As the end of the school year approaches, many students are already thinking ahead to the next academic year. For high school students, senior year is an important time that requires preparation and planning. Here are some things your students can do over the summer to get ready for their senior year of high school:

1. Research colleges and universities

If they plan to attend college after graduation, it’s important to start researching potential schools and programs early. Use the summer to explore different college websites and learn about their admission requirements, tuition fees, and scholarship opportunities. They can also attend college fairs and visit campuses to get a feel for the school’s atmosphere and student life.

2. Work on college application materials

Senior year means college applications, and the summer is a great time to start working on them. Begin by creating a list of schools they plan to apply to and identifying their application deadlines. They can also start drafting their personal statement and preparing their resume or activity list. This will help them stay on track and avoid last-minute stress.

3. Build their resume

Senior year is a crucial time for college applications, and their resume can make a big difference. Use the summer to build their resume by volunteering, taking on internships, or working part-time jobs. These experiences can demonstrate skills and interests to college admissions committees and potential employers.

4. Prep for standardized tests

Standardized tests such as the SAT and ACT are important for college admission, so it’s important to prepare early. Consider taking a summer test prep course, hiring a tutor, or using online resources to help their study. Start by taking a practice test to identify areas where they need improvement and create a study plan to help them achieve their goal scores.

5. Explore their interests

Senior year can be stressful, so take advantage of the summer to explore interests and passions. Join a club, take a class, or attend a workshop in an area that interests them. This can help them develop skills, meet new people, and discover new opportunities.

6. Get organized

Senior year can be overwhelming with college applications, coursework, and extracurricular activities. Use the summer to get organized by creating a planner or calendar to help them manage their time. They can also create a list of important deadlines and set reminders to ensure they don’t miss anything.

In conclusion, senior year is an important time in a high school student’s life, and the summer is a great opportunity to prepare for it. By researching colleges, working on college application materials, building their resume, prepping for standardized tests, exploring their interests, and getting organized, they can set themselves up for a successful senior year and beyond.

It’s a hard time being a high school senior getting ready for college. Student debt levels are at an all-time high, the job market continues to shift in uncertain directions, and universities all across the country are still recovering from the pandemic.

As a guidance counselor, your job is to help prepare your seniors for college, be they getting ready for online classes, traditional schooling, or some hybridized combination of both. In this article, we take a look at some of the most important issues weighing on the minds of incoming college freshmen.

How Things Are Different

Of course, counselors have been getting kids ready to go to college forever. It’s the job, right? How have things changed in the last few years to reshape that responsibility?

The biggest change has likely been the proliferation of remote learning. Where once online school was obscure and even stigmatized, it is now mainstream. Many students who attend in-person universities will wind up taking at least a few online classes during their time in college.

While the learning process remains much the same in remote classes, there are unique responsibilities that your students should prepare themselves for.

• Self-guided: A good deal of remote work is self-guided. Of course, to be successful at college, students do need to be able to take initiative. This need is simply greater in the online setting. Often, classes will simply ask their students to complete a certain amount of work each week. They may not have any zoom classes at all, putting a bigger premium on being able to motivate yourself to work.
• A different way of learning: Kids should also understand that learning on a screen is biologically different than learning in person. The human mind processes screen-based learning differently. Study after study shows that the human mind places a lower priority on facts that are presented on a screen. The why of it isn’t entirely understood yet, but we do know that learning effectively online requires a heightened degree of effort.

Fortunately, most high school seniors will be at least somewhat acquainted with the concept of remote learning thanks to the pandemic. However, it’s still a good idea to go over their new responsibilities with them. Self-guided learning in high school is much different than it is in college. Without the structure of home life as an anchor, many new college students struggle to establish the firm study habits that are required for college success.

Finance

The average college student graduates without even knowing how to make a budget. Unacceptable as that is, it’s also indicative of another problem— high school students are going into an independent setting with no knowledge of money.

Not only will an understanding of finance help them navigate the college world, but it may also inform their decision of where they go. It’s strange to think that kids make one of the biggest financial choices of their lives— short only of buying a house— without even realizing it. A little bit of financial wisdom can be enormously beneficial as they weigh their student loan options.

Of course, there is only so much that can be done at this stage in the game. A senior poised to graduate won’t become an expert in finance overnight. More and more high schools across the country are emphasizing financial instruction for underclasspeople for precisely that reason.

Work Gets Harder

College can be a big culture shock for freshmen. It’s not just that they are away from home for the first time. It’s the work itself. In high school, class difficulty increases very gradually and sometimes not at all. It’s not like that in college.

Universities have high standards and the teachers, though typically accommodating, are often disinclined to make special efforts to help students out. It is an adult world, filled with adult expectations. Kids who don’t know how to buckle down and study may have a tough time.

College-level classes are a great way to get students ready for university life while still enjoying the comforts of home. While not every student is eligible to take these classes in high school, it is a good opportunity to get a taste of university expectations while also saving a pretty decent chunk of money. Consider encouraging eligible students to take advantage of every college-level class that they can.

Encourage Extracurricular Involvement

Extracurriculars are a good way to provide high school students with an extra degree of responsibility. This can be a useful asset in helping them prepare for the unique demands of university life.

Extracurriculars also have the unique benefit of helping students stand out in their applications. While senior year may be a little late to start padding out a resume, every little bit counts, so encourage your students to get involved in things they are interested in.

Conclusion

Being a freshman in college has never been easy. However, as the world of education continues to shift into a new phase— an age of digitalization— kids currently in the educational system are being uniquely exposed to the influx of technology in the classroom.

While Covid did accelerate the digitalization of school work, it is safe to say that the world of education remains in a state of growing pains.

Of course, kids are tough. With your help, they will be able to prepare for school and enjoy a fruitful university experience.

The wait-list, commonly referred to as “admissions purgatory”  is that ugly and uncomfortable grey area – they didn’t like you enough to accept you and they didn’t hate you enough to reject you.

Students will need to make a decision and a deposit at a college where they were accepted by May 1. When a college puts a student on a wait-list they will ask the student to respond as to whether they want to stay on the wait-list or if they’ve already made other plans and accepted or will accept an offer from another college or university.

So after dealing with the loss of not being accepted, students and parents need to determine which of the colleges where they were accepted represents the best fit academically, socially and for the family financially. If there is a clear winner, then the process is over. Otherwise, families need to evaluate the wait-list opportunities.

It’s important to be realistic about finances. It would be a rare occurrence for a wait-listed student to receive merit-based aid. Need-based aid is more likely, but colleges will not necessarily meet 100 percent of need.

The wait-list is all about the yield; what percentage of accepted students will choose to deposit and attend each institution? The national average for yield is 33.6 percent, which means that two-thirds of students are rejecting the offers of admission that they receive. It makes sense because a student applies to multiple colleges and universities and hopefully receives multiple acceptances, but can only attend one school. Colleges wish their yield was 100 percent, it would make their jobs much, much easier.

The dynamics of the wait-list vary from college to college and may greatly vary from year to year. The big problem comes when colleges invite thousands of students to be on their wait-list and then find out, after May 1, that their yield increased. Then they have no open spots for students on the wait-list, in fact, they may be panicking that they don’t have enough beds for incoming freshmen who have already said yes.  Colleges do their best to predict yield, but it’s a risky game. All of this is to say that there is really no accurate predictive measure to determine how many spots there will be.

According to Rick Clark, Assistant Vice Provost and Executive Director of Undergraduate Admissions at Georgia Tech (www.gatech.edu), “Essentially, the wait-list exists to accommodate for demographics that were not met in the initial round of admission offers. If you have the right number of deposits from the West Coast, you go to your wait-list for more East Coast students. If you have enough Chemistry majors, you may be going to the wait-list for Business students. Ultimately, the job of admission deans and directors is to make and shape the class, as defined by institutional priorities. Meeting target enrollment is critical to bottom-line revenue, creating a desired ethos on campus, proliferating the school’s brand, and other factors.”

So, while there are things you can do to improve your wait-list chances, much is out of your control.

Lee Bierer is an independent college adviser based in Charlotte. Send questions to: lee@bierercollegeconsulting.com; www.bierercollegeconsulting.com