The College Solutions Blog

July 31, 2017

Should you visit a college before you apply? According to a new study, for some students there is a powerful benefit to visiting highly selective schools. According to the researchers, teenagers, who apply to highly selective colleges and visit the campuses, are up to 40% more likely to be admitted than comparable students. The study suggests that the applicants who...

November 2, 2011

I received an email from a high school junior in San Diego recently that prompted me to write this post. The teenager attended one of my talks and heard me mention that one in five colleges say that an applicant’s demonstrated interest is very important in their admission decisions. So what does demonstrated interest mean? Basically I told the teenager...

January 6, 2010

If you plan to apply to college as a “stealth candidate” listen up. Stealth candidates are teenagers who never contact a college before sending in their application. Stealth college applications used to be rare.  Most teenagers contact colleges through traditional means such as requesting materials, talking to admission counselors at college fairs and visiting schools. Today, however, teenagers can learn...

October 14, 2009

Yesterday, my son Ben and I spent a lovely day at Beloit College. An admissions officer applauded Ben for making the long trek from San Diego to Wisconsin to visit the college. She mentioned that some students never visit the campus before applying to the liberal arts school. I’ve always thought it was strange that teenagers apply to colleges without...

September 20, 2009

On Thursday evening, I asked my son Ben what he knew about Drew University. “It’s got lots of squirrels,” he shot back. When we visited Drew during a college tour last year we did notice the squirrels on the New Jersey campus that is nestled in a lovely forest. I wanted to be sure, however, that Ben remembered more pertinent...