On college applications, let your best shine through
December 21st, 2009Around the winter holidays, perhaps more so than at any other time, we want to be our best selves. We wish not for pretense, but rather for authenticity. We take stock of our lives and resolve, as the new year approaches, to make our best selves a little better still in the year ahead.
But how to do it? If we want to shape up physically, we’ll exercise more and change the way we eat. If we want to improve relationships with friends or family, we’ll try to be kinder and more thoughtful, placing their needs well ahead of our own. These aren’t things we can fake; either we’ll succeed in these realms through true effort and intent, or we won’t.
Read more at BizLex.com >>Tagged: Applications, Choices, College, Personal characteristics
Scholarship: a new synonym for discount
November 25th, 2009Several months ago, a letter arrived from a local seafood restaurant, offering $25 toward our next meal there. Weeks later, an invitation to a gathering at a well-known traditional women’s clothing store arrived, promising 20 percent off any purchase made at that event. Just a few days ago at a professional meeting in North Carolina, the parallel practices of the world of higher education, where discounting carries alternate names, hit home for me: merit scholarships, honorary scholarships and need-based financial aid are in expansion mode.
Tuition discounting is not a new concept: need-based financial assistance has cut the sticker price of college for millions of students. A small number of colleges, including Kentucky’s own Berea College, specialize in educating students from low-income backgrounds and enabling them to graduate without debt. Some prominent colleges with sizable endowments and applicant pools have followed this example in recent years, replacing the loan component of their financial aid packages with outright grant funding, drawing more candidates than ever before.
Read more at BizLex.com >>Tagged: College, Financial aid, Scholarship
Recruiting more help for the college search
October 1st, 2009From the audience of a recent presentation I made on evaluating college campuses, 90 faces were turned in my direction, listening intently. Their questions were not unusual for those involved in the college selection process: What do we look for when we tour? How do we assess a college’s fiscal health and its leadership? What will be important to convey to students?
This particular audience, however, was not filled with parents of college applicants, but with adults contemplating a new career direction in educational consulting. They came to Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania to learn more about the field, and this session was part of a four-day workshop presented by the Independent Educational Consultants Association, a professional association that sets the standard for ethics and competence in the field.
Read more at BizLex.com >>Tagged: Campus visits, Career, College, Educational consultant
