More Advice to Entering Freshmen

Earlier this month the NY Times published short articles of advice to college freshmen written by professors.  I was not surprised how many of them emphasized the importance of learning how to write well and the importance of reading, everything from the classics to an everyday newspaper.  However, my favorite article was “Don’t Alienate Your Professor” by Carol Berkin.  This article covers the importance of classroom etiquette and shows how your demeanor as a student can have a huge affect on your relationship with your professor.  One piece of advice I would add to her list:  Don’t fall asleep in class!
Katherine Price
Former First Year Student Advisor

The Advantages of Attending a Small Liberal Arts College

It’s always fun to get mail.

The other day I received a note from the grandfather of one of my clients. He had just dropped off his granddaughter for her freshman year at the University of the South (Sewanee).  The grandfather had never been there before, and he participated in all the orientation activities for new students.  This letter was originally sent to the parents of my client, who were unable to attend the orientation.  As this note (which I have been given permission to reproduce below) indicates, he wasn’t really aware of how different the educational experience at a small college can be–in comparison with larger universities with which he is more familiar.

Rather than editorialize too much, I’ll just let this man’s observations communicate the ways in which a place like Sewanee (or any other similar institution) can be different…and make a difference.

***********

We were impressed with both sessions of “Parent’s Orientation”. The recurring motif was, “We look out for one another.” Sewanee is a small campus, the Dean told us, and as such, is transparent. It’s difficult to hide. Or misbehave. If a student is goofing off, cutting classes or taking drugs, everyone knows about it in a very short time. And the administration intervenes right away. The student gets a “Come and see me now” letter from the Dean, and a copy goes to the student’s parents. Same for academic problems: if student is cutting classes or struggling, she gets a letter from the Dean, with a copy to the parents. Before the Dean’s involvement, however, there are other remedies.

Above all, Sewanee is a community and each member is encouraged (and required) to contribute to its well-being. In short, they help one another out. Proctors and their assistants in the dorms are there to answer questions and offer advice and encouragement; professors invite students to supper in their homes (in fact, the University Provost, who shared a table with us at the Saturday evening picnic, invited your daughter to Thanksgiving dinner). Student/faculty discussion groups, prayer groups, extra-curricular groups, special interest groups meet weekly; that provides social contact and keeps loners from isolating. Sewanee keeps an eye on its students, going way beyond what large universities (Ohio State, Michigan State, U of Colorado in my experience) do to see to the welfare of their charges.

This atmosphere of camaraderie is emblazoned on the official Sewanee T-shirt: on the back, it reads, “On my own – but not alone.” The Sewanee motto says it all: Ecce quod bonum et quam iucundum habitare fratres in unum. That’s from the 133rd Psalm: “How good and joyful it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.” Your daughter is in good hands in a good and gorgeous setting.

[Lest you think I’m showing off by so facilely translating Latin, I copied it from the Sewanee glossary on its website: https://smith2/sewanee/edu/glassary/Glossary –Sewanee.html. The website has all sorts of interesting info, including the description of a small pond where the Sewanee birders hang out, and where you’ll find me the next time I visit].

In addition to the orientations calming parental unease, we learned two things of particular interest. First, the Study Abroad Program is very strong. Students can even attend classes offered by other colleges and universities and still receive Sewanee class credit. Plus, there is financial aid available so students can take advantage of this “transformational opportunity”.

Second, Sewanee alumni are actively involved with the students in a number of ways. They help students find internships (during the summer; also during the Christmas break) and get this: Sewanee has money to pay their internees if the company they’re interning with doesn’t do so (most don’t). Alumni also serve as mentors, helping students find their niche. They also help them find jobs after graduation. Students merely need to check with the on-campus alumni office, make a phone call and say, “Sewanee” to get connected. Sewanee is a tight bunch of folks, more than just “community”.

During his opening remarks, Dean Eric Hartman said Sewanee asks incoming students three questions and, during their four years on campus, helps them find answers. The questions:

Who am I?

What are my gifts?

What is my place in the world?

As the Dean pointed out, the question are apropos throughout life and the answers are always subject to change.

***********

Clearly the writer was impressed with the sort of education and community that a small college in a rural location can provide.  I was, too.  That’s why I recommended this college to my client.

Which college can I recommend for you?


Mark Montgomery
College Planner and Consultant



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The Stress of College Admissions Means We Spend More Time With Our Kids. Good?

The Economix blog at the New York Times reports on a report (can you do that?) that concludes that the reason more and more college educated parents are spending so much time with their kids (when it would seem that it would be more rational for them to use their educations to make more money) is a result from the increasingly competitive nature of college admissions.
Interesting
Me? I’m going to skip my son’s soccer game tomorrow and make some money!
Just kidding.
Actually, as a college planner, I know that if I’m cheering him from the sidelines, he’ll feel loved, and strive to achieve, and therefore be admitted to Harvard seven years from now.
Just kidding again.
Let me know what YOU think:  More Parent-Child Quality Time? Thank Harvard – Economix Blog – NYTimes.com.
Mark Montgomery
Educational Consultant

Average SAT Goes Up! and Down!

It’s always fun when two different–and reputable–publications report the same story and lead them with different headlines.

The facts: the College Board reported that the average score on the SAT tests last year went down slightly. The averages were 501 for critical reading, 515 for mathematics and 493 for writing.

Inside Higher Ed led this story with the headline “SAT Scores Drop, Gaps Grow.” This publication chose to emphasize that while the overall scores did not decline all that much, the “achievement gap” between white kids and kid “of color” have widened slightly. As more students take the test, it becomes more and more apparent that black and Latino children are not performing as well as their white counterparts. (Note that when we talk about the “achievement gap,” we are not generally referring to the widening gap between Asian Americans and white kids…but that gap is widening, too. Nor are we emphasizing the gap in performance between boys and girls…but that gap exists, too).

The New York Times, on the other hand, led the same story with the headline “SAT Scores Steady for Class of ’09.”  The emphasis here was on the fact that while there was a slight decline in the average critical reading, the average math scores held steady.  The article does point out, however, that these gaps in achievement according to ethnicity, gender, and socio-economic class are increasing, in part because more and more minority students are taking the tests (40% of test takers were minorities in 20009, up form 48% in 2008).

Just goes to show you that the headline does not convey the entire picture, and different publications with different editorial policies will choose to emphasize different things in their articles.

On this particular story, I prefer the Inside Higher Ed version.  It gives a bunch more information, including a breakdown of scores by ethnicity and with some comparisons of scores between 2009 and 2005.  While the average yearly decline is not great, the decline over five years is more pronounced.

Mark Montgomery
Educational Planner



Average ACT Score Unchanged Despite Growing Numbers of Test Takers

A report released yesterday by ACT, Inc, indicates that the average national score on the college entrance test has held steady, even though the number of students taken the test has increased.

The national average score on the ACT is 21.1 on a 36 point scale. The test contains four components: math, science, English, and reading. The test also has an optional writing portion that is scored separately.  (The main competitor to the ACT is the SAT.  See our article for more on the differences  between the two tests.)

An article in today’s Chronicle of Higher Education (registration required) explains that the number of students taking the ACT has increased by 25% since 2005.

Much of this increase can be attributed to the fact that five states now require their high school students to take the exam. Those states are Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Kentucky, and Wyoming.

So it’s interesting to  note that while more and more students are taking the ACT exam–especially in the five states above–not all of these students are flocking to college.  While the average ACT has gone up in Colorado, for example, the percentage of high school graduates going to college (and graduating!) has not gone up all that much.

Further, it’s interesting that with more people taking the test, the average has not fluctuated much.

You can also read about the ACT report in Jacques Steinberg’s article in the New York Times.


Mark Montgomery
Educational Consultant


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Transfer Process: Life Changing or a Big Hassle?

Students sitting back to back in a forest

I recently reconnected with one of my former transfer students via a social networking site. I assisted the student with the transfer admission process at the institution I used to work at and he sent me one of those rare emails where a student reminds me why I wanted to become an educator. He raved about his transfer experience and how the decision to change colleges transformed his life. Fortunately this student had a positive transfer experience, but the transfer process can be tricky. Here are few things to consider:
Start Early: The sooner you contact the institution you are thinking of transferring to the better.

  • Ask what courses you should currently be enrolled in. Some schools want you to have completed as many general education courses as possible.
  • What are the transfer admission policies? Do they admit January transfer students? Can you transfer in your first-year or do you have to wait until you are a sophomore?
  • What are the statistics for admitted transfer applicants? Make sure you meet the average college GPA and standardized test requirements. What do you need to do to improve your profile? What is the transfer acceptance rate? The transfer admission process at some schools can be more competitive than the first-year application process.
  • Completing a transfer application can be just as extensive as completing a first-year application. Find out if the college or university you are interested in uses transfer Common Application or do they have a separate application process. What credentials do you need to submit for the transfer application process?

Show Me The Money:

  • Ask about the availability of financial aid for transfer students. Some schools do have special scholarships available.
  • Transferring academic credits can have a huge financial impact on your decision to transfer. If all of your current credits are not accepted, you may have to delay your graduation timeline. Find out if your current institution has any articulation agreements with schools you are interested in. If not, contact the school you are interested in and see if they have any courses from your current institution that have been previously accepted for credit. This may save you in the long run!
  • FInd out if there is on-campus housing available for transfer students.  If not, what is the cost difference for living off campus?

Deciding to transfer is big decision, but it does not mean that it is the end of your college career. US News & World Report wrote a great article last January on President Obama’s transfer experience. The article talks about how transferring may not be for everyone, but it may also take you places you never imagined!
Katherine Price
Transfer Advocate
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Chapman University is Creating Global Citizens

Earlier this week  I had the opportunity to visit Chapman University in Orange, CA.  Not only was I impressed by the beautiful campus and updated facilities, but the discussion of their Global Citizen initiative also caught my attention.  Chapman has included a Global Citizen requirement in their general education curriculum.  Students can fulfill this requirement by studying abroad or by completing related courses on campus.  Chapman not only has the goal of increasing the number of students who study abroad, but they also want all students to be exposed to course work related to global study.  Basically being a “citizen of the world” is a big deal at Chapman.  Something that might be worth mentioning in an essay or in a discussion with an Admission Officer.  Most colleges and universities have similar types of initiatives on their campuses.  Whether it is increasing diversity, educating students to be socially responsible or adding an ethics requirement to the curriculum, find out what the initiatives are at the schools you are applying to.  It might be interesting to see what direction your favorite college or university is headed!
Katherine Price
Educational Planner
 
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Getting Started on Your College Admissions Essay

a girl writing college admission essay

Writing about oneself is difficult. Really difficult. But write about yourself you must. So you may as well get started. But how? Most students start with the five prompts offered by the Common Application.

Essentially, these boil down to the following:

  1. A person who has influenced you
  2. An experience that reflects your personality in some way
  3. A social or political issue that interests you
  4. A fictional character or historical personage that interests or reflects upon you in some way
  5. Your perception of diversity

The Common Application also includes the catch-all prompt: “Topic of Your Choice.”
Frankly, I hate all these prompts. I understand they are meant to get students thinking and off to a good start. But from my perspective, these prompts usually set students off on the wrong course from the get go.

For example, when writing about an influential person (real or imagined, fictional or historical), the student focuses so much on the other person that they neglect to write anything about themselves. Or when writing about an experience, they recount the experience without any reflection as to why it was important. Or worse, they choose an incident in which they exaggerate their own agency, hoping that they will appear heroic or even superhuman. The average college applicant in America has faced enormous obstacles along their educational path.

When it comes to social and political issues, most students start trying to solve the Palestinian problem or combat deforestation, without really telling us why such issues are important to them personally. And the diversity issue is one of the most difficult, in part because most teens have had limited experience of diversity; furthermore, diversity is such an abstract concept that it’s hard for any of us to get our minds wrapped around what it really means in practice.

So, since I’ve tossed out all the usual college essay prompts, what are we left with? Fortunately, the Common Application, as well as many individual college applications, allow students to write about a “topic of your choice.”
Bingo.

So I start not with a prompt, which can lead us in artificial or superficial directions, I start with the student. I ask them to tell me stories. I want to know about their friends. I want them to tell me stories about parents and grandparents. I want to know how they spend their time. I want to know about significant school projects. What do they read, and what do they read about?

All this conversation takes time. But it helps me to understand what is important to the person behind this application. I need to get a glimpse of their foibles and frailties. I need to plumb the depths of their feelings. Through this process, I generally can help a student come up with several viable topics for college essays. I then ask them to write stream-of-consciousness paragraphs that revolve around the general topic area until we witness the evolution of a tightly-woven essay.

Again, the process takes time. It takes patience. Some drafts work; others don’t. But with persistence, students can deliver an excellent essay that reveals something interesting and essential about their personality.
And, in the end, the topic usually does revolve around one of the prompts that appear in the Common Application. The prompts are a great place to end. But you wouldn’t really want to start there.

Mark Montgomery
College Essay Consultant

Teach Naked: Taking Computers OUT of Classrooms

A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Eduction caught my eye.  It’s about the efforts of a Dean at Southern Methodist University to encourage his faculty to teach without PowerPoint and other computer-assisted classroom methods.

It seems that students find lectures boring, whether or not professors use PowerPoint to “spice up” their lectures with brightly colored outlines projected on Smart Boards.

Further, the use of technologies in the classroom has not fundamentally changed classroom dynamics:  a lecture with a PowerPoint is really no different than a lecture with a PowerPoint.

So what’s the point?  The point is that good teaching exists apart from the technology one uses or does not use.  Good teachers can create fantastic lessons with podcasts, wikis, blogs, and other technological tools.  Or they can just ask good questions and foment good discussion that leads to better understanding of the material.

As students (and parents) shopping for colleges, then, how should you view technology?  Well, my advice is not to get carried away with the idea that a college that has wireless access under every tree is somehow better than the college where only the residences and academic buildings are wired (and with kids having smart phones in their pockets anyway, isn’t all that wireless coverage just costing you double?).

Also, don’t assume that colleges without smart boards and projectors and BlueRay players in ever classroom are better than those that do not.  Some colleges pride themselves that their classroom experiences are focused on ideas, not on gadgets.  Do you really need all that goop to teach verb conjugations or the Plato’s analogy of the cave?  Even in science classes, a good deal of the learning takes place in the laboratory, where the technology of the Bunsen burner has not changed all that much.

Finally, keep in mind that all that technology is expensive, and that a large number of faculty on a campus are not taking full advantage of the capabilities.  Much of that technology is gathering dust, as faculty members continue to read their lectures word-for-word.  Your tuition dollars and technology fees are used to pay for all that machinery.

Demand drives costs in higher education.  Spending on technology has helped fuel spiraling costs of college attendance in the past 20 years.  I think it’s healthy that some colleges and universities are reevaluating this spending, and instead examining what really makes a difference in the classroom:  good teaching.

Mark Montgomery
College Planner



More on the Biggest Party Schools

I recently wrote about Playboy Magazine’s rankings of the top 25 party schools in America.

Today, Inside Higher Ed carries a very thoughtful piece about party school rankings, including those published by the Princeton Review.

The fact is that these rankings are sometimes manipulated by students on campuses. For example, there is some indication that Penn State students pushed one another on various Facebook groups to vote for their school (the rankings are derived from online student surveys).

Are these rankings valid? Probably not, in a statistical sense. And as I have said, nearly every college is a party school in one sense or another.

But the folks at Princeton Review do point out that the schools at the top of the party school list have been fairly consistent over time.  (There also is quite a lot of overlap between Playboy‘s list and the Princeton Review‘s list).  They also point to the fact that Brigham Young University has been at the top of their “Stone Cold Sober” list for 12 years in a row. So perhaps there is a grain of truth in these rankings.

Mark Montgomery
Educational Consultant


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