The College Solutions Blog

November 21, 2011

Do you assume that most teenagers face lousy odds of getting accepted into a good college? Lots of families believe that the admission process is stacked heavily against applicants, but this isn’t true. I largely blame the media’s obsessive coverage of the most elite universities for that misconception. A new report from the College Board, Trends in College Pricing 2011,...

November 2, 2011

I received an email from a high school junior in San Diego recently that prompted me to write this post. The teenager attended one of my talks and heard me mention that one in five colleges say that an applicant’s demonstrated interest is very important in their admission decisions. So what does demonstrated interest mean? Basically I told the teenager...

October 26, 2011

Last night my nephew Matt sent me his college essay to check out. We had talked a couple of weeks ago about what might make a compelling topic. I told Matt that he needed to write an essay that conveyed in vivid detail what kind of teenager he is. You can write a college essay that’s humorous, reflective, inspiring…it doesn’t...

October 25, 2011

I’m sharing an email that I received over the weekend from an anxious dad in North Carolina, who asked me for advice about an early decision application. I’ve changed the name of the son. Here is what he wrote: Dilemma from a Dad from North Carolina My son, Andrew, would like to go to Davidson College here in North Carolina;...

October 24, 2011

Is affirmative action on its way out on college campuses? While higher-ed affirmative action policies have been debated for decades, they could now be in jeopardy. Why? Because it’s highly likely that a case filed by Abigail Fisher, a young white woman, who was rejected as an applicant at the University of Texas at Austin in 2008, ends up being...

October 21, 2011

What are the latest college admission trends? Every year, the National Association for College Admission Counseling releases a survey that attempts to answer that question. Here are some of the trends that jumped out at me when I was reading the 2011 State of College Admission: College Applications on the Rise Most schools (73%) experienced an increase in applications. Not...

October 19, 2011

Is your university need blind? I once saw a couple of  enthusiastic young admission reps from a pair of Catholic universities back East try to answer that question at a college conference. The reps were specifically asked whether their schools might reject some applicants if they required a lot of financial assistance. Both admission reps vigorously assured the counselor who...

October 17, 2011

I want to major in art. This is the college major that perhaps more than any other strikes fear in the hearts of parents, who worry that an art degree will condemn their children to a life eating Cheerio’s for dinner and driving old subcompacts with bald tires. The truth is there are a myriad of careers in a wide...

October 14, 2011

I heard from a mom this week, who is worried about some of the schools her daughter has begun applying to. I wanted to share what the mother wrote: As I watch my daughter start her college applications, I’m cringing inside because she’s wanting to apply to out of state public schools such as UCLA, Georgia Tech and Purdue. Although...

October 5, 2011

If you do poorly on the SAT or ACT, you can always apply to colleges and universities that are test optional. It’s been awhile since I wrote about this subject and you can find the link to a previous post below, but today I want to share with you a new twist to the trend. Getting Into Great Schools With...