#they tell you in high school its okay to be undecided youll figure it out but what if its been 9 years and i still dont know

[undyinglantern]

being closer to your 30s than 20s and having nothing to show for it is so

[stuclyblrs]

hi everyone !!!! i’m a rising freshman at college/uni and thinking back on the college apps process i realized that i learned a lot that i would like to share !! i was successful with my college apps so im hoping i can give good advice✨

want to see more of this series? click here for the rest of the posts !!

the first step is knowing what you want in a school hopefully you arent as clueless as i was but you need to consider various factors that will impact your life as a student. for me, all i knew was i wanted to go to school in new york city and that was about it....i figured that i would want a larger school as my high school was very small, which i hated and if possible, i wanted somewhere the stats of the accepted students were similar to mine so i would have a more competitive and stimulating environment (basically, i was hoping that i’d get into some match and reach schools lol) if u know what you want this step is pretty easy if not...

college search sites r ur friend. personally i only used college board as a search tool as they give a lot of different search criteria provide different stats on schools (price, standardize test scores, acceptance rate) and let u save schools. if college board isnt ur cup of tea here are some others u can use !! (x) (x)

once you know how you want to search for schools, your next step is to figure out what’s important to u in a school. like i mentioned, for me it was a city, a medium to larger size school, and somewhere the admitted students stats were a bit higher so thats what i searched on college board ! i saved several larger schools located in both nyc and boston and then narrowed down my choices from there

determining which schools to further pursue  while at this point ur still in ur primary decision making about schools to apply to, you still can rule out some options early on! some important factors to consider:

major - do they have your intended major? is the schools program for that major good? if youre undecided do they have a large selection of programs? do they have any programs intended for undecided students (several schools that i applied to had 2-year undecided programs that u could do before entering a college/program within the university)? 

size and location - do you want a typical college campus or one integrated within a city? small, tight-knit college or large, diverse community? far from home or closer to home? super hot summers or cold snowy winters?

atmosphere - what kind of people do you want to be around? traditional experience with football games n greek life or non-traditional experience with people who dont care abt what sports team is winning? a school for a specific demographic (such as a women’s college, specific religious affiliation or a hbc)?

other activities - what kind of outside activities do you want to participate in? do they have club sports u want to play? extensive study abroad program or would you rather stay in one place? do the current activities of the students reflect your interests?

costs and stats (aka the sucky stuff) - are the gpa/test scores similar to yours? if not is it too much of a reach? can you realistically afford it? what kind of financial aid do they offer (sometimes a private school might end up costing as much as a public one)?

@theaplyfe has a college profile doc that u can use to edit and organize what factors youve identified as important and see if potential colleges have what youre looking for ! (original post) 

okay but i still dont know what i want? dont freak out ! i know this can be very frustrating especially when it seems like all ur friends have had their dream schools picked out for years. once you start researching and visiting schools you will learn what you like and dont like !! trust me everything will fall into place just for now start off with some schools that have the basic qualities that u want

researching donts

dont let anyone decide for u what schools to apply to or what you should look for in a college (for example i was initially scared to tell my mom that i wanted to go to nyc since im a very quiet person and its expected that i would hate living in a city but i rly rly love new york)

dont apply to an ivy or another super selective school just to ~see if youll get in~ only apply to these schools if you’re genuinely interested - selective schools like these want u to fall into their trap so theyll get more applicants, allowing them to reject more ppl overall therefore lowering their acceptance rate and making them seem prestigious

w/ this being said, no you dont need to apply to all 8 ivys and theyre all very different schools in very different locations ur not gonna like them all

dont apply somewhere b/c ur best friend or s/o wants to go there. if you could actually see urself at that school even in the event that you and friend stop talking or u and ur s/o break up - then sure ! go for it ! but otherwise dont do it

dont look @ rankings guess what it doesnt matter if ur school is ‘nationally’ ranked in the top 10 or #100 as long as a school has options that you want and has a good program for what you wanna study then apply !!!

dont rule out community college !!!! while there is still (for some god awful reason) negative stigma around community college you will still get just a good of an education there that you would at a four year university. if u feel that you arent quite ready to leave home or want to save some money then community could be the right option for you

dont rule out a school based on one factor - you never know how much that one thing would impact ur daily life a student there (for example i almost ruled out a school due to it being a catholic jesuit school since im not catholic but upon further research i learned that welcome/encourage all religions and non-religious people ! therefore, this factor would not have impacted me very much - i wouldve just had to take some religion based core classes if i went there)

that about covers everything about basic research ! if you still have questions please send me an ask !!!! in my next post im planning on covering how to organize ur schools based on safety/match/reach and your own personal factors + some other important steps before you begin to apply so check back soon