The College Solutions Blog

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

College Navigator
August 8, 2010

8 Ways to Cut College Costs

College costs sure are daunting, but the sticker prices are meaningless. I recently wrote about how my son and the other two boys in his high school carpool shrank their college costs dramatically. The tuition for the three boys for the coming year totaled a whopping $136,500, but they received grants from their respective liberal arts colleges for the 2010-11...
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June 19, 2010

Top 10 Best College Websites

What are the best college websites in the country? I tried to answer that question earlier this week when I wrote my first college blog post for US News & World Report. In the post, I nominated my own favorite college websites which can be invaluable for finding colleges, researching schools, pinpointing the generosity of individual colleges and learning about...
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April 12, 2010

College Search: 6 Ways to Find the Right College

Where do you begin a college search? When you research colleges, you’re going to want to find schools that will provide your teenagers with an excellent education and get them out the door in four years. But how do you even start such a daunting college search? Scattered around my blog, I’ve written plenty about how to conduct a college...
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January 11, 2010

Top 10 College Websites for Finding Great Schools

Want to research colleges, but not sure where to start? It’s no surprise. When I just typed “college” into Google, I got 634 million college websites. To make your job easier, I’m sharing wonderful websites that can help you assemble a great list of colleges. If you want to research specific colleges, here are my Top 10  College Websites: College...
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October 19, 2009

Hunting for Great Colleges

I subscribe to a list serve that is popular with high school and independent college counselors. I’m always amused when a counselor posts a plea for help in assembling a list of great colleges and universities for students who often possess eclectic taste. I’ve seen requests like this:  I am helping a student, who is interested in architectural engineering and...
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September 3, 2009

What's Up With Washington University?

I got an email this morning from a women who had become frustrated after reading my blog post about the usefulness about the Common Data Set. As an example, I mentioned Washington University’s Common Data Set in the post and she tried tracking it down on the Internet. She couldn’t find it and neither could I. “So now what?” she...
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September 2, 2009

Why You Should Check Out the College Navigator

All week I’ve been sharing great tools to research colleges. Today I want to feature the federal College Navigator. The College Navigator is a dull-looking website, but it contains incredible tools that tap into a vast college database that the U.S. Department of Education maintains. To illustrate what College Navigator can do, I’m using as an example Ohio State University,...
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July 27, 2009

Ten Ways to Get Ready for College

I’m taking some time off from my college blog this week and a friend, Ruth McKinnie Braun, who is the creator of the great website: SuchASmartMom.com offered to pitch in and provide this post. Hope you enjoy it….. Summer is the perfect time for low-key college planning. Setting aside time for exploring college options without the pressure of homework, tests...
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January 22, 2009

How Happy Are the Freshmen?

This is an exciting and nerve wracking time of year for high school seniors as they contemplate getting acceptance packages in the mail. Before making their final decisions, however, high schoolers should examine the freshmen retention rates of the colleges and universities remaining on their list. They should be extremely leery if any of their favorites has experienced a mass...
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