What Happens When? The College Admissions Calendar.

For college admissions May 1st marks the New Year — the end of one college admissions year and the beginning of the next. This is a great time to look at what happens throughout the year for anyone on a path toward college. (Note:  I’m sure to have missed some vital elements in the timeline. I welcome your additions or corrections — email me or list them in comments below.)

May

• May 1 is the deadline for students to accept an offer from, and pay a deposit to, the college of their choice. Most, but not all colleges, that is. Here’s why (and no, it’s not for the benefit of the students): Random thoughts on May 1.
• First two full weeks of May:  AP exams. All HS students taking AP courses take the exams at the same time.
• SAT & SAT Subject tests (aka SAT IIs) offered. Typically SATs are offered every month except April, July, August, and September. SAT Subject tests are offered every time SATs are offered except March, but not all subjects are offered each time. Specific details on APs, SATS, and SAT Subject tests can be found at the College Board’s website, Big Future.
• Parents and college counselors urge HS juniors to request recommendation letters from teachers before school lets out. (Note: typically teachers write the letters in the fall and upload them to the Common App interface after the student has specified his or her colleges. However, many teachers appreciate the advance notice and the opportunity to prep for the letters during the summer.)

June

• Orientation for new college students begins, this usually includes help with registration. Parents are usually invited and are offered their own orientation track.
• Parents of HS students may want to visit campuses while on summer road-trips.

July

• AP scores are sent to exam-takers; exams are scored on a scale of 1 [low] to 5; 3 is considered a passing score. The more selective the college, the higher score required for credit. Some colleges do not provide credit, but may still use the scores for placement. See college websites for each college’s AP credit policy. Here’s what UVa accepts in the College of Arts & Sciences.
• Parents and college counselors urge rising seniors to start drafting essays. Some students do. Read: How to Write a College Essay (in 10 Steps).

August

• The Common App goes live for the new application season. Some students actually apply in August. (Nobody I know.) Bookmark this site:  Common Questions for the Common App.
• For new college students:  first tuition payment is required!

September

• Many HS guidance counselors provide detailed information to seniors, including how much time is required for transcript requests, recommendation letters, etc.
• Many HS guidance counselors will also provide guidelines on scholarship applications.

October

• Earliest Early Admission and Early Decision deadlines occur. (Note: the 2012-13 Common App listed October 30 as the earliest application deadline. However, many college counselors will advise students to submit at least two weeks prior to the published deadline.)
• Many high schools offer PSAT/NMSQTs to sophomores (mostly for practice) and juniors (for National Merit Scholarship qualification).
• The October SAT date is typically the latest that will get scores reported to colleges for Early deadlines.
• Parents need to check financial aid requirements for early applications. Some will require an application in the fall.

November

• Early application reading season for admissions officers, extends into January.
• Parents and college counselors may urge seniors to finish essays over Thanksgiving break. Some students do.

December

• The December SAT date is typically the latest that will get scores reported for regular deadlines.
• Early decisions start to be received in December. Some HS students face rejection for the first time. (Deal with it and move on.)
• Important:  many college decisions will be provided via the college’s SIS, requiring the student to log-in. Keep a file of the log-in IDs used for different colleges.
• Important:  now is when HS seniors need to check email regularly. See Calling All Texters: Read Your Email!
• December 31 is the deadline for the majority of regular admission applications.

January

• The new FAFSA goes live January 1st. Some families actually submit that day. (Nobody I know.) Read: Catch-22: How and When to Complete the FAFSA and Your Tax Returns.
• Regular application reading season for admissions officers, extends through March.
• Sophomores and juniors receive PSAT scores. Approximately three hours later they start to receive emails and marketing mailers from colleges.
• HS course registration may begin for the next school year.
• Summer enrichment opportunities often require applications by January or February. See a very long list our local school division provides here.

February

• Many colleges require the FAFSA submission by the end of February. Parents need to prepare preliminary, or draft, tax returns in order to submit the FAFSA. Bookmark this site: FAFSA FAQs.

March

• Regular admission decisions should be received by the end of March.
• Once parents file finished tax returns, they must change the FAFSA and/or link it to the return via the FAFSA/IRS interface.

April

• HS juniors may want to spend their spring break visiting campuses.
• HS seniors may want to attend admitted day programs for specific questions, to help aid their final decisions. Read: Who should attend an admitted student event?
• Many communities hold college fairs, bringing a large number of campus reps to one location.
• Financial aid letters, in all their confusing glory, may be received through the month of April.
• HS juniors who have qualified for National Merit recognition are notified.
• Last two weeks of April:  many HS students put life on hold to prep for AP exams in early May. Except for Prom, spring sports, part-time jobs, and, like, hanging out with friends.
• Last two weeks of April:  many HS senior families square up to the college decision.

What did I miss? Write in comments below. Thanks!

Related articles

• Scary trend shows more colleges requesting SAT Subject Tests
• Why are college and scholarship applications so complicated?
• The Choice Blog: April College Checklist for Seniors

May 1st = National College Decision Day

If you (or your student) is a senior, you don’t need any help identifying the import of May 1st — the day most colleges across the country require a decision and a deposit from accepted students. From the other side of the desk, it’s also the day admission officers take a deep breath and look at their reports to see how well their offers yielded acceptances.

A few students will have made their commitment a long time ago. Early Decision applicants sign a commitment to accept an early offer. Recruited athletes operate on their own timetable.

But the majority of HS senior households have spent a good part of the past month looking at a variety of financial aid offers, revisiting schools during admitted day programs (aka “yield events”), and thinking through the choices the senior faces.

If you’re in that position, and the decision is going down to the wire, here’s counsel from a few different sources.

If you’re reading this to prepare for a decision to be made in the future, it may be useful to think about what you or your student will face.

Old Main, Augustana College. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

1.  Questions that really matter when making a final college choice, by W. Kent Barnds, Augustana College. Barnds is VP of Enrollment, Communication, and Planning for a small liberal arts college in the Midwest. He provides a number of questions related to the college experience; here are a few:

Will smaller classes benefit me in the field I wish to study?
Do faculty member in every major fieldwork one-on-one with students? What are some examples that the college I am considering can provide?
Will faculty members make time to talk with students about their future goals and career plans? Who advises students to make sure they take all of the required courses to ensure on-time graduation?

2.  Tip Sheet: Making the Final College Decision, is by Brennan Barnard, director of college counseling at the Derryfield School in New Hampshire, writing for the NYT’s The Choice blog. He wrote, “For many students, the college choice represents the first time that they have had to make a weighty decision.” Here are a couple of his considerations:

After the Facts, Go With Your Gut

The balance between critical analysis and gut instinct is a tricky one. Thoughtful decision-making involves an assessment of the facts and outcomes, while allowing for knowledge of self to guide your final choice.

Yes, it may be necessary to consider cost of attendance and distance from home. After these, considerations, however, quiet your mind from overanalyzing and fixating on the external. This will allow you to truly listen to what you know to be the right decision.

3.  Seeking Your Questions on Making the Final College Decision offers five posts of Q&As, including comparing financial offers, with answers by Mark Kantrowitz and Marie Bigham writing for the NYT’s The Choice. Here’s one of the questions facing many families:

Private University vs. State Institution

Q. My son’s top choice happens to be the most expensive (private) school. Even though it has the best offer of aid, the out-of-pocket cost would still be $40,000 to $45,000 a year. As a middle-class mother (not rich, not poor), how do we compare that with a state school where the overall cost would be $25,000 a year? I think the experience, education and connections would be superior at the expensive private school, and my son would be more likely to graduate in four years. But is it worth $80,000 more over four years?  — CA mom

I am a big fan of Kantrowitz’s clear and sometimes blunt reports on colleges and financial aid. You can learn a lot at his FinAid website. The response to the above question is lengthy and nuanced; I recommend reading it in full at the link. However, this brief calculus from the answer is worth remembering:

Total student loan debt at graduation should be less than the borrower’s expected annual starting salary, and ideally a lot less. If total debt is less than annual income, the borrower will be able to repay the student loans in 10 years or less.

Last year MS Pete made his commitment a day before the deadline. Once the decision was made, he could focus on enjoying the rest of his senior year. As Brennan Barnard wrote:

Send the check, buy the sweatshirt and celebrate the future

Even if it was not your first choice when you applied, invest yourself in your college as though you mean it. Try to remain open and trust that the universe will take care of the rest.

As always, good luck to the HS senior students and their families!

Related articles

• Students ‘baffled’ and ‘dumbfounded’ by 2013 college admissions decisions
• More colleges are putting college applicants on mid-year acceptance for enrollment

HS students: 4 questions about getting ready for college applications

While it seems like school just started — with Back to School night last week — our HS calendar points out a couple of college-related dates for juniors and seniors.

1.  Have you started thinking about it at all? Next week our school’s Counseling Department will offer College Planning Night for parents, with break-out sessions depending on the student’s class year. There’s really only time for general information, but if a family is just getting started in the process it’s a good place to begin. Each family / student will need to determine for themselves how deeply they want to dig into the details.

From collegeboard.org

2.  Will you take the PSAT? Next month Mod Squad Julie (11th grade) and all other juniors and sophomores at her school will take the PSAT. Sophomores take it for practice, to get a sense of what the SAT is like, and to get an idea of which areas of the test they may need to work on. Juniors take it for prep for the SAT too, but for them it is also the qualifying test for the National Merit Scholarships — this could be truly significant for their access to selective colleges as well as merit funding.

3.  Will you take the SAT this fall? Seniors are likely to be taking the SAT in early October — if you need to do that and you haven’t registered for it yet, run to CollegeBoard’s site for late registration — so final scores can be reported for Early Acceptance or Early Decision deadlines. Tests taken on October 6th will report scores beginning October 25th.

4.  Have you drafted any essays? This is probably one of the stickiest pieces of the college application process. Well, essays and the short answer Common App question and dealing with the Common App user interface and, yes, deciding which colleges to apply to — they’re all sticky. But the one that seems to take the longest for many seniors is to write well and eloquently about one’s self for the personal essay. If you — or your student — haven’t started essay drafts yet, now would be the time to do that. Today.

And just think, this time next year, you could have this all behind you, living the college life, tweeting something like:

M.S. Pete tweet, Sept 2012.

Related articles

• 4 Summer Tasks for College Prep.
• The 6 Steps Juniors Need to be Doing Right Now.

College decision month: time to revisit campuses

April 2012; calendar by Mod Squad Julie.

I paid close attention to college news last year at this time, thinking about April of Mod Squad Pete’s senior year.

After months of working on applications, and weeks-to-months of waiting to hear, April 1 typically launches the very short season for making the college decision. Which college to choose? How to make that decision? Once again, Pete’s deadline looms:  Decisions and housing deposits are due May 1st.

I inserted “typically” above for these exceptions:

• Early Decision applicants agreed long ago to attend if accepted.
• Some Early Action applications may have accepted college offers already.
• A few decisions, such as the final one Pete awaits, may not have been sent.

Pete’s final decision involves hearing back from an audition, which I wrote about here. He was told he’d hear early April, so let’s see, that should be any day now, right?

In the meantime, the four colleges that have offered admittance to Pete have invited him to come take another look. He revisited one campus in March, including participating in an interview for a scholarship.

He will connect with the other three colleges in the next eight days, including two Admitted-Student campus events and one Admitted-Student off-campus event (for students at a distance from the campus).

Making the decision to attend these was not a given. Pete’s interested, to be sure, yet he’s also busy with track practices and meets, a part-time job, a heavy academic load, and — have I mentioned this before? — countless hours perfecting dub-step mixes, skateboard tricks, and piano improv bits.

We’ve encouraged him to visit, ask questions, and listen to their pitches. Meanwhile, with help from these writers, I’m trying to compile our list of questions:

1.  Z. Kelly Queijo’s Smart College Visit website offers travel widgets and campus guides that many parents and students will find useful. Recently, Kelly wrote “Questions to ask on the Admitted Student Capmus Visit.” [Kelly also asked me to contribute a question or two.] Here are a few of the questions to ask the college; Kelly also includes questions for the student to ask him/herself:

Academics (will it work for me?)

1. What happens if I change my major?
2. How will I obtain credit for AP, IB and/or college level courses completed?
3. What leadership opportunities does the honors program offer?
4. Are there internship or study abroad opportunities for my major?
5. Here is what I’m interested in studying… Can I put together this sort of interdisciplinary program here?

2.  On EdWeek’s College Bound blog, Caralee Adams writes “What to Look for When Revisiting a College Campus This Month.” She provides excellent advice; I’d recommend reading the entire post. Here are a couple of clips:

“…This time, figure out if you can actually fit in there,” she says.

Eat in the cafeteria. Find out how often you would meet with your adviser. Look into whether you would get home on breaks by car, bus, or train. Pay attention to the housing options and consider if you will be comfortable in a room for four. “These kids are used to having their own rooms, cars, and bathroom. The conveniences of home are very different,” says Poznanski.

On the transition from supplicant to recruit:

Sarah McGinty, an independent educational consultant in Boston and author of “The College Application Essay” published by the College Board, says on a second visit, the student has moved from the supplicant role to someone with up to $200,000 to spend. And it’s time to ask seriously: Is this where I want to spend my money?

All schools have libraries, student centers, and study-abroad programs, but it often comes down to a feeling of whether the campus is somewhere the students can make friends. “It translates into something quite unquantifiable,” she says. “In the end, it’s an emotional decision, not a logical one.”

3.  US News & World Report‘s Education blog periodically offers posts from the mother-daughter team of Julie and Lindsey Mayfield via Twice the College Advice. Their “Ask 4 Questions About College Resources” includes these:

1. How will you help my child adjust to college?
2. What specifically does your career center to do help students find jobs?
3. What sets your college apart from others like it?
4. What are some of the resources this university offers to freshmen?

4.  Also from US News & World Report‘s Education blog, Katy Hopkins writes, 10 Steps to Picking the Right School, including:

3.  Go back to school. While you should have gotten a feel for college life during an initial campus visit, take another trip to schools and bring 10 to 15 detailed questions, says Bob Roth, author of College Success: Advice for Parents of High School Students. Don’t leave with any questions unanswered.

There’s our mission, Pete:  No questions unanswered. No stone unturned. [And, please, no dub-step for the road-trips!]

How’s the mood in your house, HS seniors and families?

So much for the college admissions letters responding to Early Action or Early Decision or, even Early Decision II applications. That was, clearly, early in the game.

Now we’re in the last week of March, staring down the beginning of April, when almost all of the Regular Decision letters are due. Good thing, too, since the high school seniors have only four weeks from receipt of college letters until May 1st, our own college D-Day, when the decision and the deposit must be made.

So, how’s it going at your house?

Is the mood joyful? Cue Otis Redding, The Happy Song:

I hope it’s not glum. Mr. Redding again, singing Fa-Fa-Fa [the sad song]:

Maybe, you’re still waiting to hear… Here’s Dusty Springfield, Wishin’ and Hopin’:

I asked Mod Squad Pete to pick a song to represent his mood and here’s what I got: Carl Carlton, singing Everlasting Love. The thinking:

It feels like a very resolved song. I’ve finished everything I needed to. The results are coming in and I can’t really do anything else now. It’s kind of like the big, wrap-it-up song at the end of the movie.

Crank up the volume and feel free to sing along:

Related articles

• Early Reports on Early Admission: Tougher Than Ever (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• Another college admissions stage completed:  Pete has options (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• What’s going on behind the closed doors Admissions offices? (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)

Early Reports on Early Admission: Tougher Than Ever

The first early admissions news we heard came around the beginning of December. Mod Squad Pete received news from two colleges on December 15 (email from one) and 16 (snail mail from the other). Pete has mentioned he might write about receiving college news for this blog, so I’ll leave it up to him for now.

A couple of reports came out this week on how the early admissions numbers look:  tough.

The NYT‘s The Choice provides a spreadsheet, periodicially updated, here. Screenshot below; the spreadsheet is downloadable from the link.

Click to enlarge.

The Daily Beast offers a report, including a slideshow with numbers, here.

“This is one of the toughest years we’ve seen in a long time,” said Mike Muska, the dean of college relations at Brooklyn’s Poly Prep, and a former senior admissions officer at several top colleges including Brown and Oberlin. “I’ve heard from colleagues all across New York about kids with 750 SAT scores across the board who were getting deferred or denied if they were unhooked.” (“Unhooked” is admission-speak for kids without a special skill or niche.)

The report included this speculation on why there were so many more early applications:

Not surprisingly, several deans said they’ve heard consistent concern over paying for college throughout this admission season. “People wonder how they are going to manage to pay for four years,” said Jim Miller, admissions dean at Brown. “Just a few years ago they could be confident about home equity loans or an intergenerational transfer; in short, help from grandparents. That is no longer the case.”

Money, or the lack of it in some state university systems, has triggered an increase in early-decision applications from students on the west coast, particularly from California. Several private colleges noted an increase in applicants from California high school students. “These are kids who would otherwise attend the first-rate colleges in the University of California system,” noted one dean. “But with higher tuitions and reductions in services, private colleges are looking much more attractive.”

Pete’s waiting to hear from one more early admissions application; regular admissions apps still in the works. [Drumming my fingers on the desk.]

Related articles

• Waiting for Admissions News: Are we there yet? (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• How to Apply to College… and When. (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)

3 Things High School Seniors Need To Do Right Now.

December 2011. Calendar by Mod Squad Emma.

Believe it or not, the important December countdown for most high school seniors is not:  “how many days til Christmas.” Most U.S. colleges set the regular admissions deadline for January 1. Eleven days away.

For any senior, like Mod Squad Pete, who just happens to not be done yet with college applications, here are the three things he or she should be doing right now…

1.  Finish the darn thing(s). Pete might have been 98% done on his regular admissions since before Thanksgiving. Each one has just one or two little things that still need doing. Get it over with already. (And yes, Pete, I’m talking to you.)

If there are questions stopping you, tune into the live chat the NYT‘s The Choice is hosting tonight, Wednesday, and Thursday. Here are the details:

The first night’s chat will take place tonight, on The New York Times’s main Facebook page: facebook.com/nytimes. The two chats thereafter will be staged at The Choice blog’s Facebook page: facebook.com/nytimesthechoice. All of the exchanges will be from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. Eastern time, and the counselors will answer questions in real time.

By the way, if you or your senior has all applications done, great! Skip ahead to task number 2. If you or your senior received acceptance via an Early Decision program, congratulations!! No more college applications! Skip ahead to task number 2.

2.  Sign up for the student and parent PINs for FAFSA. The first step in applying for financial aid is to apply for a PIN. Do that here. The steps are clear:

The PIN Application Process consists of 3 steps:
Step 1: Enter Personal Information
Step 2: Submit Your PIN Application
Step 3: Receive Your PIN

The online application goes live January 1, 2012, but the FAFSA on the web worksheet is available now.

3.  Take a deep breath and relax. 2011 may have been a big year with junior-year courses, SATs, college visits, becoming a senior, and writing applications, but just wait. The new year will bring the final semester of high school (requiring stick-to-it attention through the AP exams and finals), additional deadlines for financial aid and any scholarships (requiring more collaboration between student and parent), the emotional experience of receiving regular admissions results (some of us have had a glimpse of that with early admissions results), and making a commitment to one college.

Oh, right:  that’s just the first five months.

As always, good luck to all with those applications!

Related articles

• Wednesday Weekly Reader: 13 Key Items to Know About Financial Aid. (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• The Skinny on College Financial Aid Process and Terms (thecareercloset.com)
• College Prep – Timeline for Seniors (commonwealthmgmt.com)

Waiting for Admissions News: Are we there yet?

Admissions building, Tufts. Image via Wikipedia

Now is the season of winter admissions results. Blog posts and tweets from admissions departments loom like the colored smoke above the Vatican: What does this mean? How does this affect his chances?

See CollegeSolved’s blog, How Much Admissions Transparency is Too Much?

“Mr. Einstein! Mr. Einstein! Tufts has already admitted thirty-three students!” shouted a nervous ED applicant. “No, that’s not right. They haven’t released their decisions yet,” responded a confident and seasoned counselor. True enough, Tufts has not yet notified early decision applicants of their decisions But my anxious senior was, nonetheless, moved to near-panic status after reading this.

The New York Times blog on college admissions, The Choice, provided Field Notes From This Year’s Application Season:

While our survey was unscientific, it brought into focus some themes, including increased applicant interest in public colleges – both in and out of state – and an apparent rise in the number of students who have been filing applications early this year, sometimes at the prodding of the colleges themselves.

From the same post, in a report from a counselor…

Mr. Evans of Penn Charter reported that the heightened early application activity had increased the need for “expectation management” and counseling regarding how to navigate the complex web of restrictions surrounding early applications for those filing a mix of early decision, early action and rolling applications.

In December the emails began to arrive. One of Mod Squad Pete’s classmates heard in early December. News of more emails trickled in.

Pete sent three early admission applications, one to each of the holy trinity of college categories: reach, fit, safe. Luck of the calendar dictated that the reach response would arrive first, in December. The other two, not til January.

The email will offer one of three responses:  acceptance, deferral, or thanks but no thanks. Spring decision emails may offer a wait list.

StudentAdvisor provides advice on whether to share your results: Posting Your College Acceptances on Facebook? Some Do’s and Don’ts.

Once upon a time, when students received the big envelope from their dream college, they called their friends. Now, students rely on social networks to break the news. All of a sudden, your feeds are flooding with acceptance posts. Not only does social media make it faster to share good news, it makes it easier to act in ways you wouldn’t in “real-life.”

Here are some of the stories we hear:

• A student receiving news while in class, walks out of the classroom without a word to the teacher. He got in to his Early Decision choice, just needed to leave the room before he screamed. After he found a teacher in the hall to hug, he returned to the classroom of seniors to report his result (to their cheers).
• A parent reads an admissions blog and knows the significance of the email’s confusingly vague subject line and must wait. The student has to read far into the email to understand he got in.
• Another parent cries the day after her child’s rejection.
• Meanwhile, the parent of an underclassman asks cheerfully, ‘How’s that college thing going?”
• Another parent of an underclassman asks, “So where is Pete applying?”
• A parent of a senior shares her daughter’s acceptance and scholarship offer: “It’s fun to start hearing the good news.”

From the College Solution, Lynn O’Shaughnessy reminds us, “Only 2% of schools reject more than 75% of applicants.”

Related articles

• How to Apply to College… and When. (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• College Admissions Secrets. (drstrangecollege.wordpress.com)
• ‘Gotta love rolling admissions’ (costofcollege.wordpress.com)

Early Action, Early Admission, Early Acceptance? Playing the waiting game.

November 2011. Calendar by Mod Squad Julie.

It’s a beautiful election day in central Virginia. After a freak snowfall on the weekend before Halloween — which caused all sorts of havoc in the northeast, causing a number of colleges to extend Early deadlines — we’re enjoying a sunny day in the 70s.

We can take a breather and enjoy this for the moment. The public schools were off yesterday and today (professional learning days for the teachers), so it’s been a nice long weekend for Mod Squad Pete and Julie.

Especially after Pete submitted that last early application. Here’s an update.

Pete still has strong interests in a few colleges, so no Early Decision applications for him. If, like me around this time last year, you have a hard time remembering which Early application is binding and which isn’t, take a look at this.

He has submitted applications to a state college that should be a safety for him, a state college that should be a fit, and a super-selective private college. If, like me around this time last year, you’re not sure how to figure which college is a safe, fit, or reach choice, this might be helpful.

Pete submitted them all ten days to two weeks ahead of the colleges’ deadlines, as a result of… what? Some combination of ongoing gentle nudges to strong demands to get a move on from his parents, as well as his own self interest in getting it done.

What was the worst of it? Let’s ask Pete.

“The recommendations.”

“Really, why?”

“You guys kept asking me to remember cool things I did with each teacher so I could maybe remind them, and I just couldn’t remember what I did and you wouldn’t believe me. Or maybe you believed me, but you seemed to think if I thought about it enough I would really remember. Then you’d say if I couldn’t remember what I did with them, how could I expect them to remember? Man. Could we not talk about this? I’m getting all fired up about it all over again.”

Ok, let’s not talk about it.

Next up, he’ll be working on a few regular admissions applications. They’re due around the end of the year.

Image via Wikipedia

In the meantime, there’s a mock election campaign for AP Govt, problems to be done for AP BC Calc, notes to be written for AP Psych, various other bits of homework, piano practicing for a couple of performances coming soon, and Indoor Track practices begin next week.

First, back to enjoying a beautiful autumn day!

The 6 Worst College Application Mistakes

Here’s a timely article from College Advisor, on the The 6 Worst College Application Mistakes. Some students are still working on Early Action applications, some may have started their Regular Admission apps, but all might take a look at these as a quick reminder. Here’s one mistake you never think you would make, but how many of us have ever sent off an email to the wrong addressee?

1. Misspelling your own name..

Make sure that your name is spelled correctly on all your applications and official documents Simple typos and misspellings – Daneil versus Daniel, Cathy versus Kathy, or Smith versus Smiht – can cause colleges to think that two different people exist. Problems can also arise when you alternate between your full name and nickname. As a result, they will have a harder time completing your files. Incomplete files don’t get read. So triple check even the basic information – name, address, social security number and birth date. In the same vein, make sure that your email address is correct and while we are at it – appropriate.

Good luck to all the seniors!