How to select colleges?

<p>I am a sophomore in high school about to finish my first semester and my parents want me to start looking at colleges. So far I have many ECs in music, Boy Scouts (many leadership positions), tutoring kids, Key club (president for 2 years), NHS (treasurer/secretary 9th grade and Historian 10th grade), Science Olympiad (not in 9th grade, president 10th grade), youth group (many leadership positions), ASB (student board representative 9th grade and Vice President 10th grade). I play golf casually but the reason I can't be involved in sports is because I got my 3rd concussion the beginning of freshman year. Also, the reason I hold so many leadership positions is because my high school is a new school and I am in the first graduating class, allowing me to help build the foundation of many of these clubs. In school I have received a 4.0 all throughout high school and this year I am taking a class at my local community college, with more to come in future years. I have not taken the SAT yet but I did take the PSAT last month and I will receive the scores in December. I am really interested in finance/economics, in addition to Computer Science. I have a list of roughly 30 colleges ranging from Ivy League schools down to small local universities. Should I be focusing my time on top level schools? I want to take trips to see some top colleges, but I don't want to waste my parents time and money flying around the country looking at schools out of my range. How should I go about narrowing down my list?</p>

<p>Bump…</p>

<p>Take the ACT and SAT to narrow down your list. If you get 2000+/30+, you can start thinking about top schools.</p>

<p>My advice is not to match schools to your scores and ECs yet. You can do that to figure out safety schools in the summer before Senior year. You should think about what you want to do, and then figure out which schools offer the best in that area, and then also research into the schools (visit them preferably or talk to alumni) to figure out which ones you want to go to. Then look at what the school wants and work towards that.</p>