The list of 50-50 colleges and universities is designed to provide students and their families with options for good schools where students are likely to be admitted. What makes a 50-50 school even better is when it provides generous financial aid. And quite a few 50-50 schools do. Continue reading
If you’re interested in playing your sport for one of the Ivy League schools, you need to understand the Academic Index. I’m assuming that you already know that the Ivy League does not provide athletic scholarships and that you’re hoping to use your athletic abilities to help you get admitted. After all, recruited athletes have approximately a 30 percentage advantage in being admitted compared to non-athletes with no legacy status. Continue reading
If you want to get any financial aid, you need to submit college financial aid applications such as the FAFSA and PROFILE. This is obviously a critical step: no application, no aid. But if you want to pay less for college, it certainly isn’t the first step.
The fact is that the FAFSA is just one of the final steps of many in paying for college. I’m not talking about the savings account you were going to set up for your kids when they were little but never got around to. What I’m talking about are the things you need to know before students even start applying to colleges. Before you even start making a college search list, much less worry about completing the FAFSA, you should know the following five things about paying for college. Continue reading
The National Merit Scholarship Program seems like a great opportunity for test savvy high school students and their families to make a substantial dent in college costs. Well, it really all depends. Much to the surprise of many families, being a National Merit Finalist doesn’t mean a full-ride scholarship to the college of your choice. Continue reading
At the end of my son’s last high school summer baseball season, I was struck by the number of players who had graduated and didn’t know yet where they were going to attend college. I heard a lot of talk from parents about “maybe walking on” to various teams and see what happens. These were good players, the majority better than my son who did know where he was going. Continue reading
Starting sometime in December of each year, you’ll see various College Confidential Boards, test prep websites, select parent support groups, and occasional independent college counselors start posting the minimum PSAT scores required by state to qualify as a National Merit Semi-Finalist. Depending on the venue, there will be some wailing of the unfairness of the system that allows students outside New York and Massachusetts to qualify with “much” lower scores. From the angst level, you would imagine National Merit Status confers students with full-rides and automatic admissions to the colleges of their choice.
It doesn’t.
Before you start ratcheting up the academic stress level around your household to qualify as a National Merit Finalist, you really need to know the following. Continue reading
What, you say you’ve never seen a tuition coupon? Just because nobody has ever actually held one in her hands doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. You know how you start getting coupons for movers and home stores when you change your address? Or after you visit a website online, you start getting discount offers from them in your Facebook feed? Well, it’s possible to get a coupon for $10,000 or $15,000 off your college tuition if you pick the right college. Continue reading
It seems that weekly, if not daily, you’ll come across another story about how today’s generation has been coddled with self-esteem trophies since their first little league game and have been told that their clay pots are special no matter how lumpy and cracked. This has an especially insidious strain in high school sports that can undermine a player’s chances of getting recruited to play college baseball.
Think about it, combine the me generation with a standout high school athlete and the too often accompanying egotism, you get a package of entitlement that will keep even the best players off a college baseball team. Continue reading
As families approach the college planning process, there’s one thing they need to do before anything else and that is have “the talk.” I know, parents have been putting it off because it can be embarrassing. Who wants to discuss such potentially intimate details with their teenagers? Besides, you’re pretty sure the school counselors have covered the topic so there’s no point in having to suffer through the rolling eyes and general awkwardness if you don’t have to.
Well, I’m telling you right now that you have to because “the talk” I’m referring to isn’t the “birds and the bees” but something just as important, “The Money Talk.” Continue reading
