Daniel Spangenburger has two jobs and is at the top of his class. So why aren’t the best colleges courting him?

Article by Peg Tyre, Newsweek

Daniel Spangenburger, a high-school senior in Berkeley Springs, W.Va., dreams of attending a prestigious college like Carnegie Mellon or Cornell. A degree from either “could make a difference for the rest of my life,” he says. And on the face of it, Spangenburger has what it takes: eight Advanced Placement courses and an impressive 3.9 grade-point average.

He scored 1330 on his SAT, well within the range desired by many elite schools, and now that he’s borrowed an SAT prep book, he hopes to break 1400 on his second try. His teachers say he’s smart, motivated and exceptionally mature. He holds two after-school jobs and also finds time to volunteer, setting up a computer cafe at the local Boys & Girls Club. And he drives his mother, who is battling cancer, to her monthly chemo sessions. Only two obstacles stand between Spangenburger and his dream: he comes from a poor family (neither parent went to college) and attends a rural high school. “With the right kind of college education, Daniel could do great things,” says Berkeley Springs High School principal George Ward. “But so many smart rural kids fall through the cracks. Top schools don’t know Daniel exists.” (more…)

Colleges and universities have varying deadlines and admissions requirements. Your high school guidance counselor can be your best resource for information. Build a relationship with your guidance counselor and (s)he can help you through every step of the college application process. Our timeline can be a great resource as well, although you may have to make adjustments based on your specific needs and the schools in which you apply.

Freshman Year

• Get involved in activities, both inside and outside of school. You can participate in sports, school clubs, youth groups, and even volunteer! Choose activities that will allow you to make new friends, have fun, and take on leadership positions.
• Challenge yourself by taking the hardest classes you can handle. Taking tough classes now allows you to take more advanced classes down the road. Just remember that good grades are also important. Don’t take on more than you can handle.

Sophomore Year

• Take the PSAT. This exam is great practice for taking the test again during your junior year.
• Stay involved in advanced courses and extracurricular activities! You can have a great time, face challenges and learn, while becoming a more desirable college applicant. Begin to focus on the areas you enjoy the most and the ones in which you’re excelling.
• Good grades are critical!

Junior Year

First semester

• Take more of a leadership role in your activities. Take on a service project and see it through from start to finish.
• Take the PSAT (as the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test).
• Focus on your grades!

Second semester

• Begin thinking about colleges and scheduling college visits. There’s no better way to learn about a school than experiencing it firsthand!
• Study for the ACT and SAT.
• Grades, grades, grades! This semester is probably more important than any other!

Senior Year

First semester

• Begin speaking more regularly with your guidance counselor.
• Request college applications.
• Visit more schools.
• Retake the SAT and/or ACT if necessary.
• Get recommendations from teachers.
• Prepare and mail applications.
• Don’t forget about grades! Even if you’ve mailed your applications, many schools will ask for a grade update in January.

Second semester

• Enjoy your senior year! This can be a very exciting - and sometimes stressful - time.
• You’re going to get responses from schools.
• Choose a college!

Parents: when it comes to helping your child choose a college, you may be tempted to make a decision based mostly on cost, reputation and, possibly, your own alma mater.

However, campus visits can provide insight and information on a school that can’t easily be ranked in statistics. Visiting a school can give you and your child a chance to get a gut feeling about the environment, which becomes just as important as cost and how many professors have a PhD.

Knowing what to look for and what to do on a campus visit can help ensure that your child makes the right decision. Familyeducation.com offers these tips to make your campus visit as beneficial as possible. (more…)

Choosing the right college can be a difficult decision for students and parents alike. Guidance counselors strive to provide the best resources to aid in the decision, but it is ultimately students and parents who have the weight on their shoulders for the verdict.

Students are considering various pros and cons like distance from home, student to faculty ratio, and student housing. However, parents may place importance on a different factor - getting the best bang for their buck.

Choosing the one perfect college or university out of selected few can be difficult; actually getting to the top choices can be even more taxing. You can start by weighing the pros and cons of public vs. private colleges. (more…)

It’s hard to get into college these days: Since the baby boomers’ kids came of age, the number of students in classrooms and the level of competition have both surged. Luckily, there are still a few ways to guarantee Ivy League admission — high SAT scores, lots of extracurricular activities, alumni in the family and the name of a prestigious private prep school on your transcript. Right?  (more…)

The following article about studying abroad as a college student was written by By Brooke Kosofsky Glassberg for Budget Travel.

What to ask the advisor of the university program that — if all goes well — will change your life.

What’s the program like?Who your fellow students are and what courses you sign up for have a big impact on your experience. “Island” programs, like the NYU Center in Prague, are populated by Americans. If you enroll at a foreign school like the Universidad Complutense in Madrid, meanwhile, your classmates will primarily be locals.

“When I was a master’s student, I took a third of my classes at the University of Florence, which gave me the opportunity to meet Italian students and professors,” says Adam Gagliardo, assistant director of Study Abroad Admissions at New York University. “It introduced me to a side of Italian culture that I never would have seen in an exclusively American school.”

As for classes, students generally want to learn about the culture rather than simply fulfill a math requirement. To find out more about a particular program, ask for referrals of students who have recently participated. (more…)

There are many options for pursuing higher education. Today’s high school students can choose from traditional 4-year colleges and universities, Hispanic-serving colleges and universities, historically black colleges and universities, Christian colleges and universities, community colleges and technical colleges and schools.

The following article written by Jennifer LeClaire for FastWeb, addresses the myths surrounding community colleges. It is a helpful article for high school guidance counselors to share with their students and parents.

Like most misconceptions, community college myths are based on elements of truth. But like most misconceptions, these myths lead to mistaken beliefs that could warp your ability to choose the right post-high school educational path for you.

It’s the truth about community colleges that sets you free from the bondage of what some in educational circles call the “snob factor.” In fact, the truth about community colleges flies in the face of some overblown stereotypes.

“There are many wrong assumptions about community colleges, but the top students at community colleges are among our country’s greatest assets,” says Joshua Wyner, vice president of programs with the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, an organization that focuses on community college student development. (more…)

The following article appeared on MSNBC.com.

When you’re in the market for a new car, you read reviews of various makes, visit dealers and go for a few test-drives. You want to know about things like gas mileage, repair costs and resale value. That kind of careful consumerism is exactly what Education Secretary Margaret Spellings would like to bring to the process of picking a college. “We need to make higher education more accountable,” says Spellings, “by opening up the ivory towers and putting information at the fingertips of students and families.”

Spellings and others would like a national database that discloses things like graduation rates, how well students are educated and how much they earn afterward. A few states already provide some of this information, and it’s revealing. In a recent paper for Education Sector, a nonpartisan think tank, policy analyst Kevin Carey talks about two such measures: the Collegiate Learning Assessment released by the University of Texas system and Florida’s annual profile of public-university graduates. Both show that the best-known campuses aren’t always the best place to get an education. In the Texas system, for example, Carey found that the UT campus with the most freshman-to-senior-year academic growth was Permian Basin, which accepts 95 percent of applicants. In Florida, the top earners graduated from Florida International University—not the flagship Gainesville campus. (more…)

The following article was taken from CNN.com. If your state does not presently sponsor such a site, maybe your state union chapter can push to have one created.

With her first child headed for college this fall and two more soon to follow, Carol Wright was lost.

Campus tours, applications, financial aid forms, transcripts, SAT scores, class planning — and that was just the beginning.

“It’s unbelievable,” the Carrollton, Georgia, mother said. “You don’t know where to start or what to do. It’s trial and error, at the mercy of everybody telling me what to do.”

Then she heard about Georgia’s year-old Web site, gacollege411.org — a one-stop shop for applying to the state’s colleges and requesting financial aid. Modeled after a similar site in North Carolina, Georgia’s has already registered more than 100,000 students and families in just 18 months.

Georgia is now among about 35 states with such sites, an effort by education officials to make college more accessible by demystifying the daunting task of applying to schools while helping students enroll within their borders.

The $1.5 million site includes free prep classes for the SAT college-entrance exam, a class planner for students entering high school, applications to more than 100 colleges, virtual campus tours and information on getting one of the state’s full-ride, lottery-funded scholarships. (more…)

Contrary to popular belief, today’s college students seek majors that align with their natural interests, talents and goals. Sometimes that leads them to major in high income earning careers down the road. Other times, the salary and job projections are dim.

So, what do college students major in? The Princeton Review released this list of the top 10 college majors and what careers are available to graduates of those programs.

1) Business Administration and Management. Saving up your allowance instead of blowing it each week. Starting your own lawn-mowing business when you were still in grade school. They always said you had a mind for business, and now you’re ready to prove it. Business majors often find success in the field of their choice, working their way up the ladder to become managers, executives, and vice presidents in their companies. This major offers focused training in accounting, finance, marketing, economics, human resources, and decision making. You’ll learn to budget, organize, plan, hire, direct, control, and manage an organization. And you’ll find even more chances for career growth if you go on to earn your MBA.

2) Psychology. Psychology is the study of the way humans and animals interact and respond to their environment; in essence, it’s the study of behavior and the thoughts behind it. Cool thing about this major: analyzing your friends and family. Not so cool thing: you almost always have to go to grad school to do anything at all related to this line of work. Which is perfectly fine, if you understand and commit to that path from the get-go. Just don’t expect that four years of college will get you a private practice where people lie on a couch and tell you their troubles for $95/hour. You’ll need an extra five to seven years of schooling and a Ph.D. or Psy.D. before that will happen.

3) Elementary Education. From tracing a little hand on colored paper to make a Thanksgiving turkey to taking a field trip to the local science center with your fourth-graders to learn about static electricity, you are excited about working in a grade school and shaping young minds before they develop the attitude. In the early grades, you are responsible for giving instruction in all the basic subjects (reading, writing, ‘rithmetic–plus science, social studies, and the basics of health and physical education), as well as overseeing the general development of each of your charges. Some college programs offer (or require) an area of specialization, such as early childhood, language arts, or mathematics. When your academic work is complete, you move into the classroom for the trial-by-fire known as student teaching. This practicum lasts from one semester to a full academic year. When you successfully complete the elementary education program, you’ll have to take any certification examinations required by the state in which you want to work. Then, it’s into the classroom to mold the minds of our youth. (more…)