March Madness

by | Mar 3, 2024 | Uncategorized

Are your brackets ready?

Squares are purchased, initials marked, and the Boards are ready. Yes, all eyes turn to the NCAA Tournament and college hoops. This year, the tournament comes to our backyard as Boston plays host to the East Regional Finals at the TD [Boston] Garden at the end of the month.

March is a busy month across the higher education landscape.

  • Graduating classes are gearing up for finals, marching, and the next stages of their lives
  • 10th and 11th-grade students are watching and enjoying the feeling that they will soon take their next step.
  • Transfers: those who need a new look or individuals looking to restart should be finishing applications
  • Parents should calculate their ability to contribute to the student’s education costs and, if need be, what Plan B will be.

The FAFSA dilemma is not over…Sorry.. Student/family financial aid data is coming to colleges, universities, and accredited post-secondary schools. Fingers crossed

In the meantime, students and families must focus on what they can control-maintaining their mental well-being. Families of 12th-grade students bound for college in September should use this valuable time to prepare for pending decision time.

  • Watch and follow up on all information on your student’s colleges, universities, and other accredited post-secondary schools’ portal.
  • Analyze financing strategies, including running Net Price estimates for public and private institutions.
  • Begin comparing cost, merit scholarship received, and personal resources (including 529 college savings funds and disposable monthly income) to project financing gaps at each school. Spreadsheet available at www.getcollegegoing.com/resources
  • Invest at least one-hour daily hunting for non-college, independent, community, and philanthropic scholarships. Make it a family affair!
  • Evaluate your credit standing to ensure that, if needed, you can serve as a co-signer on a last-resort private college loan.

DID YOU HEAR 

Colleges are now moving to eliminate Dean Lists – in the face of rising mental health issues on campus, two high-pressure institutions. Schools like Cornell, Penn, and others are moving away from the Lists. I’m not sure how I feel.

Discover Exits the Student Loan Industry – It’s all about making them more profitable for the sale to Chase. If you’re a Discover customer, watch your accounts – print your last private student loan statement.

New employer-employee education benefit programs to help workers manage education loan payments. As part of the January 2024 Secure Act 2.0, changes permit employers to shift financial resources to help with monthly loan payments and add college advising benefits to EAP.

Standardized test scores will return to college admission requirements for 2025-2026; plan accordingly as you develop your student’s college search list.

Are You Saying YES to the College

Here are five criteria that I ask all students and families to consider when choosing the final college, university, or accredited post-secondary school to attend. Yes, and you have your match – fit!!

The school will:

Advance my academic learning and skills to the next level
Meet my personal needs
Provide me with a socially safe community to learn and live.
Be affordable, with limited educational debt
Prepare me for a job and Career on the way out.

To learn more about who we are, our services, and our approach to planning and funding your student’s educational pathways after high school, visit www.getcollegegoing.com. Start a Conversation- the office is always open.

 

Housing Before Yes – Wait a Minute

by | Mar 3, 2024 | College Admissions, College Planning, College Readiness

The college admission process is stressful enough … add this year’s financial aid debacle, and you have sources of students and families on edge. But, no, let’s make matters worse.

If it isn’t hard enough for families to navigate the college planning, finding, applying, and funding process, colleges and universities are exerting more pressure on anxious students. It comes from all places: housing and resident life.

As an education advisor already trying to stem the stress and strain of the admission decision-making process and uncertainty on how to pay, I now hear from students and parents that emails are arriving with a message: no housing deposit, no room.

Growing up in the industry, the process, procedure, and protocol that college-bound students and families follow have been to find a school, apply, get accepted, learn about financial aid (or lack thereof), and then, after evaluating your options, say yes, here is my May 1 deposit. Add me to the list of incoming first-year students. Only then was the next step to send a housing deposit to secure a dorm room.

Did I miss a significant shift in the process? A new business decision on campus. If not, Presidents, Deans, VPs, Directors, and Managers on campus, why are you putting the cart before the horse? Why are you adding to the already emotional, stressful period in the lives of many highly vulnerable young teens?

On behalf of my students and families, please share the why?

Posted on Linkedin and FB – 3/3/2024 – no campus comments yet.