Expecting students to find their own time and motivation to explore and apply to colleges and financial aid has always been risky, but the COVID crisis seems to have made it even more challenging.
Let’s change that.
The Senior College Seminar (SCS) is a comprehensive curriculum designed to help students investigate colleges, build a college list, apply for admission, financial aid, and scholarships, and begin the transition to college during the school day, in their senior year. Designed around the feedback of school counselors, the SCS curriculum works around your school’s schedule and calendar, offering comprehensive lesson plans that can be taught in any order.
How does it work?
Time Each unit comes with a lesson plan that can be taught in 10, 20, or 20+ minutes. If your school can offer SCS as a full period class, great; if a classroom teacher or study hall monitor gives you 10 minutes for a lesson, that works, too. Add it to an existing health class, or a unit on careers, or a required senior class, or make it a class all its own. (Want ideas on when and how to offer a class? Contact us!)
Length of class Schools hoping for a full class period that meets daily can supplement with the long-term lesson plans, where students are given time to complete college applications, financial aid forms, and scholarship submissions with your help, during the class. If you only have 10 minutes, that works too, leaving students with the knowledge and confidence to complete the work they’ve started in class.
Content There are 37 lessons with rich content that helps students understand all facets of making a strong college decision. Each lesson has follow-up lessons on the same topic, giving you the content for up to 90 class sessions-- a full semester. Schools that may only have time to teach a few lessons can pick the topics most important to them and present those in any order—no one lesson depends on teaching another one, so if you only have time to teach five lessons, pick any five, and you're on your way. Schools that want to teach the entire curriculum are given ideas on how to present the curriculum in a “start to finish” order you can rearrange any way you wish.
Customization Each lesson provides ample, free resources to make sure students understand what’s being presented, eliminating your prep time. At the same time, there’s always room for you to add a favorite website or resource that meets your students’ needs.
Instruction SCS is best taught by a professional counselor familiar with the college application process. College advisers, career specialists, and other educators who know the process can also mentor students through SCS, but may want to review the content and links before presenting them.
Cost SCS is free of charge.
SCS is designed to be taught at any school, using any schedule. If you’d like ideas on how to present SLS at your school, contact us, and we’ll talk about solutions.
It’s time for class time to go to college.
Want the curriculum? Click here.
Need more information? Contact us.
Topics Include:
What is College, and Why College?
4 Year Colleges
Women’s Colleges, HBCUs and Other Historic Colleges
Colleges with Something Different
2 Year Colleges
Trade and Technical Schools
College Searches
Exploring Colleges
Testing
Test Prep
Talking College With Your Parents
Going to College Far From Home
Building a College List
College Update
Applying to College
College Essays
“Why Us” Essays
Letters of Recommendation
Interviews
Application Deadlines
Admissions Decisions
You and Social Media
Paying for College
Applying for Aid with FAFSA
Applying for Aid with Other Forms
Applying for Private Scholarships
Reading a Financial Aid Award
Appealing Financial Aid
Making a College Decision
Last Steps to Enrolling
Finishing Strong Senior Year
If You Get “Behind”
Taking Time Off Before College
Transferring Colleges
First in Family to Go To College
Art and Music Schools
Making the Most of College
“If college is so important, why do we expect students to research, select, and apply to colleges on their own time?”