If you are like me and are spending mid-winter break visiting colleges, you probably experienced:
Freezing cold weather in So Cal (I visited Loyola Marymount in LA, University of San Diego and UCSD. I shivered through most of it!)
Mid-winter break crowds.
Tour registrations that were already filled.
More schools to visit than your schedule allowed.
Burn out after hearing the same thing over and over again (yes, they all have great study abroad programs!)
Pressure to answer the questions, “who are you, where are you from and what do you want to major in?”
Here are just a few tips to make your campus visits meaningful:
Book at least two weeks early if possible; even earlier if it’s spring break or some other very popular time of the year when school is out.
Plan to get to campus early to scope out parking, wait in line to pay for parking, and find the admissions building so that you don’t miss important parts of the information session that usually precedes the tour.
Prepare questions and listen to other people’s questions.
Take notes and pictures. Otherwise, after three visits, they all blend together and you won’t remember one from the other.
Pick up a student newspaper, eat in the dining facility (do you want to eat that food for four years?), take time to hang out in the nearby town, and take your time.
Lastly, while I will make every effort not to sell anything in the “College Crier", sometimes it is critically important for you to know why we offer one of our services. Please do not wait until the fall semester of senior year to write essays and fill out applications. One of my goals is that students have the majority of their application filled out, or at least well thought out, prior to the beginning of Senior year. Why add extra stress to an already stressful first semester of Senior year? Leave the fall for writing supplemental essays and possible scholarship essays. Also, it’s important to be prepared for 11/1 early action deadlines. Along with my partner, Andrea Liddane, we offer summertime application and essay writing workshops. We love doing them, we make it fun (we really do!) and I’ve never had a student walk out who wasn’t grateful for having attended. We are currently offering a 10% discount if you sign up prior to April 30th. Here’s the link: http://www.liddanetutoring.com/summer. Scroll down to workshops. If you can’t attend ours, but you like the idea, let me know. I’ll give you a referral to someone else’s quality workshop (that’s how much I believe in doing this over the summer!) or we’ll make other arrangements to support you.
If you like the “College Crier”, feel free to pass it along to anyone you know!