Collegewise

A good way to investigate college majors

If you have the slightest idea what you might want to major in when you get to college, try this:

1. Pick five colleges you're interested in.

2. Go to their websites and find the listing of required classes for your intended major.

3. Read the descriptions of the required courses.  

What are you actually going to be learning?  Who's going to be teaching you?  What does the department for your major claim that you'll gain from that course of study?  And most importantly, how does all of that sound to you?

If you're not excited to start those classes as soon as possible, you might want to think about choosing a different major.  Or you may need different colleges.

Four tips for seniors before the Common Application goes live...

On August 1^st, the 2011-12 Common Application goes live.  If you're a senior applying to college, chances are you'll be completing this, given that there are now 456 colleges that accept it.

Here are four things you should do before August 1st, courtesy of Arun at Collegewise.

1. Bookmark https://www.commonapp.org.

You’ll be using it a lot in the months to come. (Use Internet Explorer, Firefox or Safari. Other browsers are NOT supported, although rumor is that Chrome will be when the new app comes online.)

2. Make sure the spell checker in your browser is enabled.

You can find out more about the various spell checkers here: Firefox , Internet Explorer and Safari.  It’s essential you know how this works.

3. Friend the Common Application on Facebook.

They offer lots of great tips throughout the year, and the Support tab on the  left is filled with excellent answers to a lot of questions. It’s also helpful to bookmark the FAQs.

4. Most importantly, take six minutes and watch this video carefully.

Six minutes now will save you nail-biting and hair-pulling later.

In September, Arun and I will be releasing our guideline, "How to Make Your Common Application a Lot Less Common."  If you're applying to college and would like to know when it's available for sale, you can sign up to be notified here (and we make it easy to opt-out of the list at any time). 

Five college planning tips for students with learning disabilities

At Collegewise, parents sometimes ask us if colleges will consider the fact that a student has a documented learning disability.  And while the degree of consideration depends on how personal each college’s evaluation of their applicants gets, there are a lot of things LD students can do to help their chances of admission to the right schools.

Here are five college planning tips for LD kids.

1. Don’t let your disability affect your effort. 

If you want colleges to look beyond your transcript and consider your disability, show them that you haven’t let it affect your effort to learn.  Challenge yourself as much as can.  Ask teachers for help.  Find creative ways to work around your learning disability.  Colleges know it’s those kids—the ones who work to overcome their challenges (even if they didn’t get “A’s”)--who will keep giving that effort and succeeding academically once they get to college.     

2. Ask for—and accept—help.

Part of managing a learning disability means asking for and accepting help when you need it.   So visit your teacher after class when you have questions. Ask your counselor for advice about classes you should take, colleges you should consider, and whether or not you qualify for extended testing time.  If you’re really struggling in a class, tell your parents that you’re having a hard time and ask if they can help you find a good tutor.  Don’t worry about seeming too dependent on other people.  There’s no shame in asking for help when you need it, especially if you’re appreciative and willing to work hard. 

3. Maximize your academic strengths.

Do you have a particular class or subject that you really enjoy, maybe where your learning disability seems to hold you back less than other times?  Maximize those opportunities by doing your best work.   If you struggle with reading and writing but have always loved math, take challenging math courses.  Be especially engaged in your math classes by raising your hand and asking questions.  Take an extra math class over the summer at a local community college.  Colleges are always looking for areas of academic spark, and this is particularly important for students who are working to overcome learning disabilities.    

4. Find the right colleges.

Some LD students want to select their schools based on name, location, or other factors and don’t want to look into special LD support services or programs.  That might be fine for some students, but remember that consideration of your learning disability goes both ways.  If you’re not willing to factor in your disability when choosing colleges, it’s not fair to expect those schools to consider it when they evaluate you.  Think—and be honest—about whether or not you need colleges with LD support.  Be specific about exactly what kind of services you need.  And look into colleges that are known to have strong programs for LD kids. The more challenging your learning disability has been for you, the more you should consider it when you pick your colleges.   

5.  Be willing to share your LD story.

If you want colleges to understand your particular challenges, share your story with them.  Not just by mentioning it in one line on an application, but by writing an essay, or talking about it in an interview, or asking your counselor to tell them about it in a letter of recommendation.  And what should you share?  Everything listed above.  Tell colleges about your efforts to overcome your disability, the people who’ve helped you along the way, and the areas where you’ve done your best academic work.  Explain your thought process in picking your particular schools, how your LD played into that decision, and what you plan to do to be academically successful once you get there.  Your counselor can give you good advice about the best way to share your story with each particular college.  But if you want them to consider it, you’ll need to share it some way. 

There are plenty of colleges out there that can give LD kids a great college experience.  But you can improve your chances of finding and getting accepted to the right one for you by following these tips. 

What is your online legacy?

Before you share anything in an electronic format—an email, a photo, a blog post, etc.—ask yourself if you would be comfortable with it showing up whenever anyone Googles your name.  Forever.  Potential viewers include the colleges you’ll apply to, friends, your family, future employers, and people you haven’t met yet but will one day want to date.

Last Friday, a Whole Foods worker who was at best disgruntled and at worst, well, a little deranged, penned a 2000-word resignation letter loaded with anger, personal insults, and gems like,

“Oh, you actually think being 20 minutes late matters? You know Whole Foods Market is just a grocery store, right?”

At some point, someone will unearth the author’s name.  And that means that for the rest of his/her life, there will be no escaping it.  That letter will be his/her online legacy.  Google will never forget, even when other people do. 

Can you even imagine the long term damage that’s going to carry for the writer?   How long will that person have to regret hitting “Send”?

I’m not suggesting that a 2000-word tirade is the same as one Tweet or a Facebook photo.  But today’s high school students are the digital generation.  You live in a reality where people have been humiliated, fired, divorced, sued, and even prosecuted because of things they or other people have posted online. 

Be protective of your online legacy.  I don’t have to answer for anything I said or did way back when I was sixteen.  Today’s students won’t necessarily have the same luxury.

"I will be the student who..."

A lot of colleges are asking questions on their applications about how you plan to contribute to their campus community.  A good way to think about that question is to finish the statement, "I will be the student who..."  How you finish it doesn't really matter as long as it's honest, legal, and not, well, a dumb thing to admit.

Here are some good examples:

...plays intramural soccer.
...finds other musicians who like to play music for fun.
...does math problems with other math geeks.
…makes homemade tamales for my new friends.
...writes for the school paper.
...knows how to do basic first aid and CPR if anyone needs it.
...fixes students' computers when they break.
…never forgets what my parents sacrificed to send me here
...finds (or starts) a book club.
...sets up a poker night in the dorms where anyone who likes cards (and has ten bucks) is welcome.
---finally gets to spend my academic time studying physics as much as possible.

Now, what are you doing today to prove that you’re going to be that student?  Start walking the talk now and your answer will carry a lot more weight on your college applications.

For college information, always go to the source

When you have a question about college application deadlines, how many letters of rec are required, whether or not an interview is offered, etc., the safest, smartest way to get that information is from the colleges themselves. 

A parent emailed one of our counselors last week and asked:

“If [a student] takes the SAT or Subject Tests on November 5th, will the results arrive in time for early decision deadlines?” 

We know the only way to answer that is to research the individual schools that student is interested in.  Penn’s website says yes, but you need to rush the scores (they haven’t updated their dates for fall deadlines yet):

"Early Decision candidates should take these examinations either during the junior year or in the summer before the senior year, but no later than November 2010. Early Decision candidates who opt for November examinations must rush their test scores to us."

But Duke gives a different answer:

"We strongly recommend that Early Decision candidates take either of these sets of standardized tests no later than October of their senior year. We cannot guarantee receipt of November testing for Early Decision candidates, although past experience suggests that November scores typically arrive in time. You do not need to rush-report your scores to us."

Good summer project for senior families: go to the source—the colleges’ websites—and research all their application requirements and deadlines. 

The best way to grow your business, club, college, etc.

It’s counterintuitive, but the way to grow your business is to focus entirely on your existing customers.  Just thrill them, and they’ll tell everyone.

Anything You Want
Derek Sivers (Founder of CDBaby)

Turns out that's not just true for businesses.

The best way to grow your independent school is to make your current families so happy they can't help but talk about you.

The best way to grow your club or organization is to make it so rewarding for your current members that they talk voluntarily about how much they love it.

If you want to grow your community organization, make your volunteers feel even more appreciated and rewarded.  They'll tell people for you. 

If you want to have more dates, make your current significant other so happy that...wait, yeah, that one doesn't work.

If you want to grow your readership of your school newspaper, blog or newsletter, write the articles your existing readers want to read.  They'll share them with like-minded potential readers. 

And colleges, if you want more students, if you want more applications from those students who are most likely to enroll, and if you want more donations from your alumni, stop spending so much money trying to find and sell to potential students.  Slash the budget for the marketing consultants and the direct mailings and the branding experts.  Redirect that money towards your existing customers (your current students and their families).  Make them feel so lucky to have found you that they can't help but tell everyone how great their experience is.  That will be worth more to you than any mailing list or social media campaign.

From our class of 2011

We just finished collecting testimonials from our Collegewise class of 2011.  I'm sharing the link here for two reasons, one of them admittedly selfish.

1.  We're proud of them.  Our counselors work really hard to make our families happy and it feels good to read their nice words.   

2.  The testimonials are documented proof that it is possible to enjoy the college admissions process.  The students and parents in these testimonials are excited about their collegiate futures, whether or not the schools are prestigious.  That's the right way to do this. 

Congratulations--and thanks--class of 2011!

Have questions about financial aid?

The folks at Finaid.org have a great FAQ section here. And in the "I can't believe it's free" department, they have a service called "Ask The Aid Advisor" in which over 100 financial aid administrators from across the country have volunteered to answer questions for free.  You fill out a form, submit your question, and get an email response within two weeks.  The site says they've already answered over 10,000 questions. 

Every college-bound student and parent who's concerned about paying for college should spend a weekend pouring over the information they give away for free at Finaid.org.  There's no shame in admitting that you're concerned about college finances and need help paying for it.  But with resources like this available to you, you can be as informed as possible and make sure you don't make mistakes. 

Don’t wait for someone to pick you

If you have a dream college, it’s not entirely up to you whether you get to go.  You have to hope they admit you.  But one of the nice changes in the world today is that for most things you want to do, you don’t have to wait for someone to pick you.

If you didn’t get into AP Calculus, nobody’s stopping you from learning it.  You can take it online at MIT.  For free.  It doesn’t matter what your GPA or SAT scores are.

If you want to write, you don’t have to hope your school newspaper picks you to write your own column.   You can write a blog.  You can write an email newsletter for your club.  Just start writing what you want to write.  Nobody's holding you back.

If you like photography, you don’t have to wait to get picked for people to see your photos.  You can take good pictures.  You can enroll in a class online. You can post your favorite photos to your blog.  And you don’t necessarily need to get picked by the yearbook or the school newspaper to take pictures of school events.  Do you really think the cast of the musical, the artists, the cross country team, the marching band, or any other group wouldn’t appreciate and thank an enthusiastic photographer who captured great photos of them doing what they love?  No need to get picked.  Just take good pictures. 

And you don’t have to get elected to a leadership position to lead people.  Find an issue or cause you care about, bring in other people who feel the same, and lead them.  If your volleyball team needs new uniforms, organize the fundraiser to pay for them, recruit the volunteers, and you’re officially a leader.

You can lament how hard it is to get picked by the most competitive colleges.  But the good news is that there’s never been a generation of high school students with fewer constraints to stop you from doing what you want to do.

The most successful students aren’t waiting for someone to pick them.  They’re learning, writing, photographing, and leading already.