In this podcast, I’ll dive into:

• The story behind how I started connecting screenwriting and the college essay in the first place.
• Two exercises that I love to use to generate some great content for the essay.
• Two structures that I think can work for just about any essay.
• Four types of college essays
• What I believe the end of an essay should do.
• And so much more! Enjoy.

Ted’s book has been a go-to reference for me (and many other counselors) in our work with students and I loved getting a chance to go behind the scenes and hearing how the sausage is made. We discuss, among other things:

• Why did the Fiske Guide happen in the first place?
• How does Ted avoid sounding generally positive about all schools?
• How the Fiske Guide ratings systems differs from that of US News and World Report
• Who actually writes all 882 pages of the Fiske Guide
• The best approach for students who have no idea what they want
• Some of the biggest mistakes students and parents make when searching for a school
• The dangers of narrowing your college choices too early on.
• One quality Ted finds essential to having an amazing college experience

On this episode:

• How many schools students should apply to and when is best to start the process
• An amazing list of resources for helping students get to know themselves better
• Answers: What is the highest-impact hour that someone should spend developing their college list? (answer may surprise you)
• What do parents and students miss out on if they only used US News and World Report?
• What Steven listens for specifically when helping a student develop a list
• What terms Steven uses instead of “reach,” “match” and “back-up” for schools on a list
• We play a game where Steven helps me develop a college list on the fly based on a few preferences (something, he points out, he would never do without more information, by the way)… but he plays along and it’s neat to hear the master at work.

On this episode, my guest Monica James and I discuss, among other things:

• What the heck is demonstrated interest in the first place and why is it important to colleges?
• What “yield” is and why there’s a multi-million dollar industry of people called “enrollment consultants” who use sophisticated predictive analytics to foresee which students will actually attend a particular school… and why that’s important
• How to find out which colleges track demonstrated interest
• If you discover that there’s a school you are very interested in… how do you go about demonstrating interest--some practical tips for that
• Is it possible to go overboard and demonstrate too much interest?
• And we even get into: should you or shouldn’t you like a college’s Facebook page?

I chat with Parke Muth, former Associate Dean of Admissions at UVA. We cover, among other things:

• What Parke has learned reading over 10,000 college essays
• We’ll go behind-the-scenes to look at how close decisions are sometimes made by committees at highly-selective universities (and why essays matter even more as a result)
• What Parke wrote his college essay about
• Parke’s 10% rule for when students should/shouldn’t write about their activities or achievements
• What an “authentic voice” is and why, contrary to popular wisdom, we maybe shouldn’t be encouraging students to write in it
• Some dos and don’ts for the “Why us” essay, including one thing students should definitely do but most don’t, and
• Why Parke believes his job is better than being a king

In this paradigm-shifting interview with Maria Furtado, the Executive Director of Colleges That Change Lives (aka CTCL), we discuss, among other things:

• What is a liberal arts education and why is it important?

• Three questions every student should ask when it comes to picking a college

• Three ways to reduce anxiety during the college application process: the Car Idea, how to avoid “college creep,” and how the Ice Cream Prize can make a tour better

• One great way to increase (not decrease) stress during the college selection process

• How to make the most of a college fair experience

• Perhaps the single most important thing for parents to consider when it comes to the college application process

This week, I cover:

• 6 Ways That Most Workshops Fail in the First Five Minutes (aka 6 Terrible Ways to Start a Workshop)
• 9 Tips for Leading a Workshop of Any Size
• 5 Potentially Life-Changing Workshop Moments
• Bee tea dubs: These are essentially three of the modules from the Essay Workshop in a Box--there are 29 total, btw, and you can find out more about that in the show notes.
• At the end I also say a few words about my Counselor Training Program, which I’m super duper excited about.

Curious how to make the most of your upcoming summer? There's a lot you can do (and they don't all cost money.) This episode, we cover:

• Great questions to ask when it comes to planning a summer
• The 2014 National Pre-College Summer Survey, which Jill and her co-author put together based on asking 50 colleges: What summer opportunities matter most on a college application?
• She addresses whether or not expensive summer programs are “worth it”?
• What students and parents should do but often don’t do when it comes to planning their summer
• This really cool Teen Program Evaluator that you can check out that’s basically a scorecard that students and parents can use to determine whether or not a summer program is a good fit

I even ask Jill what I’m really dying to know: Which program is definitely going to get my daughter into Harvard? And she definitely gave me an answer.

Ever wonder what you should include in an appeal letter? This week, Jodi and I cover:

• Who should make the call to a financial aid office: the student or parent?
• What to literally say to a financial aid officer when you call them to appeal
• Why you maybe shouldn’t start off the conversation by mentioning a financial aid offer from another school
• Jodi’s five points to cover in an appeal letter
• What tone to take and how long the letter should be
• The one thing students and parents should do but don’t

I chat with Dr. Aliza Gilbert about how to support undocumented students. We chat about:

• What terms to use (and not use) when working with undocumented students
• What the Dream Act is and why not all students love the term “Dreamers”
• What percent of kids born right now are born to undocumented parents
• Whether or not students should reveal their undocumented status in their personal statement
• How incorrect assumptions can sometimes make a student feel horrible
• How to know if a school (or a state, for that matter) is/isn’t supportive of undocumented students
• What teachers/mentors/counselors can do to help undocumented youth