Author Archives: AMJ

Want to Impress Colleges? Be Yourself!

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How much do colleges weight sports? Does it help if I quit tennis and pursue a more unique sport? Can I get into a top school if I am Captain of Speech and Debate? Do I really have to do research? Is 1600 the score I need to get into any college? What if I try to skip ahead in Math and do Calculus in my Junior year, is that better than if I do it in my Senior Year?

These are the types of questions I often get from parents of older students as it relates to their high school students. But these were the questions that a very eager and precocious seventh grader asked me the other day. As a thirteen-year old, she is already wrapped up in the college admissions race going so far as to know what is her dream school. While I was not shocked to hear from such a young girl her plans for the future because so many students are thinking about college earlier and earlier in their lives, I was a little saddened to think about her pursuing only those interests and activities she deemed would “look good on her college application.”

Middle school students, all students for that matter, should use their time pursuing activities that truly appeal to their sense of curiosity, their sense of adventure, and their sense of fun.

Colleges, yes, want to see accomplishments, strong academics, and a complete list of activities, all of which should stem from a student’s interests and not from some preconceived notion of what is expected. Admissions officers do not match applications against a set list of criteria. And when colleges tout the use of a holistic admissions process they are not just trying to calm the applying masses.

So rather than planning the next year or few years trying to be the perfect college applicant, use that time being the best you that you can be. Get involved in the activities that really speak to you. Those are the ones where you are likely to gain some of recognition anyways. And in whatever you pursue reach for the stars, knowing that failure can be just as valuable as success. If the opportunities you want are not in front of you, find ways to make them happen. Start a club if you want but because you are passionate about a cause not because staring a club shows leadership. Think beyond the bounds of your high school. Perhaps you would love to or need to get a job. Working in a fast food restaurant can teach you some very valuable skills about working with customers and working in an office can teach you about a potential career. Both are valuable.

When it comes to academics and test scores, balance is the key. You should push yourself to your limits. But you also have to be deeply aware of what those limits are. Don’t sign up for the hardest courses because that is what you think you need to do. Take the classes that excite you and also ones that show colleges your academic potential. And work for your test scores but don’t obsess about them – admissions officers certainly don’t.

The reality is that almost anything you do is valuable to an admission’s officer because it gives a glimpse into who you are. In the several pages that make up your college application, admissions officers want to learn as much about you as possible – about what you will contribute to the campus, what you will gain from the experience of being a student, and what you will represent as an alumnus of the school. In trying to build a well-rounded class, admissions officers want students that will contribute in different ways. Admitting students that fit any checklist will only bring together a boring, uni-dimensional group of students that will not inspire one another. It is important to think about the future. It is important to have goals. But it is also essential to live in the moment.

As I tell my students, this is your life. Live it to the best of your ability and admissions officers will be more than impressed.

The kind of student colleges like __________ are looking for…

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Each year a number of my students are admitted and a number are rejected. Such is the life of an admissions counselor. And on this day, my colleague and I had a similar task: we each were asked by parents of our students to explain the decision their child had received from X dream school. My colleague had the unenviable task of explaining to a family “why” their daughter had been deferred in the early round, and I had the welcome task of explaining to a family “why” their daughter had been accepted when the school seemed such a far reach for her particular profile. Neither of these questions actually have answers, but there are some clues:

The family that was disappointed complained incessantly that other students must be getting different advice, that their parents were doing the work for their children to pad their profiles with science fair accomplishments, and that some were even writing their children’s essays. These things do happen. A lot, sadly. And yet, the remarkable thing is that this student hadn’t even been rejected. In fact, the school had merely deferred her application to the regular round, which in this case, for this particular school, meant that she was seriously being considered. But the parents described a scene of total chaos and desperation when they read the decision online: “my daughter was sobbing uncontrollably,” the mother said. I wondered if the tears were less about the decision and more about failing to fulfill the astronomically high expectations imposed by her parents.

While this conversation was unfolding, in another office, opposite my colleague, I was writing this email:

Dear ___________,

Of course, I cannot know what exactly went through the minds of the admissions officers as they read your daughter’s application, but a short answer to your question might be the trusty adage: “hire for personality, train for skills.”

Research internships, while impressive are also often attained through either family connections or paying for extremely expensive summer programs. I am not trying to diminish the value, because I do recommend both of these options to students who want to pursue research, but the research experience does not make the scientist (per se). What your daughter displayed in spades throughout her application was a unique combination of determination, grit, compassion, authenticity and self-awareness. You can’t underestimate the value of sincere self-awareness coming through in a college app. At best, I think I play the role of helping students have the courage to really write what’s true for them and focus less on what colleges “want to hear,” though that may sound ironic coming from a college counselor. Your daughter risked putting who she really is out there for colleges to see and her enthusiasm for her chosen career was both evident and believable because of her authenticity.

I have no doubt that when she encounters the inevitable challenges of college life, she will move through them with the same grace and determination that were evident in her application and life experience thus far. That is the kind of student colleges like __________ are looking for 😉

This same mother had written to me a week before early decisions were released and said that she was so proud of her daughter and so grateful for my guidance and that these feelings would not be changed by the outcome of college decisions because she could see reflected in her daughter’s writing the maturity, growth and inner wisdom that had emerged merely from the process of working on college applications.

So on the one side, we have a family and a child who believe that future success is so contingent upon the extrinsic variable of a college decision that all the hard work and energy of a lifetime of academic success have been forever diminished by the evaluation of one school. And on the other side, we have a family and student who believe that even the process of applying was itself a learning and growth experience, as will be the next step and the step after that in this student’s lifelong journey. This dichotomy calls to mind Carol Dweck’s theory of the growth vs. the fixed mindset.  But it also touches on the very heart of why I love my job, why I really do what I do, and what in fact it is that I do when I work with students (at least as I think about it):

I mentor students in becoming the authors of their own lives.

This aspect of my work is present with younger students, but is most evident in drafting personal statements for college applications. When I begin the application process with students, I tell them that if they are open to it, this process does not have to be an onerous task, but holds intrinsic value in the form of self-exploration, reflection and values clarification. When else in your life will you be required to spend weeks, maybe months thoroughly and thoughtfully answering questions like: What matters to you and why? Talk about a time when you challenged a belief or idea, what prompted you to act and would you do it again?

The personal statement, I tell them, is its own genre of literature: it is a short story, in which you are the protagonist and everything that happens is true. And, most importantly, you are both protagonist and author. You may not have control over the events in the story, but you decide what they mean. You cannot be wrong, you can only be honest, and more honest as you peel back the layers and get to the heart of how each story reveals an essential fragment of the whole you.

In her now famous TED Talk, Brene Brown asks the audience: “How many of you associate vulnerability with weakness? Be honest.” Everyone raises their hands. And then she asks, “And how many of you, when you saw vulnerability up here on the stage throughout this week perceived it as ultimate courage.” And just as quickly everyone raises their hands.

That is where the power of the personal narrative lies: in the willingness to be vulnerable, to be seen. As readers, we know it when we see it and it is hard to look away once that courage shows its face.

It doesn’t mean you will get in; it doesn’t mean your great American novel will get published; it doesn’t mean people will like you or will appreciate what you put out into the world. But it is the recipe for building a meaningful life and if you do get in, get the job, get recognized, chances are it will not be what you said, but what you revealed of yourself to which the school, the manager, the audience said YES!  

The Coalition for Access, Affordability, and Success

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One of the ongoing debates in the world of college admissions is how to make the entire process more affordable, especially to families in lower income brackets.  The Coalition for Access, Affordability, and Success (CAAS), a diverse group with more than 90 colleges and universities, is aiming to offer a more affordable education to students.  The Coalition is providing a single focused set of resources to help students to organize and develop their college applications.  It will be free for students, families, counselors and high schools to use, and it continues to add high profile colleges as members.

New college planning tools, meant to streamline the admissions and financial aid processes, will include the College Locker, set to become available this April.  The Locker will provide a private space for students to gather work they’ve accomplished on their high school journeys, from strong essays to volunteering photos to videos from extracurricular competitions they engaged in along the way.  Colleges will not have access to the Locker while students are making choices about how to represent themselves, but students will be able to share their Locker with counselors, teachers, and other adults they choose to.  Eventually, the Locker is intended to become the Coalition’s Collaboration Platform, a shared meeting place where counselors and teachers can support students by offering feedback and editing.  The final piece of the puzzle, the Coalition Application portal itself,is scheduled to become available this July, 2016. Here, rising seniors will be able to maintain a detailed list of their colleges, review admissions requirements of each school, and submit materials before school deadlines. 

Currently many Coalition schools have agreed to accept applications starting this summer, although others are in the process of deciding exactly when and how to use this new application system.  But it’s important to note that there is not a distinct advantage to using the new Coalition Application over the more well-known Common Application. Colleges that accept both will not have a preference.  The long list of Common app schools that have already joined the Coalition includes Brown, Caltech, Chicago, Claremont McKenna, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, Emory, Georgia Tech., Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, Northeastern, North Carolina, Notre Dame, Penn, Pomona, Purdue, Rice, Stanford, Tufts, Vanderbilt, Wash U., Wesleyan, Williams, and Yale. However, three prominent public universities – Florida, Maryland, and Washington – will be using the Coalition app exclusively.

While the Coalition plans to go into full effect this coming application season, it seems probable that it will be used by many more people starting the following year as everyone becomes increasingly familiar with this new process.  As we gather more information, we will update families accordingly so that you have all the knowledge needed to navigate the CAAS.In the meantime, students will find CAAS affiliated colleges marked with a “C” on their tentative college lists in the portal.  As always, students may direct any additional questions to their Insight counselor. 

 

UC Application New Essays: “Personal Insight Questions”

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On March 24, the University of California (UC) announced a drastic change to the essay section of the UC application. Effective immediately, freshman applicants will have the freedom to choose four questions to answer out of a possible eight. Each short-answer can be as long as 350 words.  So in simple terms the maximum word count has gone from 1000 words to 1400 words.

Although the UC has decided to rename the prompts, “Personal Insight Questions,” the reality is that students will now be required to write four admissions essays. On the one hand, the diversity of questions will hopefully make it easier for students to identify topics that they connect with. On the other hand, teenagers often struggle when given too many choices. And in our experience, the thought process, time and energy behind writing one 500 word essay is no different than writing one 350 word essay.

Our immediate and general reaction to the changes is that they are an improvement over the previous essays. The prompts for the previous essays were written in a way that targeted a specific segment of the applicant pool. The wording of those prompts was also rather confusing and often led to unoriginal responses.  The challenges that come with these changes are likely to impact students who struggle with writing or start the UC application late in the admissions season. We also worry that calling them “questions” vs. “essays” will leave some students assuming that they don’t have to take them as seriously as a proper personal statement/essay.

Below are the new prompts:

  1. Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes, or contributed to group efforts over time.
  2. Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving, original and innovative thinking, and artistically, to name a few. Describe how you express your creative side.
  3. What would you say is your greatest talent or skill? How have you developed and demonstrated that talent over time?
  4. Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked to overcome an educational barrier you have faced.
  5. Describe the most significant challenge you have faced and the steps you have taken to overcome this challenge. How has this challenge affected your academic achievement?
  6. Describe your favorite academic subject and explain how it has influenced you.
  7. What have you done to make your school or your community a better place?
  8. What is the one thing that you think sets you apart from other candidates applying to the University of California?

The beauty in these new topics is that students finally have a choice in what they want to convey to the University of California. This will undoubtedly cause some students to panic, wondering if what they think is important is what the admissions officers want to read. The most important thing students can do is to spend some time this summer reflecting on their experiences and what these experiences reveal about them. This will lead them to identifying the four prompts that best suit their life experiences. Essays should always be approached as opportunities to highlight those things that are not readily evident on the rest of the application. This is where voice becomes so important and the UCs have taken one valuable step in letting that voice shine through.

The Archeology of Success

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A student of mine had just been admitted to her dream school, a school that we both knew was not a guarantee by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, she explained that when she first shared the news with her friends, she heard someone nearby whispering, “Wow, she got in where?!? I didn’t know she was that smart.”

Overhearing this comment, even in the midst of her excitement and overwhelming joy at the life changing news she had just received, launched her into a tailspin so that by the time we met the following Friday, she started the meeting by asking me to confirm if the school she had been admitted to was actually a competitive brand name school or if maybe it was easier to get into than she had thought. Just to prove a point, I showed her that her school ranks among the top 15 schools in the United States, right next to Cornell and Brown, according to US News and World Report.

I spend much of my life and work convincing families that there is much more to the college experience and to the value of any given school than ranking, but this seemed to be a case in which ranking was actually useful! In the weeks leading up to this decision, this same student had scoured her application, even AFTER it had been submitted for any possible errors. Each week that we met between when the application went in and the decision came out, she had a new question about some feature of her application that wasn’t quite right. And now, even though she had been admitted, she was already beginning to doubt the magnitude of her own accomplishment. She’s starting to sound a little crazy, but she isn’t.

We ALL do this. In fact, I think we can all relate to scouring something after there’s nothing we can do for that one little typo, particularly when the stakes are high. And imagine how we feel and behave when we do find a typo, which is often the case because of that persistent pest called imperfection that seems to plague the human experience: we fixate, obsess and justify this whole process with idea that there’s always something to learn from failure and that’s what makes it tolerable.

But, imagine for a second if rather than a negativity bias, the human brain were biased toward fixation on the positive. In this alternate universe, the student and I would have spent the weeks of waiting for her decision relishing this word choice, that effective use of punctuation, savoring the beauty of her writing and marveling at the authenticity and self-awareness present in her essays. And though that alternate universe is not the one in which we live, because in fact the brain is like Teflon for positive experience and Velcro for negative experience (see Rick Hanson), we do have the power to tip the scales ever so slightly in the other direction through conscious effort.

What I suggested to my student is that she owed it to herself to treat this success with the same “enthusiasm” and rigor she would treat a major (or minor) life failure. That is, I know that she would have Monday morning quarterbacked for days, weeks, months if she hadn’t gotten in. Every detail she scrutinized before she even knew the outcome of her application would be rehashed, reassessed for its role in this failure, and countless other possible explanations for the rejection would be explored.

So, I suggested she do the same kind of archeological dig on her own success. Borrowing from the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley’s exercise called Mental Subtraction of Positive Events, I urged her to write down all the complex events, all of the people in her support network, all of the inner qualities and personal strengths that culminated in this incredible moment of recognition and fulfillment. I also asked her to reflect on how things might have turned out differently if one tiny detail in the vast interconnected web of events that led to this single moment hadn’t happened in just the way that it did.

The point here is not to induce fear, but wonder at the exquisite fragility and abundant serendipity present in the story of our own success. It usually follows that from this sense of wonder and awe emerges a natural impulse to give thanks. I encouraged my student to remember the people who had helped her, but also to take this moment to express gratitude to herself for having the courage, persistence and grit to arrive where she is today. She loved the exercise so much that she added the idea of listing some of the failures and negative experiences that had been part of her journey so that she could integrate them into the story of her success.

Each day of our lives, we have the opportunity to do this: to drop one small and brilliant nugget of gold into the positive side of the scale whenever we are willing to take the time to savor the good in our lives, small and large. If you think you don’t have time, get honest with yourself about how much time you already spend ruminating about the small failures in your recent past or planning to protect yourself from shame and embarrassment in a future that hasn’t even happened yet. We have time, you have time, to uncover, polish and delight in the treasure of your own life.

Setting up Routines for High School

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Do you know how you actually spend your time?  Gone are the days of my high school life when I was waiting for the bus, I would pick up my book and read.  Now you can fill your time with Facebook, Tik Tok, Snapchat, read through your texts, Tweet, take 10000 selfies of what you would look like with and without bangs.  And before you know it, that project that was due two weeks from now is due tomorrow.  There is no possible way you can get it done in time so you fake a stomachache and stay home to finish the project. 

 

How did this happen? You started the year off awesome!  You wrote all the due dates in that school planner, you started reading ahead, heck, you even took a pre-course course for your hardest classes!  But now you are so behind, you are looking forward to Thanksgiving break so you can “catch up.” 

 

Don’t worry, all is not lost.  You can catch up before Thanksgiving.  Here are a few things you can do in order to better manage your time.

 

For the next two days, start a log of all the things you do and how much time you spend on them.  Yes, every. single. thing. Log how much time you are on Facebook, youtube, etc., how much time you spend eating, attending a class, talking on the phone, watching TV, assignments. Everything!!! There is no judgment here, don’t try to change anything you do in your normal day just yet…

 

For instance:

7:00-7:18am –  wake up, check Instagram, get dressed

7:18-7:30am – eat breakfast and check Tik Tok, check emails

7:30-7:40am – ride to school with Mom, make a Snapchat of my mom lecturing me

7:40-7:45am- get my books from my locker and go to class

class (1.5 hours)

lunch- eat lunch with my friends and talk about the snapchats or Tik Tok we posted this morning

class (30 minutes)

…… and so on throughout the day

 

This exercise should be really eye-opening to how you spend your time.  Even while studying, you may be spending way more time completing a project than estimated. Look at your daily log inventory to make serious changes. For example, wherein your schedule can you completely put away your smart phone and social media and actually focus on completing your tasks?

 

Now that you’ve found all this time you can fill, let’s fill it productively!

 

Write in your planner:

plan your day to minimize time waste

Are you just writing due dates in your planner?  If so, that’s a great start.  Yes, I said start. Go back and read over the assignments, estimate how much time each one is going to take you, and block out times to complete before the due dates.  This includes writing down when you should start studying for finals and midterms, ideally starting to review at least 3 weeks in advance of your final.

 

Make a to-do list daily:

This should include your study times and goals for you to complete.  Once you’ve completed it, check it off!  Do this daily to manage your daily schedules and track if your goals. Also take some work with you to use your downtime, like waiting for your ride or riding the bus to school, as an opportunity to get some studying out of the way. 

 

Written by Jenny Bloom

This article is written by Insight Senior Counselor Jenny Bloom.

Jenny has worked with a variety of students since 2012 to help them take the right steps to achieve their academic goals. Part of her philosophy is to guide students to consider how they will build and hone their skills and talents to make a difference in the world around them. Contact Insight Education today to schedule an initial consultation with Jenny. Read her full bio here.

What are our Students are saying about Insight?

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I am here writing today as an Insight alum. I just wanted to take a quick minute and truly extend my thanks and gratitude to Purvi and Ajit for providing me with such exceptional guidance as I went through my college selection process. Were it not for them, I don’t think that I would have chosen a school that matches my needs and goals.

Working closely with Purvi to work through my essays and in general talking about college life with both her and Ajit was an experience I would not have been able to receive through my high school counselors. The care that these two take in helping you school goes above and beyond. They have the unique ability to understand the student through and through and help them achieve their potential. They ability to assure parents is definitely a big plus! It helps having such a team on your side where you can go with all your questions and concerns. Their resources are vast and they always will go the extra mile in helping you find the answers that you need.

The endless supply of literature on colleges across the nation continues to grow with each year! Their promptness in interacting with the student is something that definitely makes the whole application process a lot less scary. I definitely wasn’t as stressed about the application process due to Purvi’s diligence in making sure that I had every single base covered 🙂  Today, I see them help my younger brother with the same zeal and enthusiasm as they had when they were helping me during my own process. I know that he will also benefit, just like I did, by having Insight as such a great resource. 

I walked away from Insight with not only a great experience, but also two friends that still care just as much about my future as they did back when I was just a high school senior. It’s great having Ajit as a sounding board for advice as I continued through my college years.  As I am getting ready to graduate, I am thankful to still have Purvi and Ajit as mentors and friends who can provide me guidance and support as I start my own career in the business world. So if you are still not convinced, let me leave you with these simple words: trust me, your kid will definitely be getting that competitive edge by being a part of Insight and Ajit and Purvi will do everything to help them achieve their undergraduate aspirations!

To find out more about Insight College Admissions Counseling, visit https://www.insight-education.net/high-school-college-admissions-counseling/ 

A New Freshman in High School

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It’s that time of year- the countdown has officially begun! 

The first day of school is just here and for those students entering their freshman year in high school, this is no ordinary first day of school. The first day of high schools marks an important life transition in so many ways. How is it that so much can change in just few months between eighth grade graduation and the beginning of high school? Students who once felt that they could commit to memory every deadline and exam date often find that they drop the ball on small assignments, forget to study for an upcoming test, or encounter unforeseen conflicts between schoolwork and extracurricular commitments. These experiences speak to the accelerated pace, significantly heavier workload, and emphasis on inquiry based learning that students encounter in high school.

In this month’s article, I will offer some key suggestions and words of advice to students and their families in navigating this exciting and challenging transition.

As students enter high school, my hope is that they approach the challenges they face with what I like to call a “growth mindset.” This approach to learning is based on the research findings of Dr. Carol Dweck at Stanford. Dr. Dweck’s research has shown that students who attribute their academic successes to hard work and persistence perform better in the long run than students who attribute their success to being “smart” or “talented.” Indeed, contemporary neuroscience tells us that the brain is more like a muscle that gets stronger when we exercise it. Students who have a growth mindset are not afraid to try hard problems and fail because they understand that like lifting weights, exercising their brains is what builds intelligence.

The growth mindset approach underpins another important transition students will face in high school. My colleagues and I have observed that many of our students at the high school level struggle with critical reading, both on standardized exams and in the classroom. As students learn about literary devices, syntax and essay structure, I find that many students mistake the elements of good writing for the meaning of the text itself. At the high school level, students are expected to use what they know about effective writing to support their own opinion regarding the meaning of the text. That means students need to have opinions about what they are reading. A great way to support this development at home is to choose an article or current event to discuss around the dinner table each week. Students need to be encouraged to take intellectual risks and express opinions that may be unpopular; this will support their success in the classroom setting and foster their capacity to read critically.

Last, but not least, an article about transitioning to high school would be incomplete without a note on time management and organizational skills. Each year, most students receive a planner directly from school. And most students will use this to write down homework—that is, if they use it all. I cannot overstate that proactive planning is often what separates the top students from the rest of the crop. Don’t just write down your assignments; write down WHEN you are going to complete them.

Beyond time management skills and hard work, my hope is that Insight students learn to meet the inevitable challenges on their academic journey with greater patience and self-confidence, rather than with a “grit your teeth and bare it” kind of attitude. What the top universities in this country are looking for, as explicitly stated in their application questions is intellectual vitality and curiosity. That means: work hard, but don’t forget to have fun while you’re learning. High school may just be starting for Freshman, but it will be over in a flash—enjoy it!

The New SAT: What to know and how to prepare

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For the first time in 11 years, The College Board will be offering an updated version of the SAT exam beginning in March, 2016.  The new test will be administered only three times during this remaining academic year, once in May and then again in June.  With seniors awaiting college decisions and most underclassmen being unfamiliar with the previous SAT, the onus of exploration and success now rests on the growing shoulders of high school students in the graduating classes of 2018 and, especially, 2017.  What follows is a run-down of key changes to understand and reasons to tackle the new test.

 

Those familiar with the ACT may notice some similarities in the new SAT, perhaps unsurprising following widespread speculation that The College Board’s overhaul is directly correlated to the increasing popularity of the ACT nationwide.  With that in mind, they have made a number of changes to the test’s format, structure, scoring, and timing.  Rather than a 2400-point scale, the new SAT will revert back to the 1600-point scale, with the Math Section and Evidence-Based Reading & Writing section each scored between 200-800 points.  Rather than 10 sections on the exam, the new test will feature only 4, including Evidence-Based Reading & Writing, and Math sections to be completed with and without a calculator. 

 

A common complaint of the old SAT was that some students felt they were forced to jump around from section to section very quickly; with 6 fewer sections in 2016, students will have more time to complete each.  In addition, the new SAT essay section will now be considered optional, and without the essay the exam will only require three hours to complete*.  Also gone is the scoring system that subtracts a fraction of a point for each incorrect answer.  There will now be no penalty for wrong answers, a benefit especially to students who tend to take longer to finish questions and may otherwise run out of time.  There will also be only 4 answer choices for questions on the new exam compared to 5 on the prior version. 

 

 

So who should take the new exam?

For starters, any high school juniors who scored competitively on the new PSAT last October.  Even if you have completed and done well on the ACT, you will need to take the SAT at least once officially to avoid disqualification from National Merit Scholarship consideration.  If you have taken the ACT and decided that is not the right test for you, the new SAT will be your best option. And as a growing number of students take the new test for practice, many are finding they prefer the new structure to the old exam.  Furthermore, colleges will be holding the new SAT in equal regard with the old SAT and ACT, so it will be important for students to learn if the new test is the one they score

Curious what your ACT score is relative to your SAT score? Check out our ACT – SAT Conversion Table.