College Admissions: How to Know What to Do Next Without Feeling Overwhelmed

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0:00:01.7 S1: One of the most common questions that I get is about, what to do to start the college admissions journey or what to do next? It’s a really important question and it’s something that can leave families feeling overwhelmed and not sure where to start, that you just don’t know what to do, and a lot of times it’s easier to put it off, which can then lead to even more stress. So some of these are topics that we’ve discussed before, but today I want to break down some of those first steps so that you know what to do and you can feel confident in what you’re doing, and there are several episodes that I will link in the show notes where we actually have broken down those steps for our freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors, so that you know what to do, but what I want to do is have some just general overview of things, and then you can go in and really dive in to those episodes based on where your student is. So stay tuned. Thank you to those of you who have been with us for all of our over 30 episodes. Just the community that we have.

0:01:18.0 S1: I so appreciate you all being here. For those of you that are new, my name is Courtney, I am the founder of confused to college ready, and I actually have over 16 years experience working as a mental health therapist, turn school counselor. And I’m super, super excited to be able to just share with you and help to make this transition go a little bit easier when maybe you can even have some of these conversations without feeling like you’re having an argument all the time. So what I want to also share with you is we are going to be beta testing our new course and group coaching program called confused to college ready. So I am really, really excited about this. I am looking forward to spending some time, it’s going to be four weeks going into some of the first few steps of what you need to do, and this is actually going to be a free program for those first 30 days, and the only thing that I ask in return is that you give me some kind of feedback about the program or and a testimonial, just to be able to share with others about what you have learned, so if you want more information on that, please please go to our Facebook page, it’s confused to…

0:02:45.6 S1: Ready? On Facebook.

0:02:47.7 S1: So it’s Facebook dot com, confused to ready. And I would love to give you some more information about joining us, so there is an application process, and I would love to have as many people as we can join to be able to just share with you and help you as you navigate this, and it is going to be like a 697 value. So that’s the other piece is…

0:03:15.3 S1: It is just incredibly exciting. So today, I want to give you an overview of some of the things that we will be talking about in this free program that will last for that four weeks, and then I want to be able to just give you some hints and tips to make things go more smoothly. So the first thing I want you to know is take a deep breath, so you are not alone in the college search, there are people that are there to help support you, to help give you what you need, to help make sure that everything that you have that you need for the college search for identifying schools, for knowing how to identify schools, knowing how to apply all of those different pieces that it is there and ready. There are going to be staff at school… School counselors… Now, I will say as a school counselor myself, I do not have… We have individual meetings, we have 30 minutes, 20 to 30 minutes where we meet with individual families, and that happens once a year, so I am always happy to help anyone if they reach out, but it does take you going and reaching out to that counselor oftentimes to be able to say, Okay, here are some of the questions that we have.

0:04:34.1 S1: And part of why I wanted to do this podcast and to be able to have the group is because I wanted to make sure that our families were able to get some more in-depth information and to really break things down, and I also have seen the stress that many of our families and students go through, and I am just super excited to be able to share some of this, and I wanted to be able to have… Also an affordable option for families. Because a lot of programs that they’re charging an arm, a leg for support, and some of them are… I’m not meaning that in any negative way towards any of those programs, but not everybody can afford that, and so I want to give people a more affordable option with some of that group coaching. So take a breath. You’re not alone in this. The next thing is, I talked about some of those general topics that we have detailed episodes for specific grade levels, so that you know kind of where to focus your time, the younger your students are, the more time you have, if your student is in junior year, senior year, we’re going to have some more work in front of us and ahead of us as far as how quickly you are needing to get things done, so those are the first couple of things, so take that deep breath.

0:05:57.5 S1: Know those, go back and take a look at those general topics when we actually get into the actual college search, this is where I want you to grab a pen and grab some paper if you’re driving, just make sure that you have an opportunity to go back and talk, listen to this and talk through these things. So the first one for the actual action steps is going to be determining your path, so what I want you to do as a family is to talk about when and how you are going to make sure that you are having conversations about where your student is in that college search. So is that going to be something that happens on the weekends, is that going to be something that happens one evening a week when everyone is free, think about how your schedules are going to work, and there’s a major difference in summer versus what you’re able to do during the school year, and some of that also is going to depend on a student’s extracurricular activities, siblings, extra extra-curricular activities, all of those different pieces, but think about what kind of process do you want to have put in place for your specific…

0:07:10.5 S1: For your specific meeting times to help structure those conversations and have it not be like it is such an intense amount of stress or overwhelm, then number two is going to be looking at how do you explore possible careers, there are several different options that are available, your school might have some resources for you. And it might be something where you can use a program like nations or score, they’re also our free programs such as College Board, they have the big future, and then there also is my next move, but being able to have some conversations and so the beginning of those conversations about careers are going to be using those career interest inventories and then being able to go more in-depth, and this is something that we actually are going to talk about in the coaching program, is how do we figure out, okay, so these are the things that it might be a good fit for me, and then how do I take that and expand it into, what is that something that I might want to actually do with a potential career?

0:08:24.4 S1: Then when you’re looking at those careers, then it’s looking at what is the right fit for me as far as potential schools.

0:08:33.8 S1: And so those conversations with potential colleges, number two, exploring that college fit is going to be looking at, does your student want to attend four years of college.

0:08:45.2 S1: Maybe more depending on that profession, they don’t have to go to a four-year college to be successful, there are many professions where they can attend to two-year college, they can go to a certification program, there are different options that are available out there, and then some professions are going to require that four-year degree.

0:09:03.3 S1: Or more.

0:09:04.2 S1: And no matter what path your student chooses, it is okay for them to take that path. Now, if your student doesn’t quite know what they’re interested in and isn’t sure, it might be a matter of saying, Okay, maybe we need to look at a four-year school first, or a two-year school first and then transfer to that for your school, so that you have some time to figure out what you’re most interested in. It might save some money. Maybe your student isn’t ready to attend a four-year school, or maybe they go to the four-year school and they’re getting a lot of those general education components knocked out in the first year or two, and they’re figuring out what it is that they want to do.

0:09:45.3 S1: So college fit does not have to be a four-year, but you want to figure out what are the things that your student is most interested in in a school, are there any programs that they absolutely have to have… If you’re close enough, you want to make sure that you can take a look at going to the campus to see is this something where… I feel like it could be a good fit when the pandemic hit, there are a lot of schools that have virtual options, it’s not the same thing as setting foot on campus, but it is absolutely a wonderful option to be able to just see what things might look like having conversations with college admissions counselors, all of those pieces are wonderful ways to get started with that process, and then as you research potential colleges, so we know kind of what those… I call them, it’s almost like your must-haves in my… No ways. So these are the things that I have to have in a school. I want to make sure that this club or this activity is there, or I don’t want anything to do with a school, if you have a female, if you have a daughter, maybe they don’t want to go to a female-only college, or maybe…

0:11:02.1 S1: They don’t want to go to a small school. They want something big. And if you have someone who’s interested in marine biology, you’re probably not going to be looking in the Midwest, you’re going to need to be on a coastal school. So looking at that college fit, what are some of those things that you absolutely have to have, and are there any things that would be a deal breaker or a… No way.

0:11:24.4 S1: The third piece in it is researching those potential colleges, so starting to say, Okay, this is what I’m interested in as far as potential careers, these are the things that I know that I really want to have with my college, and these are… Been looking at GPA, also looking at test scores and all of those pieces to see, okay, so this is a school I think I might be interested in, how am I going to be as far as an applicant…

0:11:53.9 S1: If you go back, and again, I’ll link this in the notes, but if you go back and you look at some of our other episodes, it takes a look at different careers, picking colleges, how to know if a school is the right one for you. There are a lot of resources that we have available. And again, if you are interested in starting this and really going more in-depth, even than what we’re talking about today, I would love to have you apply to join our free beta test, if you go to facebook dot com, confused to ready. Going to find more information about that, and we are really, really excited for that to get started, so that should be starting about the third week of July, third and fourth week of July is when we’re going to be really kicking that off, so please come join us. You don’t have to feel overwhelmed, you’re not alone, and we can help you when you know what those potential schools are, and let’s say that you have a senior that’s when we dive in even deeper to figure out, Okay, how do we look at essays, how do we look at the application and how can you manage navigating some of that and applying to those schools and making it as easy as possible on yourself and saving time so that it doesn’t feel so overwhelming during the school year.

0:13:21.6 S1: So, as always, I hope this has been helpful for you. If you are listening, I would love if you would download our… If you would subscribe to our channel, if you would leave us a review and then also go into that Facebook… Onto that Facebook page, we also have a Facebook group, it is Facebook dot-com groups, confused to college ready. And I hope that you all have a wonderful rest of your day. Take care.vinar dapibus leo.