Q & A

Q. My oldest is a sophomore. Colleges don’t know anything about her grades do they? It’s weird because we’ve been getting bombarded with college stuff. Just today I got 5 letters from colleges.

A. By far the number one question this month! The letters you are getting are most likely based on her PSAT results. As an effort to increase the number of students who apply to their school, colleges often send letters to many, many students. One particular company actually does the marketing for most of the schools. Aren’t the letters strikingly similar when you look at them? The name of the game for colleges is getting lots of kids to apply so their selectivity goes up.

Here’s an article that talks about the marketing process colleges use.

Q. We’ve heard you say how important it is to visit a college. Any tips on what to do while we’re there?

A. If you’ve been to any UniVarsity presentations, you know how strongly we feel about actually setting foot on actual campuses. Almost all schools offer an information session and a student-led tour. We highly recommend you do both of these as they help give you a good feel for the school and also give you insight into the application process as well as what type of student the school is looking for. Another tool we like can be found on Cappex, and is called “the College Visit Checklist.” This will give you some ideas about what to look for and do while on campus.