The College Solutions Blog

October 11, 2010

I have parents ask me variations of this question all the time: What are the best colleges and universities to attend that will ultimately generate jobs for my child? I think it’s rare that going to any particular school, by itself, will result in an automatic job for a new college graduate. I am willing to concede, however, that there...

October 7, 2010

How do you select an independent college counselor? A parent posted that question on my college blog a couple of weeks ago and I promised that I’d provide the answer. I had the good fortune to interview three prominent independent college counselors on this subject when I was at a national college conference last week in St. Louis. I interviewed...

September 27, 2010

During my last two posts, I have focused on picking college majors. This is the last post that I’m going to devote to majors for awhile. Here are my previous posts: Chosing a College Major College Majors: 5 Things You Need To Know Is getting a head start on a college major a good thing? Not according to a study...

September 26, 2010

How do you choose a college major? This is my second blog post that explores this question. If you missed the first one, here is the link: Choosing a College Major Today I want to share some more tips on majors: 1. Rethink a business major. Business is the most popular major in the country, but don’t assume that you...

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 22, 2010

I’ve been cranking out college blog posts for the past two years. (It makes me tired just thinking about it.) During this time, I’ve been pretty much picking college topics to write about that interest me as a mom and journalist. I hope that the topics that I’ve chosen, including scholarships, college costs,  financial aid, SAT and ACT tests, college...

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 13, 2010

In my last blog, I talked about why it’s important to know what your EFC or Expected Family Contribution is. Here is the post: What Is Your EFC? Today, I’m going to show you how you can get a preliminary EFC, which is not as hard as you might think. You just need to use an online EFC calculator. Here...

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...