighs essays more heavily than a large state university (see Public vs. Private post). That said, in 2009, more than a fourth of alcolleges viewed essays as a factor of “considerable importance”. That percentage has doubled since 1993. So ace that personal statement!

As I posted in “How Important Is the College Essay, Really?”, the essay is always valuable in the sense that it is the only element of the college process through which the applicant’s unique, authentic voice can be heard directly. You can’t control whether your chemistry teacher has it “in” for you, but you can control what you write in your essay!

6. Demonstrated interest (21%). This factor has only been measured since 2003, when it was 7%. As I posted in “Why University of X?”, demonstrated interest has become a hot button for admissions people required to maximize their yield (see  The Boston Globe: “A new factor in making that college–loving it”) .

7. Teacher recommendation  (17%). My post on “Teacher’s Recommendations” tells you everything you need to know. Encourage your kid not to hide in the back of the class! And don’t be the last student to ask a popular teacher for a recommendation: they do get “rec” fatigue.

8. Counselor recommendation (17%). The guidance counselor not only writes the cornerstone “rec” for each applicant; she is the spokesperson for the applicant with every college. So if your teen attends a large high school where it is hard for counselors to get to know students, your kid must get to the guidance office whenever possible all four years, keeping the counselor informed about achievements and issues.

9. Class rank (16%). Class rank data is downplayed in some schools, to dial down competitive attitudes. But you know vaguely where your kid is.  This factor should help gauge how realistic your student’s target schools are.

10. Extra-curricular activities (9%). ).So this is where all the hours of playing varsity sports and rehearsing for the winter musical goes, at the bottom of the top ten list? YUP! So unless your child is a Div I athlete or a classical violin prodigy, extra-curriculars should be undertaken for personal development and fun. Not as an “ace in the hole” for acceptance! College is an academic institution, which is why, on the NACAC list, grades are at the top and activities are at the bottom.

To offer further insights, I am sharing a segment from a recent interview I did on Hometowne TV, a local access cable network based in Summit, NJ, hosted by Myung Bondy. You can find additional segments of this interview covering a number of college application topics on my YouTube channel.

Related Posts: First Day of High School, 10 Things Parents Can Do For Your College-Bound 10th Grader, Your 11th Grader’s 11 Steps to Success, First Aid for a Disappointing Grade, How Important Is the College Essay, Really?, Why University of X?,  and Public vs. Private Universities or Liberal Arts Colleges.

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A College Consultant’s Grown-Up Christmas List

Amy Grant’s touching rendition of Grown-Up Christmas List was omnipresent on the radio this season. I welcomed it, far more than the slaphappy holiday fare that glosses over the complex lives we all lead, textured with joy and pain, gain and loss, peace laced with worry and uncertainty. No holiday is as pure and simple as the songs portray it.

As a college consultant, I share my students’ disappointments  as well as joys, and December is a bittersweet time. While many seniors are accepted Early Action, some are not. When Early Decision apps are deferred or denied, the sting is especially painful.

In Admissions Matters, December heartbreak is vividly described: “The problem with an early application denial is that it usually occurs in isolation, and also at holiday time…students usually apply early to only one college, and those who receive denials have no simultaneous acceptances to ease the blow” (Springer et al, p. 215).

But acceptance stress is only one kind of trial that students face in December. So here is my grown-up Christmas list:

1. I wish students and families were free to separate a young person’s self-esteem from acceptance at a specific school. There is a suitable higher education choice for every individual. Our society is so preoccupied with prestige, symbolized by material wealth or college pedigree.

But it is unrealistic to expect that “baby boomlet” children of “boomer” parents who graduated from elite colleges can get into those same schools today (i.e., growing demand vs. static supply).

Even academic stars will face rejection unless they adjust expectations. There are only 8 Ivies, but 2500 4-year institutions in the USA: your kid’s gotta get in somewhere! As a separate issue, many kids do not possess interests or skills that fit with 4-year schools.  But they also have plenty of choices, among 1700 2-year schools that are more focused on career training.

Despite our culture’s disdain for vocational education, many kids will be happier, and more likely to get jobs in this economy, if they learn medical technology instead of archaeology. With apologies to Indiana Jones, how many archaeologists do we really need?

Look, if everyone wants to go to the same restaurant the same night, someone will be disappointed. No reason to lose self-esteem: it’s just supply & demand. If we truly “got” that, the college process would be more about discovering one’s unique “fit”, and less about “getting in.” I wish parents could gear their kids to find a school where they’d thrive and find their way, without a feeling of failure if rejected by a “hot” school that is probably not a good fit anyway.

2. I wish students would start preparing for college earlier. WHAT? you say. It’s already stressful enough, starting spring of junior year. Hold on! I don’t mean taking SAT’s in kindergarten or visiting campuses in utero.

I mean, simply thinking about the future. Some teen athletes know all about their physical capabilities and how to improve to switch to a more desirable position or team. But if you ask about their academic abilities, or what they imagine doing for a living someday, you get a blank stare…

Not that an adolescent should have this all worked out now, but it would be nice to at least have a clue. Only in the USA is it acceptable to apply “undeclared.” Why are European teens able to pick an occupational focus but Americans are not?

At minimum, a student can prepare by earning good grades. All colleges want that, even if the applicant doesn’t know what he wants to be when he grows up. So my second wish is that parents would urge their students to start getting good grades–early.

3. I wish standardized tests were not timed. We hear about time accommodation for learning disabilities (LD’s). Do more kids have LD’s today than back in the fifties? Are they just more frequently diagnosed? Or, as simplistic cynics insist on cruelly proposing, are they just an excuse for poor motivation?

My instinct says, when a problem is epidemic, there’s a broad-based cause. But I doubt the answer is that every American suddenly just decided to become lazy. Someday scientists may figure out that LD’s are linked to environmental toxins, food supply, or an ubiquitous force that has only become prevalent in the past 50 years.

Meanwhile, the movement to obtain LD extra time accommodations has unearthed a concern that was always there for some students: PARALYZING TEST ANXIETY. Someday we may learn that families who go to great lengths to obtain accommodations were actually trying to help a kid with severe test anxiety.

If tests were not timed, LD students could demonstrate their true potential without jumping through bureaucratic hoops. Untimed testing could also measure the true potential of a much broader sector of students, those who suffer from test anxiety.

My guess is, there is one group of test-takers, high academic/low anxiety, who excel, timed or not. Another group, low academic/low anxiety, test poorly, timed or not. But two groups, high academic/high anxiety and low academic/high anxiety, may do significantly better if not timed. Non-timed tests would measure the true potential of these students.

A 1995 study by Onwuegbuzie & Seaman, The Effect of Time Constraints and Statistics Test Anxiety on Test Performance in a Statistics Course, concluded: “Both low- and high-anxious students performed better… under the untimed condition… However, the benefit of the untimed examination was greater for high-anxious students than for low-anxious students.”

But they need to test your ability to think under pressure, don’t they? I say, Why? If you aspire to become MacGyver, diffusing bombs while seconds tick away, then timed testing is a good predictor of career success. But as a marketing executive, I never had to make a decision with a stopwatch ticking. So what’s the point of a timed test?

Sure, I was one of those nervous test takers. It is amazing how I ever got three Ivy League degrees, because I choked on the SAT’s, GRE’s and GMAT’s. My scores weren’t disastrous, but they always underpredicted my higher education performance.

If test anxiety is a cause of underestimation of college success in the population at large, it will be worse among disadvantaged groups without the luxury of paid tutors to help them practice under timed conditions. If standardized testing was originally adopted to “level the playing field,” this is one more dimension in which the wealthy win and the less affluent lose.

I have often comforted a Position U 4 College client who earns excellent grades, yet cannot overcome test anxiety. But recently in a pro bono setting, a terrific young woman from the inner city, a hard-working student with fine grades, was denied at a school due to low test scores. She had studied a workbook (tutoring was out of the question), but her scores were still too low. “Do you get nervous taking the SAT’s?” I asked. Fighting back tears, she nodded. “I always did, too,” I said.

That’s why this is my third grown-up Christmas wish.

Related Posts: December 15 College News: Deferral or Denial, Your Target Colleges–And It’s a Moving Target, Parents of 11th Graders: Get Set for “Junior College Night!” What Is Important to Colleges? Top Ten Factors.

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