How to Search for Colleges? Advice for Me?

College Search & Selection
1

Hello CC!

I just want to apologize if I seem ignorant in any way regarding this college process; I’ve felt very behind for the entire thing, and my lack of aspiration has caused a lot of procrastination.

I need some help figuring out which schools would be appropriate for me to pursue, and what I should be researching (and how) to gain a better insight into the college itself. For example, do I search on the college website or other places. Should I be looking into clubs or facilities or both? Etc. Currently, I don’t have much time to visit the colleges in person, with only a one week break between now and when the applications are due.

Just giving some tips for my dilemma above is perfectly fine, but if anyone would be willing to look over what I currently have down below, that would be great!

I’m an Asian female going into senior year, so applying this fall. No religious affiliation if that’s important (shouldn’t think so). I live in California and am a US Permanent Resident (not citizen). I’m Kiwi (New Zealand) and have lived and studied in three countries total. I’m not quite sure what I want to pursue in the future (which is my biggest problem), though from my family, some ideas include Liberal Arts schools with a focus in Economics (I enjoyed this class in HS) and perhaps a certificate or minor in Architecture. Another route would be Hotel Management + Architecture.

GPA:
Current cumulative GPA weighted is 4.135. I haven’t calculated my cumulative unweighted, but my unweighted for the last semester (11th second semester) was 3.96. I have a slight upward trend in GPA.

Classes:
Freshman- 2 Honors
Sophomore- 2 AP, 2 Honors
Junior- 2 AP, 3 Honors
Will be taking in Senior year- 4 AP, 1 Honor

Tests:
ACT- 35 (I only took it once)
SAT- didn’t take
SAT II Subject- U.S History 710, Math II cancelled first try, will retake in August
AP- MacroEcon (5), MicroEcon (5), Chinese (5), BC Calculus (5), US History (4)

Extracurriculars/Service/Summer/Clubs:
Honestly, apart from the aspiration thing, I’m very worried about this section. As you might be able to tell, there isn’t a specific area of interest in what I’ve done. I did these simply because I have an interest in them, but not a passion, I guess you would say. I’m not looking to pursue any athletics/music on a competitive level in college.

All year counts include if I’m going to take it Senior year.

  • Yearbook 4 years, Co-Editor Senior Year
  • School Orchestra 4 years
  • Peninsula Youth Orchestra 4 years
  • Music Honor Society, founding member, Treasurer/Historian (2 years), Vice President (1 year)
  • Tennis 4 years
  • Track & Field 1 year
  • Technovation, 2 years
  • Volunteering at schools helping children/food banks, etc.
  • Volunteered for Peninsula Bridge Program one summer teaching math
  • Cornell Summer School: Hotel Management
  • Parsons Paris API: incomplete summer design workshop (had to leave early for personal reasons)
    I may have left off a few, this is only from the top of my head.

I just realized how long this is, and I apologize.

I have a very long college list compiled through my family/counselor, but I would like to see which ones I would actually like personally. I don’t like urban areas (like right in the middle of the city like NYU). I like nature next to/within campus and a college town nearby (I like the feel of CMC, one of the few colleges I’ve visited). I prefer smaller schools but my parents want me to go to a bigger school, so I’m open to both. Budget is not an issue.

Reaches: Northwestern, Stanford, UPenn, UCs, RICE, Cornell
Matches: Carnegie Mellon, WashU St. Louis, Tufts, University of Virginia, Cal Poly SLO
Safeties: UT Austin, Syracuse University, Tulane, Connecticut College, University of Rochester, UN Las Vegas

THANK YOU VERY MUCH IN ADVANCE!

*I don’t know if this was posted before, because there was an “error”, so I’m reposting it. Sorry if it was successfully posted before and I’m being excessive.

2

Nice profile!

This resource can be useful for a sense of economics faculty scholarship at liberal arts colleges:

https://ideas.repec.org/top/old/1411/top.uslacecon.html

Some aspects of your preferences seem to indicate colleges such as NESCACs, Claremonts, Vassar, Kenyon or Colorado College. At schools such as these you would, in most cases, need to check with the respective art history departments for information regarding your interest in architecture.

Overall, your list seems workable. Ideally, though, you would replace choices you perhaps arrived at in a somewhat aleatory manner with those in which you feel fully confident. You wouldn’t want to mispend your excellent profile due to a lack of research or information at this stage.

3

Also, do you see yourself taking a wide array of courses outside of your major in fields such as classics, philosophy, religious studies, government, literature and history? The answer to this could inform your selection process as much as other major factors.

Regarding urban, at a few of your current choices such as Penn seem to be near the middle of dense urban areas. Others, like the riparian URochester and Tulane, are set further from city centers.

Princeton might be another school to think about.

4

“I live in California and am a US Permanent Resident”

US permanent resident is essentially the same as a US citizen in all respect except one: in addition to being a US permanent resident you also have citizenship somewhere else, which might or might not open up more options, and in some cases more affordable options, outside the US. For schools in the US, permanent resident or citizen is the same thing.

You have very good stats. Congratulations and good work! The next issue to think about is probably affordability. What can you afford for 4 years of university? You need to budget for at least 4 years, and be aware that many students are not done after 4 years (either because they want to consider graduate school, or because for some reason or other they didn’t actually graduate in 4 years). Avoiding debt is always a good thing.

You need to run the NPC for each of the schools on your list and find out what you can afford. You have a lot of very good in-state options in case $250,000 turns out to be a stretch.

5

@DadTwoGirls Thank you very much for your advice! My major focus is definitely staying within the states, since that was one of the reasons my parents moved us here for. Right now, my budget isn’t one of my largest issues, as my parents are helping with my tuition and other costs. The main thing is figuring out which schools would be a fit for me, and if you could provide any insight into how to research colleges, what are some things to look for (apart from cost), etc., that would be great! I will definitely take a look at the costs just to upt things in perspective though.

6

@merc81 Thank you for your input! I’ll look into some of the colleges you recommended.

“You wouldn’t want to misspend your excellent profile due to a lack of research or information at this stage.”

I was wondering if you could expand on the research element. In what manner should I be researching these colleges? Should I be focusing my research on forums, college search websites, or scouring the college’s websites themselves? Sorry if this seems “stupid” to ask.

7

@BCRaven, congratulations on your hard work! When you say the UCs are a reach, you’re just talking about Cal and UCLA, right? I don’t know whether those are considered a true reach for you or not (I am sure other posters with more experience will weigh in), but the other UCs don’t seem to be a reach, especially since it sounds like you are not focused on one of the more difficult majors for admissions.

University of Oregon in Eugene also offers a minor in architecture and it has the Clark Honors College.

8

Forums, college search websites, college websites…the answer is all of the above.

I think most people begin with the basic criteria…

  • Academics - find colleges that have majors/minors in your areas of interest..economics, architecture, etc.
  • Cost - self-explanatory
  • Location - urban, suburban, small town, rural, etc.; East, West, Midwest, South, etc.; in-state vs out-of-state
  • Curriculum - Open, distribution, core; thesis vs no thesis
  • Academic calendar - semester vs quarter
  • Academic culture - pre-professional vs liberal arts; teaching vs research
  • Structure - one college vs many different colleges under one roof
  • Size - self-explanatory
  • Selectivity - self-explanatory

Just rattling off a few examples off the top of my head.

This is the easy part. It’s basically a brute force search on one of the online college search engines.

The more difficult part is to figure out “fit”. For that, you have to read college websites, read forums, read college guide books, and do a lot of self-reflection.

Hopefully, this answers your question to some extent…

9

@Shrmpngrtz Thanks for your insight! This was definitely what I was looking for.

10

@pickledginger Thanks for your response! My college counselor mentioned that since UCs use external readers to go through the applications (due to the large amount), it’s unclear whether or not the reader you get would like your “style” of writing, so all UCs are uncertain for me. Thank you for your suggestion—I"ll look into the University of Oregon :slight_smile:

11

“Right now, my budget isn’t one of my largest issues, as my parents are helping with my tuition and other costs.”

Right now, the most expensive schools in the US cost a bit more than $70,000 per year for everything (but not including travel). By the time that you start university that is likely to be about $75,000 per year. By the time that you graduate it is likely to be about $85,000 per year. If you are certain that you will graduate university in four years (the majority of students don’t), and if your parents can afford a total cost for four years of $320,000, then indeed you don’t have to be concerned about cost.

On the other hand, if you are considering graduate school and don’t want to blow your entire $320,000 budget in four years, or if your total budget is less than this, then you really do need to consider the cost of education.

The vast majority of American students manage to spend significantly less than this, but part of the reason is that they take cost into consideration when thinking about which universities to apply to and which universities to attend.

12

CMC is a great school with a very highly regarded econ program. If you really loved it when you visited, you owe it to yourself to apply. (LACs are a uniquely American educational institution; some Asian immigrant parents–unfamiliar with that tradition–can be reluctant to let their high-achieving kids apply. If that is relevant to your own case, you might consider showing your parents something like the Forbes annual college ranking, in which LACs like Williams and Pomona have often been near or at the top of the list . . . and in which CMC is currently ranked #11, ahead of Cornell, Rice, Northwestern, UCB, UCLA, and every other school on your list except for Stanford and Penn.)

Your combined interest in hospitality and architecture screams “Cornell,” and your summer program there should work to your advantage on a Cornell application. Despite its focus on hospitality, the Hotel School also sends plenty of grads into consulting, banking, and other areas of finance, so–vocationally speaking–it covers some of the same ground that an econ degree would. I think your record would give you a solid chance at Cornell RD, and an excellent chance if you opted for the ED route.

Rice (where my daughter is a student) has an top architecture program and an up-and-coming econ department that has recently undergone significant upgrades in teaching and curriculum. With an enrollment of around 3900, Rice also splits the difference between your preference for a smaller school and your parents’ preference for a university. However, the School of Architecture does not offer a minor, so you would need to double-major across schools (since econ is in the School of Social Sciences). Fortunately, Rice has very flexible distribution requirements (which makes double majoring quite common), so such a move might not be as onerous there as it would be at some other colleges. Good luck!

13

@DadTwoGirls Thank you for your breakdown. Cost is of course a large part of choosing a college, and I appreciate your suggestions in that manner.

14

@MrSamford2014 Thank you for your information on the three schools. My brother is currently attending CMC, so my parents are indeed reluctant to send another child to the consortium. (My brother banning me from following him around and applying to the same college was definitely not taken into account :P) Thank you for your confidence in my Cornell application.

Your information regarding RICE has sparked an interest, and I will look into the double majoring possibilities and new curriculum.

15

Tulane, UT Austin (for OOS) and Rochester have become very competitive in recent years and can’t be considered safeties for any applicant; I would move them up to your matches list. Your other safeties look great, however. This would also even out your matches list since all of the schools listed are definitely high matches.

As for finding schools, this article really helped me and others I know.

http://blog.prepscholar.com/what-colleges-should-i-apply-to