Tag Archives: College Selection
4 Ways to Grab a College’s Attention
Demonstrated Interest is a term that doesn’t always make it into the college selection dialogue, but it should. With the turn to online applications for college, schools experienced a surge of applicants. This threw off their long standing formulas for how many students to admit. Colleges are essentially businesses. They need a body in every seat. Before online applications, each college had a formula they were confident in to yield the number of students they wanted to enroll. Let’s keep it simple. A college establishes how many freshmen they want to enroll for the next school year. They also have an established … Continue reading
Making the Most of Winter Break
While sleeping in, video games and Facebook maybe calling over the Winter Break, there is still plenty of time for college bound students to do something productive toward their college goals. FRESHMAN Have you put together a resume? If not, start now! It doesn’t have to be something fancy or even well formatted. Simply start a list of activities, honors and community service along with dates. This is something to build on throughout high school and will save you time three years from now when you’re completing college applications. Pulling your resume together will also help you see any holes … Continue reading
Relax and Master Your College Interview
The thirty to sixty minutes you have in an interview with a college is certain not to make or break your admission, so take a deep breath and shine! Frankly, at many schools, especially the larger ones, you won’t even be given the time to interview, so don’t be surprised, or take it personally, when they won’t make time for you. Large colleges simply have too many applicants to meet with. So how do you take the pressure off and actually enjoy the process when you’re offered the opportunity to interview on campus or with a local alum? Do Your … Continue reading
4 Ohio Colleges You Might Not Know
Doing college visits in June doesn’t give someone the full feel of a campus, however it does give an independent counselor, like myself, plenty of time to not feel rushed taking the tour, speaking with admission counselors and those in financial aid. Watch our video, Ohio Colleges, to get a glimpse of four very different campuses and read some highlights below. Thanks to Trent Mader for putting the video together of my iPhone snapshots! University of Dayton UD is a great and unique size, in my opinion. Many of the private schools are much smaller and the publics are much larger, so … Continue reading
What’s a Parent To Do?
In short: Not Much! I know that answer disappoints multitudes of parents of college bound high school students. The intentions of parents vary from just wanting the best for their kiddo to the “helicopter” parent to those living vicariously through their child. The bottom-line is your child needs to OWN the college selection, application and admission process. Getting to Know You Colleges are wanting to get to know THE STUDENT. It will be the student, not the parent, heading to school and the college needs to be the best fit for the student. Therefore interaction directly with the college needs to … Continue reading
Cutting the Cost of College Visits
This week I was interviewed by FOX Business for an article they did for their online news with tips on tips for doing the college visits affordably. It’s a challenge for all families. Many find they need to budget not only for the college visits, but for ACT and SAT testing as well as applications. It all adds up! You can read the article on the FOX Business website by clicking here. For tips on how to make the most of your visit when you are actually on campus, read our previous post.
Knowing This, I Would Have Enjoyed the Ride
Our guest blogger this month is Maria Marballi, Ohio State freshman and former LEAP student. One year ago, I was asking myself what I was going to do with the rest of my life. I had to pick a college, and in order to pick a college; I had to select an area of study of which to narrow down the selection of vastly distinctive universities that lay in front of me: all with different positives and negatives, strengths and weaknesses. This meant a few things: anxiety, peer pressure and angst. Senior year was a collaboration of learning how to … Continue reading
The College Visit Done Right
Juniors on the initial college search and seniors making final decisions are hitting the road for college visits. College visits cost time and money, so putting some time into planning your visit is key to making the most of a 3-day weekend like Presidents’ Day or spring break for college visits. Do Your Homework Likely, you are limited on the number of schools you can visit, so take the time to make wise choices of where you’ll go. Next, thoroughly research the school before you go. Using data on College Navigator will give you important information such as retention and graduation … Continue reading
Impressing College Admissions Officers
The admission’s officer assigned to your “territory” is ultimately the first person to review your college application. The days, months, years leading to that moment should not be taken lightly. Determining who this individual is usually only requires a visit to that college’s admissions page. Look for “staff” or “contact”;” to locate your rep. The smaller the school and more selective, the more likely they are to care how much attention you pay to them in the years leading to your application. You are “Demonstrating Interest” – see our previous post on the importance of demonstrated interest by clicking here. In Person … Continue reading
Why Pay Sticker Price for College?
This past summer I had to finally replace my trusty mini-van after almost a decade. Frankly, I was ready to move on to something non-van! I started my research of reviews and price. We did buy new and of course, we did not pay sticker price. No one does, right? So can the same sticker price rule also apply to college? Yes! Sticker Price Sticker price for college is the total Cost of Attendance (COA). This means tuition + room/board + books + fees. Note: COA is not just tuition + room/board! Many families look at the sticker price of … Continue reading
