The College Solutions Blog

Valuable insights from Lynn O’Shaughnessy
a nationally recognized college expert.

Admission practices

Jumping Ship: The Hazards of Transferring to Another University

I got an email recently from a dad named George who shared the bad luck of a young woman who lost lots of college credits when she transferred from one four-year university to another. His email is pertinent because many students end up hopping from one school to another. In fact, I believe about one out of four students fall...

The Fascinating Anatomy of a College Scholarship

How do colleges decide which teenagers will win their merit scholarships? And, just as importantly, how do schools determine how much each scholarship winner will receive. I was excited to gain some insight into that question yesterday when I talked to Jonathan Burdick, the undergraduate admissions and financial aid director at the University of Rochester. After the latest admission season...

5 Things High School Seniors Should Be Doing Now

If you are a rising high school senior, you probably thought you had all summer to get prepared for the upcoming college admission frenzy. But guess what? You’re running out of time. To avoid the time crunch in the fall, here are five things you can do now: 1. Examine school prices. I think it’s reckless to apply to a...

What’s Wrong With High School Counselors Part II

I want to thank everybody who commented yesterday on my post: What’s Wrong with High School Counselors? And a shout out to those who shared their thoughts about the post on the Facebook page for The College Solution. (If you haven’t checked it out and “liked” my new Facebook page, please do!) The thoughtful comments that I received prompted me...

My Favorite Books on College: A YouTube Review

Interested in some summer reading? I’ve got bookcases packed with college books in my home office. In this YouTube video, however, I share some of my favorite books about college. College Workshop I’ll be giving the final college workshop this Saturday (July 23) in a summer series for parents and teenagers at the University of California, San Diego. If you’d...

Reading a College Admission Office’s Mind

In my last post I talked about the benefits of visiting colleges before applying — particularly at schools where you can collect brownie points for showing up. If you missed it, here it is: Which Colleges Should I Visit? Today I’m directing you to a couple of resources that can help you pinpoint whether a school really cares if you...

Which Colleges Should I Visit?

Is there a strategy to deciding which colleges to visit? I got that question via email from a mom who attended my college workshop over the weekend at the University of California, San Diego. Clearly it’s much more expensive and involved for families out West to visit schools because you can’t just hop in the car and visit a bunch...

Getting Into Great Schools With Poor SAT and ACT Scores

I don’t have to tell you that one of the biggest stresses of the entire college process is the standardized testing. The prospects of taking the SAT and/or ACT is daunting, particularly since so much can ride on the results. I resented the amount of time and money spent in my house on these darn tests for my own two...

The Perfect Class: What Are Colleges Looking For?

Today I’m sharing a guest post written by Daesun Yim, a student at MIT, who earned a perfect 2400 on his SAT test. Yim has served as president of MIT’s Class of 2014 and has won a slew of math contests at Harvard, MIT and Princeton and elsewhere. Yim somehow found time to co-found Uncommon App, a firm that helps...

How Valuable is the ACT?

If you do poorly on the science and reading section of the ACT will you struggle in college? Not necessarily, according to a new intriguing study conducted by researchers at Stanford and the University of Chicago. The research concludes that the test scores on the reading and science sections of the ACT have “little or no” ability to predict whether...