College Application Season: Seniors, Start Your Engines
The back-to-school hustle is alive and well and in full effect here in Asheville, NC. If you’re like the rising seniors I have been working with all summer, college applications have been on your radar for months, but for most seniors, now is the time to dust off the resume, bust out the calendar, and feng shui the writing station. College application season has officially begun.
Knowing where to start can be daunting. So many of my students show up trying to tackle it all at once. But like I always tell them, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.”
So here are my suggestions for a few of your first bites:
Bite #1: If you haven’t knocked out all of your summer work, it’s time to find a shortcut - AP English classes in particular are notorious for laying on the summer work. If you’re a procrastinator, consider buying or borrowing the audiobook versions of your assigned reading that you can listen to while you take care of all your back-to-school errands. Keep some simple notes on your phone or on paper as you progress. Write down a physical list of what you need to do, and mark each item off as you complete it.
Bite #2: Start a fresh notebook for college applications- Unlike school classes, college application work isn’t something that is automatically factored into your routine. A notebook can be one place where all of your to-do lists, questions, and writing exercises can live. It is also important to keep track of all the new online passwords you’re going to accumulate throughout this process, and this is the perfect spot for those to live as well.
Bite #3: Start the Common Application- Chances are, most of your prospective colleges will be available through the Common Application. www.commonapp.org Register your account as soon as possible, because these are a lot more work than you may think. Don’t forget to save your password in your notebook from Bite #2!
Stay tuned for the next few bites!
