Great College Advice

Yesterday Scott Jaschik of Inside Higher Ed reported in a lengthy (but characteristically thorough) article that despite the economic downturn, the number of early decision applications to many expensive, private colleges is up this year over last. Mr. Jaschik offers the following possible explanations:

1.  Colleges are better communicating that college fit matters, so students [...]

The financial downturn has high school seniors and their parents running scared.  How can we reduce costs?  How can we get the best deal?

The conventional wisdom says that an in-state college is the cheapest option.  As with most conventional wisdom, this assumption is wrong.

Let’s compare costs for a Colorado student considering majoring in business at [...]

Clients have asked me repeatedly to explain the relationship between the financial aid and admissions offices, and to help them to understand how financial need is factored into admissions decisions.  Usually these questions revolve around whether a college is “need blind” or “need aware.”  So in this post, I’ll try to shed some light on [...]

The Denver Post reports today that endowments at Colorado colleges and universities have shrunk significantly, which may mean fewer scholarship dollars for students.

Endowments pay for important aspects of college, from prestigious professor positions to millions in private scholarships and science labs.

However, there are two things worried parents should recognize before hitting the panic button.  [...]

Sometimes peer pressure is a good thing.

I read an article the other day in Inside Higher Ed that Baylor University had implemented a policy to pay admitted students to retake the SAT scores, in a bid to build an appearance of greater selectivity and (so Baylor officials said) to give away more scholarship money.

On Thursday, [...]

Sallie Mae and Gallup released a new annual survey on how families in the US pay for college. It yields a great deal of information.  One of the problems in analyzing this data, however, is the huge variety of colleges student attend, the financial circumstances of those families, and the enormous varance in the price [...]