What age/grade should I start looking and communicating with colleges?Answered
Hello. I am a high-school freshman set to graduate in 2024. I was wondering when was a good age/grade to start communicating interest to colleges? I was also looking for some advice in how to show interest in a college when you're still a few years from high-school graduation? Thanks for the help in advance. (:
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2 answers
Right now! Look at some colleges you would consider going to and contact your regional admissions counselor for those colleges. Remember that just because you are contacting them now, it doesn't mean you can stop contacting them later. In fact, send a few emails spread out over time now, and then increase frequency as you get closer to senior year/admissions process. Be careful, however: your emails should not be small talk, as these admission counselors get up to (or more than) a 100 emails a day, so you don't want to be wasting their time. Come up with some genuine questions that are appropriate to your grade/experience, and not questions like "what are my chances at getting in?" or questions whose answers can be found online. You can also demonstrate interest by signing up for and attending webinars and information sessions, although in my opinion, these are more helpful during the summer after junior year/beginning of senior year.
Hope this was helpful, and good luck!
P.S. only some colleges consider demonstrated interest. Look at this page to see which colleges those are:
https://www.collegetransitions.com/dataverse/colleges-that-consider-demonstrated-interest
I disagree with musician in some aspects. Its fine to search and attend webinars now but it’s not necessary. The elite schools like Rice et cetera you don’t lose anything by starting in late sophomore year. There’s no harm to doing it now but in late sophomore you have a better idea of what you want to do/study and where you want to study so you are better served by starting late sophomore year.
A way to express interest now is to email your regional admissions counselor (typically found by googling insert school admission officer by region) and then email them and ask a question that is either a personal opinion like asking how the campus feels or In my opinion to ask a factual question that is hard to google.
One of my favorite ones to ask is about an honors college/program or a question about the community. One of my top schools on my list is in a suburb of a very large city. Let’s call it city X and I asked about the diversity of city X, does it have big city feel, is it college town-y among other questions. Also try to insert some information you know about the campus. The one for the school in city X was as city X is near some mountains so I asked about nature opportunities in city X.
Hope this helps and feel free to comment if you’s like clarification as I’d be more than happy to help!
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I am a sophomore right now and I want to go to top schools like Duke, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Yale, etc. I started looking into colleges, doing my research, compiling my list, and building extracurriculars at the beginning of this year. Did I get too late of a start? And if so, how can I fix this?