2010.05.17 23:17:38

Patrick OConnor

College Admissions and Tests-- Send the Scores for Free

A recent column talked about when and if you should take the SAT or ACT a second time (the short answer was yes, but read the whole column, since it’s still up). In addition, a ton of  wrong information is out and about on these tests that could cost you more money that front row seats at the Eminem/Jay-Z joint concert at Harwell Field in Detroit, and cost you more sleep than the folks who live next to Harwell Field are going to lose that very same night.

In the interest of setting the record straight (get it—Eminem?  Jay-Z?  Record?), here’s the info on the tests—read on to make sure you’re Not Afraid:

Every college that requires testing will accept the SAT and the ACT.  There used to be a time when colleges on the coasts only took the SAT, and all the Midwest colleges only accepted the ACT.  The days of one test only colleges died about three years ago, when Wake Forest made the jump from SAT only to test optional (this deserves a “dude”!).  While there may be a small college or two out there that’s still test-specific, any college that recruits nationally will accept and welcome either test, if indeed they want any tests.

Many colleges are test optional.  Another change in the past three years is the number of colleges that don’t require any testing at all.  Many of these colleges see the test as one more stresser you just don’t need, or a piece of information that just doesn’t tell them all that much  So if you want to send your scores, cool; if not, equally James. A partial list of these schools can be found at www.fairtest.org; you’ll notice Wake Forest is on the list as promised.  Sarah Lawrence is as well, but that can be misleading, since Sarah Lawrence is actually Test Optional Extreme—even if you send them your scores, they do not look at them at all.  (And yet again—“Dude”!)

Send the scores before you see them.  This is the big issue that would make Doctor Evil pull his hair out if he were a school counselor—and if he had hair.  ACT and SAT will send your scores to as many as four colleges at no extra charge, as long as you tell them where to send the scores before you actually take the test.  If you wait to send the scores after you get them, it costs you at least $9 per college, and sometimes more. My advice?  Save the dough, and send the scores for free.

“But dude” says you, “what if I score badly?   I don’t want a college to hold bad scores against me!”

I get that—and the answer is they won’t, even if you send them bad scores.  After talking to a lot of colleges and hobnobbing with my fellow school counselors, I can tell you I know of no college that sees a high ACT score and a low ACT score and uses the low scores in their decision.  In fact, some colleges have computer systems that only let the admissions officials see your best scores, and other colleges will “superscore” your results by taking the best sub-scores of each test and putting them together.  Not every college has these services, so ask—but even if they don’t, you won’t find a school where bad scores are used in a decision.

You need to do your best on the tests, but don’t let them get the best of you—that’s the secret to test success beyond a Reasonable Doubt.

college admissions | ACT | SAT | college testing | admission requirements | college applications

2010.04.29 22:06:31

Patrick OConnor

College tests-- don't ACT out- find a way to do better!

Just when the hallways at school were quieting down as seniors made their May 1 decisions, the cries of “Oh the madness!” are now coming from the juniors who have received their ACT scores from early April (yup, they’re online—the ones in the mail will come in about three weeks.)  Even though many of these juniors should be studying for the APs they’re taking next week, all they can do is stare at their e-mail from Iowa and say “How did this happen?”

If this is your first ACT, calm down—it happens to almost everyone.  No matter how much you practice, there’s nothing to replace the first ACT experience… except of course, the second ACT experience, provided you score higher.

Several juniors have asked if a re-take of the ACT is in order.  The answer (of course) is—it depends.  If something unusual happened the day you took the test—if you weren’t feeling well, if there was a fire drill in the middle, if you felt nervous about the test, or (true story!) if you fell asleep during the test, or if you walked out from the test and said “I can do better”, a re-take is most likely in order—see if you can sign up for June.

On the other hand, some students simply look at the scores and want them to be higher—so they wonder about a re-take.  The best answer I can give here is to consider if you really feel you can score higher—it’s great to *want* the scores to be higher, but do you think you gave the ACT your best shot?  If you’re not sure, and you want to give it another go, by all means make it happen…

…but before you register, consider if you’re ready for a re-take.  For example, some students feel a particular score was surprisingly low—for many students, this is the Reading score.  If your Reading score surprised you, you’re going to want to get some help with reading comprehension skills before you do the re-take—and you want to do this for more than one reason. 

First, if your reading comprehension needs improvement, there’s a good chance you scored lower on the Science section as well—because the Science section is really a Reading test with scientific content, and not a science test.  If you love Science, your score might be higher than your Reading score—but that probably has to do with the fact you liked what you were reading.  There’s a good chance the Science score could go higher with some comprehension help (incredibly, this doesn’t always apply to your English score, since English is more about mechanics), so that’s something to consider.

Second, since improving reading comprehension generally takes time, June might not be the best time for an ACT re-take, so this might wait until September.  If this freaks you out, you might want to consider taking a Spring SAT, since only one of the three sections of the SAT emphasize the kind of reading the ACT Reading portion does.  Again, there’s nothing hard and fast about these rules, but if you find yourself needing some time to sharpen your reading skills, and you want to get a decent set of scores, the plan may be to do a Spring SAT, followed by a Fall ACT—and remember, the scores from the September ACT will be delivered to colleges around October 8th,, just in time to be used to review your killer application.

college entrance | college applications | college tests | ACT | college test re-takes

2010.04.02 20:07:01

Patrick OConnor

College Admission Acceptances-- a Year of Wow!

Students, parents and school counselors are still spinning from a week of college news that surprised even the most cautious college watchers.  Thin envelopes, noisy e-mails, and overworked Web sites have left a cloud of data and decisions that ask two questions—what happened, and what’s next?

First, a look at what happened:

• As expected, all highly selective colleges reported an increase in the number of applications—but the increase was larger than expected. This means more students were applying to college than ever before, AND these students were applying to more colleges than ever before, meaning many selective colleges offered admission to less than 10% of their applicants.
• Why were students applying to more colleges?  First, the economy. High unemployment and the tight housing market are still making parents cautious college consumers.  As a result, students applied to economic safety schools (this is why public colleges saw big application jumps) and to more colleges that were out of reach, hoping to find one that would offer a better financial aid bargain.
• Second, Harvard and Yale.  Word continued to spread about the bargain these schools are for families that make less than $160,000 a year; as a result, more families who thought they couldn’t afford an Ivy are applying to Harvard and Yale.  While this is good for these colleges, it makes admission that much harder, meaning the “traditional” Harvard and Yale families had to apply to more colleges.  This explains part of the reason why colleges as small as Swarthmore saw big application jumps.

What does all of this mean?  Three things:

• More students with more choices.  Students who used to have one or two acceptances from safety schools now have three or four.
• More uncertainty.  These students can still only attend one college, meaning more colleges will get “no thanks” notes from many admitted students.
• Bigger waitlists.  Many colleges expect an increase in the number of admitted students who attend somewhere else, so they’re padding their waitlists, just in case.

If you have many college acceptances, congratulations!  In addition to reviewing the financial aid offers from these colleges, review your notes from when you visited these colleges to help make your decision. 

If possible, visit these campuses a second time between now and May 1.  It’s been at least three months since you applied, and five months or more since you visited.  You may have different interests now than you did last fall, or you may see the college a different way.  There’s a big difference between “I hope I’m admitted here” and “Do I want to go here?”  Make sure you’re answering the right question, now that they’ve said yes.

If you’ve been waitlisted, ask yourself if you’d still want to go to this college if they called today and said “Yo, our bad—you can come.”  If the shine is off this college, take your name off the list and move on. 

If not, send back the postcard with a brief, updated list of all you’ve done since you applied, see if a teacher can write another letter, and be prepared to wait until late June for the college to run through the wait list, knowing financial aid may be limited at that point.  Of course, be sure to deposit at another college by May 1^st, just in case.

In a year of surprises, there are sure to be more to come.  For now, find a quiet place to focus on what matters most to you—the answers on what to do next will fall in place.

college admissions | college applications | college acceptances | waitlists | financial aid

2010.01.23 01:25:50

Patrick OConnor

Financial Aid and Final Exams-- Waiting? Wondering? Why?

You’re probably studying for finals for your seventh semester—the grades colleges just love to see—or you’ve completed them, and are waiting for the grades to come in. Either way, you’re convinced the best thing you can do is stand in front of a mirror and see how quickly you can say “Do you want fries with that?”, just in case this college thing doesn’t work out.

The rock of your support, your parents, aren’t much help either.  If they are working on financial aid forms at a normal clip, they’re shocked at all the paperwork they need to complete the FAFSA.  If they filed on January 2nd, they may have heard back from the Federal government already, and all they can seem to say is “Congress really thinks I can pay this much for college?”

With Conan on his way out, and a Republican senator from Massachusetts on his way in, there seems to be no relief to the madness— just what can you do?

Friends, I am a professional—please attempt to do this at home:

• Help your parents calm down. The FAFSA asks for material most families need to fill out tax forms—they just need the information sooner.  Tell your parents to “think taxes,” and be amazed by how happy that idea makes them.  If the forms aren’t around, they can use last year’s tax information as an estimate, and update with the actual numbers later.

• Get them to phase two.  A large number of families don’t get grants from FAFSA, but you have to apply anyway before a college will give you need-based aid.  Once you’re done with FAFSA, get your parents to fill out the forms the college needs completed—Profile, their own form, whatever—so you can be considered for institutional-based aid.  If you don’t know what they need, call and ask; in this case, the only stupid question really IS the one that doesn’t get asked.

• Hit the Web yourself.  With college essays and final exams as warm-ups, your writing skills are at their peek—hit www.finaid.org or other scholarship search sites to find cash you could earn with an essay everyone else is too tired to write.  I once won a trophy in a 10K race for my age group, and I run about as well as an 8-track player.  What did I do to earn the gold?  I was the only one in my age group to finish.  Get it?

• Man up and move on.  You may think you have nothing better to do but freak while you wait on your grades, but the world begs to differ--good students don’t wait for anything.  Now is the time to DO—focus on your studies, because colleges have many more qualified applicants than seats.  If your last semester in high school is a let-down, it won’t take much for the college of your dreams to change their mind, and you want to avoid that nightmare.  Also, go teach something to someone. The best college students know what it means to learn AND to teach, and with college applications done, you have some free time.  Go coach a basketball clinic at the Y, tutor at the library, show your mom how to Skype— believe me, you’ll want her to have that skill in a couple of months.

college applications | college counseling | paying for college | scholarships | financial aid

2009.12.28 18:41:47

Patrick OConnor

As Application Deadlines Loom, Make a Plan

I’d like to think you’re reading this just to check in and wish me a Happy New Year, but I know better—you’re here because your college apps need to get out now, and you need some help.  Here goes:

Double check the deadlines.  A number of colleges changed their deadline from January 1 to January 4, so go to the Web site of each college you’re applying to and make sure you have the right date.

Complete your application online.  If you really are working with a January 1^st deadline, applying online allows you to hit submit at 11:45 pm on New Year’s Night; if you’re applying by mail, you have to get your application to the post office by 11:45 am on New Year’s Eve.  That’s an extra 36 hours, and a lot less snow on your shoes.

Check your schedule.  You’ll want to give yourself time for breaks, sleep, meals—and family events. If Uncle Bob’s holiday brunch is scheduled for Friday morning, you want to know that now, not Friday morning, so check your schedule with your parents.  They’ll be pleased to see you’re looking ahead, and that will ease the college stress they’re feeling, too.

Vary your activities.  Most students decide to leave the essays of an application for last.  That’s OK if you’re only working on one application, but if you’re looking at three or four, your essays won’t be as fresh if you write ten in a row.  Start with an easy essay, then go back and fill in your name and address—then back to an essay, then over to your high school activities.  Variety keeps most writers focused.

The “Why Us?” question matters the most.  Previous columns have told you how to approach the “Why do you want to apply here?” question.  Even though you’re in a hurry, be sure you do your best writing with this very challenging question that usually has a limit of 100 words—your answer has to be specific to that college, and can be a deal-maker, so it’s worth the time.

Send test scores now.  SAT and ACT scores can be ordered online during the holidays, so take the time to make sure they get sent to the colleges that request them.  You’ll need a credit card to order them; use this as a break from your essays, and a chance to touch base with your parents to let them know how things are going.

Transcripts and teacher letters will have to wait.  If you discover a form that’s supposed to be completed by your teacher or school counselor, there isn’t much you can do with those right now.  Fill out the top of each form, and make a note to touch base with teachers and counselors the first day school’s back in session; colleges usually give supporting documents a little more time to arrive, but your material really needs to make the deadline.

Build in time to double check essays.  Dazzling essays lose their shine when they have misspelled words, bad grammar, or talk about how much going to Brown would mean to you when the essay is going to Lawrence University.  There’s a difference between being in a hurry and being sloppy—now is the time to show the colleges you know what that difference is.

Celebrate wisely.  Whenever your applications are finished, remember a great application is successful only if you’re around to actually go to the college next fall.  Be safe, be sober, and only ride with those who are the same.

Happy New Year-- you can do this.

college applications | college deadlines | essays | admission | college counseling

2009.12.03 23:14:31

Patrick OConnor

Grades and College Applications: What's Your Road Map?

It’s now time for the world’s easiest college admissions test.  Ready?

Question 1.  If I were to compare my high school transcript to a geographic feature, I would choose:

1. A mountain
2. A valley
3. A ski slope
4. The end of a ski jump
5. A very high plateau

Time’s up—let’s check your answer, and see what this means about your college applications:

If you chose a mountain, this means you started high school with OK grades, had great grades in 10^th or early 11^th grade year, and went back to OK grades in late 11^th grade or during this first term.  If this is the case, colleges may be wondering why your latest work isn’t as strong as your Rocky Mountain work.

If you chose a valley, this means your early grades were strong, then you hit a rocky patch, and now you’re back at your usual level of work.  Colleges will definitely want to know about what caused the unexpected drop in altitude.

The ski slope is also known as the negative trend— grades in 9th grade were the highest you’ve earned, and they have been declining ever since.  This is a cause of concern to colleges—if you keep getting lower grades each semester, where will your GPA be after your first semester of college?

If you’ve picked any of these, you’ll want to address these trends with the college.  If  low grades can be attributed to an unexpected challenge— illness, family issues, or something personal—it’s usually wise for you or your counselor to tell the college why things didn’t go as planned.  If your grades have turned around, it’s important to point that out; even though it’s clear on your transcript, pointing this out assures the college that the storm has passed, and you expect to have strong grades from here on in.

If you find yourself in the middle of a tough time with grades right now, it’s time for some quality counselor time.  A personal challenge in senior year is one thing; but if the grades are low because your classes are too hard, that’s something very different. The time to sort out the cause and build a plan is now, with the support of someone who can help the colleges understand.

Some students are hesitant to talk about the challenges they’ve had, either because the memories of that time are still too fresh, or they feel the colleges will judge them on their behavior.  If this is the case, your counselor can address the issue, either in a note to the college, or through a phone call.  Either way, it’s important for someone to talk about it; transcripts don’t lie, and if a bad run of grades isn’t explained, the colleges won’t know what to think— and you don’t want that to happen.

The end of the ski jump is known as a positive trend, where your grades have been getting higher and higher every semester.  Colleges may want to know why you started out low, but generally they’re pleased about this, since it suggests you’re improving your grades all along. If there was a personal issue early in your high school career, mention it; if not, it might be wise to let it go.

You high plateau folks are fine, as long as you’re taking the most challenging classes you can handle.  If for some reason the colleges think you didn’t ramp it up, and could have, they’ll take that into account—but you’ve still got a lot to be proud of.

A’s all around!

college counseling | counseling | grades | college help | college applications

2009.11.12 19:09:08

Patrick OConnor

Applying to Colleges a Bear? Time to Regroup!

This is the hardest three weeks of applying to college.  You've already submitted a couple of applications, and now you're up to your Uggs in essays and deadlines for more colleges.  You're starting to wonder if this is all really worth it, when along comes a thick envelope from one of the colleges you applied to in September-- congratulations, you're in!

You have now entered the Goldilocks zone.

(Forgot about her?  Go to http://www.dltk-teach.com/rhymes/goldilocks_story.htm --DON'T ask your English teacher, who will tell you the story is a metaphor of global consumption by Western civilization.)

Why Goldilocks? Right now, you think your college list is:

Too hard  With 5 class papers to do and the fall play, you're sure you are applying to too many colleges.  You only visited half of them, the time you spend on essays would be much better spent on keeping your grades up, and you're already admitted to one college-- do you really need more?

Too soft  Sure, you're in at one college-- but that was a safety school.  In fact, every school you're applying to looks like a sure thing.  Maybe it's time to ramp things up-- and if that means more essays, you can take your laptop to Grandma's on Thanksgiving.

These may seem to be opposites, but they are signs of the same thing-- you are stressed about the application process.  Pull up a bowl of porridge, and let's sort this out with three simple questions:

How did you feel about your college list in September?   If you put a lot of thought into your choices, visited some campuses and researched the others, chances are you'd be cutting out some options by cutting down on the list; the busy-ness of school is blocking your view of the big picture, and it's time to take a breath.

However, if you threw the list together to get Mom and Dad off your back, you may now have a better idea of what you want-- or don't want.  If that's the case, there's time to re-visit the list, and a good reason to do so.

How many essays do you really have left?  Count up the college essays you have to answer.  Now, divide that number by six.  That's the number you have to complete each weekend to finish the apps by mid-December.  If you mix and match short and long essays, you're probably OK if you have to do three each weekend, maybe four.  (Remember, no writing during the week.  That's time for school work, which is the way you keep your grades up.)

Then again, if you have to write something like one-sixth of an essay each weekend, you have room to apply to more colleges.  Write down what you're looking for in a college, and spend this weekend looking around for more; it sounds like you can skip the essays for a while.

Have your college goals changed since September?  If you have new college plans, a review of your list is the right thing to do.  If you really know all of the colleges are keepers, it's time to pull up your socks and do the heavy lifting of the essays.  Persisting now will be good practice for college, when you have to choose between turning a paper in on time, and the Euchre tournament.

Goldilocks made bad choices-- trespassing, destruction of private property, and napping after a big meal.  Don't let this happen to you; step back, think about what matters most to you, and you'll make a decision about college apps that's just right.

college applications | applying to college | college entrance | college stress | paying for college

2009.11.09 22:03:18

Patrick OConnor

Applying to College is a Changing Game!

October seemed to be the month of surprises for college-bound students, at least as far as the state of Michigan was concerned.  The first surprise came on October 16th, when the University of Michigan announced they were going to change the way they recomputed the GPAs of their applicants.  For years and years, U-M only counted grades in the five academic areas (English math, science social studies, and foreign language) earned in 10th and 11th grade.  Right—they didn’t use any grades used in 9th grade at all.  Now, U-M is not going to recompute GPA — they will use whatever GPA appears on the high school transcript.

While this is a huge surprise—admission reps at U-M were still talking about recomputing GPA as late as October 14th—the bigger surprise is that this change will go into effect immediately, including applicants for the Fall of 2010.  It’s uncertain if this change will impact admissions decisions—U-M says it studied GPAs for two years and concluded this change had little impact on applications—but the news that the change would begin this year was most unexpected.

The second surprise came two weeks later, when the budget for the State of Michigan was passed.  One of the programs axed by the state was the Michigan Promise Scholarship, where students who scored well on a state exam could receive up to $4,000 to attend a Michigan college.  The test is given in junior year, meaning this year’s seniors took the test last March, thinking they were aiming to get some college cash.  It turns out their labors were literally for nothing…

…but it gets worse, I’m afraid.  The Promise Scholarship has been in existence for three years, and the entire program was cut.  As a result, students in some Michigan colleges have been sent letters saying “So, the state was supposed to pay $1000 of your tuition this semester, but they really aren’t.  Here’s your bill.”

U-M’s decision on the Ides of October and the Devil’s Night Diss from the state legislature emphasize three important points when it comes to applying to colleges:

paying for college | applying to college | college applications

2009.10.21 21:49:16

Patrick OConnor

Freezing on College Applications? Here's the two-step cure

The real challenge for a college counselor is helping students whose first sense of application panic comes on a fall Saturday morning, when they bring a pen or laptop to the breakfast table, throw a last handful of Cocoa Doodles in their mouth, decide it’s time to take on that first application—and they freeze on the line that says “Name.” In other words, they are coming out of the “College is Crazy” hype, and thinking about what they really want out of college for the first time in a long time, or for the first time ever. 

I’m sorry I can’t be at the breakfast table when there’s nowhere to run to—if I could be there, I would tell them to go to their room. 

The good news is the colleges that are right for you will feel just like home. It may be in the dorm rooms, it may be at the library (hey, it happens), it may be the whole campus—but somewhere at those colleges, there is a spot waiting for you to reflect on the challenges of life, wonder about the possible, and text your BFFs til dawn. Once you think about college as your next home, completing the applications will be as easy as taking the written exam for your driver’s license, because both are just the paperwork that leads to a greater sense of freedom. In the end, going to college isn’t about leaving home—it’s about taking home with you. 

The second thing I would do is replace students’ earbuds with soundproof headphones. Some students hit the brakes because of outside opinions about their college choices. The application to a college a student loves often heads to the shredder when a well meaning neighbor asks “Where is that college?”, or Uncle Bob reports the college is nowhere to be found in the recently published rankings. If it turns out no other student at the local high school is applying to this college, this can become a trifecta for trauma.

When this happens, I encourage students to make the mature choice and be selfish. By fall, college-bound students know who they are and what they want in a college—with all the research they’ve done and the campuses they’ve visited, if college selection were a term paper, they’d have about 25 sources to quote and 3000 file cards to synthesize by now. 

Knowing what you know about college and yourself, it’s important to keep the well-meaning insights of others in perspective—some may know you, some may know colleges, but very few (except your parents) will know both as well as you do. Everyone on your first grade soccer team got a trophy for participating, and choosing colleges works the same way—with self knowledge and college knowledge, everyone gets a best college, even if what’s best for you is different than what’s best for everyone else.

college applications | applying to college | essays | college essays