The College Solutions Blog

September 24, 2010

Last spring I bumped into a dad I know whose daughter had attended the same middle school as my son. I asked him where his daughter would be attending college in the fall and he said: She’s going to a community college. I was surprised because Rachel is a very bright girl. The dad explained, however, that his daughter didn’t...

September 14, 2010

As many of you know, I’m not a fan of college rankings. I think most rankings are lame and their methodology is creaky. When a mom emailed me yesterday complaining about the rankings, I decided to use this as an opportunity to share one of my biggest pet peeves about the college rankings of U.S. News & World Report, which...

September 10, 2010

The last two days I’ve been writing about applying early decision in the college admission process. Here are my two posts: Finding the Success Rate of Applying Early Decision Case Study: Applying Early Decision After reading my case study post, a mom posed with her own question about early decision. I decided to answer her here.  I promise this will...

September 8, 2010

Should you apply early decision? I got an email last night from a psychologist who asked if his daughter should apply early decision to The College of New Jersey, which is a public liberal arts college. Last month, I wrote about the early decision dilemma that a mom from Minnesota was facing regarding her daughter’s desire to apply early decision...

September 5, 2010

How can you tell if a college or university will cut the price for your child? You can get an idea by looking at a school’s Common Data Set. If you don’t know what a Common Data Set is, you’ll want to read the posts that I wrote last week on this valuable document: Researching Colleges With the Common Data...

September 2, 2010

The Common Data Set can be a great tool for researching colleges and universities. You can learn what a Common Data Set is by reading the post that I wrote yesterday: Researching Colleges With the Common Data Set Today I’m going to explore how you can use the Common Data Set to gain insights into what admission officers are looking...

September 1, 2010

At the beginning of yet another college admission season, I want to share one of my favorite tools that can help anyone research colleges and universities.  The tool is called the Common Data Set. College and universities all over the country produce their own Common Data Set every year. The Common Data Set is a document about 32 pages long...

August 29, 2010

If you hadn’t already noticed, this is college rankings month. US News & World Report, the big college rankings  gorilla, released its latest lists of the best liberal arts colleges and best universities earlier in August.  Forbes Magazine rolled out its best college list this month too and the Washington Monthly unveiled its picks for  best colleges a few days...

August 27, 2010

With the economy still floundering, more Americans are considering attending graduate school. But how do you shop for the best  graduate school programs? Writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Thomas A. Benton, an English professor at Hope College made a stab at answering that question. He observed that the  universities receiving the highest graduate school rankings aren’t always the...

August 26, 2010

Yesterday I wrote a blog post for CBSMoneywatch that included lists of the most popular graduate degrees. Here is the post: America’s Most Popular Graduate Degrees Not surprisingly, the MBA was the most popular master’s degree program for both men and women. What I found interesting, however, was how quickly the most popular master’s degree programs diverge for men and...