The College Solutions Blog

August 27, 2009

Out here on the West Coast, I know parents who believe that their children will be condemned to mediocre lives if the University of California, Berkeley, doesn’t send them an acceptance letter. Okay, it might not be that bad, but plenty of parents and teens believe that getting into UC Berkeley is the ultimate academic achievement  for a teenager. Unfortunately,...

August 14, 2009

Every weekend, I like to share the most recent college posts that I wrote for CBSMoneyWatch.com. The post that generated the most traffic — and great placement on CBSMoneyWatch.com — focused on a young woman, who graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in just two years.Even for a bright student that’s quite a feat. As I mention in the...

August 5, 2009

I am the guest lecturer this week for an online college counseling course that’s offered through the extension service of the University of California, San Diego. It’s the second time that I’ve taught the class and it’s nice to get a chance to see what high school counselors, who are enrolled in the class, are thinking. Here’s a question that...

July 24, 2009

Will the financial crisis that colleges and universities are experiencing lead to cannabalism? I started wondering that when I heard that most of the department chairs at the University of California, San Diego, wrote a crazy letter recently to the president of the 10-campus UC system. Twenty one out of 28 department chairs suggested that Board of Regents consider killing...

July 21, 2009

What colleges and universities produce graduates who go on to earn the highest paychecks? It’s easy to answer that question if you consult the annual college salary survey that Pay Scale Inc., just released.  The list of schools that produce the graduates with the highest starting salaries is dominated by Ivy League institutions and other elite private schools. Big surprise....

July 13, 2009

If you have a child who is attending — or hopes to attend — a school in the University of California or California State University systems, these are scary times. Tuition at the 23 Cal State schools is expected to jump by 30% for the fall semester. Tuition at the University of California campuses will increase more than 9%. Students...

June 20, 2009

Today I’m providing links to the three posts that I wrote this week for CBSMoneyWatch.com where I also write about college. Hey, why be a slave to one time-consuming college blog when you can have two?? 1. Three-Year College Degree In this post, I wrote about what may be a nascent trend — the three-year college degree. Since I’ve been...

June 18, 2009

I know a bunch of parents who expect their teenagers to graduate from college in four years. Many of them are dreaming. Forty percent of  students can’t even graduate from college in six years! Colleges and universities often blame students for this dismal record. But if it’s the kids who are slackers, how come schools with similar academic profiles experience...

May 28, 2009

Gov. Schwarzenegger has proposed putting the 50-year-old Cal Grant program on the chopping block. This would be a disaster for more than 200,000 students. According to The Institute for College Access & Success, these students would lose anywhere from $576 to $9,708 a head this fall. To save roughly $250 million, the governor would eliminate all Cal Grants, which students...

April 21, 2009

Just thinking about what it takes to get into college today can be exhausting.  High school kids are supposed to take challenging classes, study for the dreaded SAT/ACT, round up teacher recommendation, complete applications, nag their parents to fill out financial aid forms ….it never seems to end. But today was a triumph for the two seniors who ride in...