The College Solutions Blog

Valuable insights from Lynn O’Shaughnessy
a nationally recognized college expert.

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August 16, 2010

Cutting the Cost of College for the Wealthy

I had a mom email me today who has been doing her homework this summer. Specifically, she’s been reading my eBook, Shrinking the Cost of College: 152 Ways to Cut the Price of a Bachelor’s Degree, in the hopes of making college more affordable for her family. After I emailed her back, I thought I’d share what I told her...

August 15, 2010

Saying Goodbye to Ben

Saturday evening I said goodbye to my son Ben, who officially started his four years at Beloit College. I am grateful that the send-off was better than the one that Scott Bierman, the president of Beloit College, experienced years ago when he dropped his second daughter off at Kenyon College. As the drop-off day wore on, Bierman told a gathering...

August 12, 2010

4 Ways To Win a Merit Scholarship

I am out of town the rest of this week because I’m helping my son Ben move across country to Beloit College. So I asked David Montesano, an independent college counselor at College Match, to write a guest post in my absence. At the end of the last admission cycle, David tallied up the merit awards that his clients earned...

August 11, 2010

Starting College With the Jitters

I’m getting up before dawn tomorrow. My son Ben and I are catching a 6:45 a.m. flight to Chicago. Ben will be starting college on Saturday and he’s nervous. But hey, aren’t all college freshmen nervous? Coincidentally, I found a great blog post today, written by two college professors, who shared ways that college freshmen can increase their confidence. Here...

August 10, 2010

Are AP Classes Worth It?

Are AP classes really worthwhile? There is no doubt that advanced placement classes are popular. Last year, nearly 1.7 million students worldwide took more than 2.9 million AP exams. Twenty five percent of high school graduates have taken at least one AP exam. With teenagers returning to the classroom grind soon, I thought this would be a good time to...

Why It's Harder Getting Into Harvard

It’s not your imagination. It’s become even harder to get into Harvard, the rest of the Ivy League gang and the other super elite schools. In the college blog post that I wrote for CBSMoneyWatch.com today, I explain 5 reasons why it’s become even more challenging trying to storm the gates of Harvard and other schools of that ilk. Here...

Best and Worst Paying College Degrees

It’s been my experience that blog posts that include words like,”Best and Worst ….” or “10 Hottest….” or “20 Tips to….” will generate more traffic to your site. That’s certainly been the case with my college blog over at CBSMoneyWatch. During the past year, the most popular blog post that I wrote for the network’s financial website was this one:...

2 College Case Studies: Where Should These Teens Go to College?

Over the past two years, I’ve written scores of posts on this college blog about how to evaluate schools. Just the other day, I wrote a piece about my 10 favorite college websites. It can be challenging for families, however, to know how to use these tools to find the right colleges at the right price. Consequently, I wanted to...

College Vacancies: 240 Colleges Where You Can Still Apply

Don’t like where you’re heading to college in the fall? Take heart: There are still at least 240 schools with college vacancies. Most of the schools with college vacancies have room for both incoming freshmen and transfer students. All but one school on the list still has financial aid available and 236 still have dorm space. You can find the...

Check Out College, Inc., Tonight on PBS

I’m going to veg out on my couch tonight and watch College, Inc., on my PBS station. College, Inc., is a FRONTLINE production that explores the explosive and controversial growth of the for-profit higher education industry. One of the universities profiled in this investigation is the University of Phoenix, which is a darling of Wall Street. University of Phoenix is...