Category: College News

Should You Consider Taking a Gap Year?

If you’ve accepted a college’s offer of admission, you may find yourself in a dilemma. You don’t know if the campus will be open in the fall or if classes will be online. And you may be hesitant to pay a substantial sum for what may be only a facsimile of college life. Paying for […]

Make This Summer a Positive Factor in Admissions

High GPA’s and test scores are the norm for students who apply to selective and highly selective colleges. For this reason, colleges also include “soft” factors such as essays, letters of recommendation, interviews, and extracurricular activities as factors in admission decisions. In selecting your extracurriculars, you have the opportunity to pursue activities that suit your […]

Advances in Virtual College Visits

Past posts to this blog have extolled the high value of visits to the campuses of colleges that you’re interested in attending. Visits reveal more useful information about a college than all other sources of information combined. In the past, we’ve advised you on ways to assure that you’ll derive maximum benefit from your […]

College Admissions Rates for the Class of 2024

The admissions statistics for the Class of 2024 may be the final report of a passing era. Applications for the Regular Decision cycle were due on the last day of January and colleges announced their decisions on March 31 or April 1, as they do every year. Many colleges had ceased operations due to the […]

The Effects of the Pandemic on Seniors and Juniors

The Coronavirus pandemic has disrupted admissions processes at all colleges. High schools and colleges are closed and the ad hoc methods used to provide essential admissions-related services are, for the most part, inadequate. If you’ve been admitted to the Class of 2024 or intend to apply to the Class of 2025, you need to stay […]

The Stem Disciplines Demand Creativity Too

There is support in academic circles for adding an “A” to STEM, making it STEAM for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics. There’s no need to add an “A” if the purpose is to train students in the other four disciplines to be creative. They’ve always been creative. The Humanities Don’t Have a Lock on […]

Your Résumé Can Boost Your Chances of Admission

There are colleges that require you to submit a résumé with your application. Many other colleges don’t require a résumé but encourage or allow you upload one and will consider it along with the rest of your application materials. When you submit a résumé you should view it as another opportunity to enhance your appeal […]

Top Colleges Increasingly Value Transfer Students

However compelling the case may be for transfer students, administrators of selective colleges have traditionally neglected them as applicants. They’ve stated that they were already inundated with applications from high school seniors with excellent qualifications. This institutional bias has been an obstacle to college students aspiring to transfer. More than one-third of students transfer in […]

Now Is the Time to Plan for Summer

Your academic record is the most important factor in admission to colleges, but non-academic factors such as extracurricular activities also play a significant role. We advise that you use your opportunities to participate in extracurricular activities in ways that increase your likelihood of admission. The Value of Summer Activities Among your activities, those you engage […]

What’s the Right Number of College Applications?

While there is no “right” number of applications per se due to individual circumstances, we advise that, for the great majority of students, the best number is 10. Less than 10 doesn’t spread your risk sufficiently and more than 10 dissipates your focus and effort. Your Selection Criteria The first step in selecting the colleges […]