Creating Your College List

As you determine your list of colleges where you would like to apply, it is important to keep a few things in mind...

1. You will only be attending 1 college next year.  

2. College is a match to be made not a prize to be won.

3. There are no absolute guarantees, but there is a LOT of data available that can inform your decisions.

4. You should only apply to colleges where you would actually WANT to attend.

Applying to tons of colleges "just because" or "just to see what happens" is not a good strategy.  It wastes your time and the college admissions reps time if this is a college where you will never plan on attending.  Additionally, if you feel like you need to apply to countless colleges it is usually a sign that you're not really sure what you're looking for in a college and so it might be a good point to pause and really reflect on what you're looking for in a college.

When we talk about creating a college list, you will often hear us (and lots of other college admissions representatives) talking about making a list that includes Reach, Likely/ Target/ Match, and Safety schools.  So I want to talk to you a little bit about this because I know it can be confusing to students and parents.  (For this blog post I am going to use the term "Likely" schools.  You may also hear people call this "Match" or "Target" schools.)

When you are trying to decide if a college is a reach, safety, or likely school, you will want to first look at your own information.  What is your grade point average?  What are your test scores?  How rigorous of an academic course load have you selected each year in high school?  Then, when you have a pretty good idea of what YOUR application profile would look like it is time to look at the college websites and look at their accepted student data and compare to see how you match up.

A safety school would be a college where you are ABOVE their criteria of what they have been accepting for admission.  These are often (although not always) colleges where students will get the most money for scholarships as well because they want to entice you to come to their school and therefore they will make it an attractive financial option for you.

A likely school would be a college where you are solidly right in the mix of their accepted student profile.  It is most likely that you will be attending a likely school.  That is why they are also called a target school or a match school.  This is where you should really be focusing your college applications.  Schools where you are more likely to get accepted and that you would be right in the mix academically with all of your peers.  Why does that matter?  Well, it means that you'll be able to have a balance in college of a social life along with school as opposed to needing to study 24/7 if you are in a school where you're struggling to stay afloat academically.

A reach school would be any college with less than a 33% acceptance rate and/ or a school where you are on the lower side of their accepted student data.  Now, let's pause for a moment and think about this. If you are sitting with a very respectable 3.7 GPA and the college you are looking at has an 8% overall acceptance rate and their average GPA is at or above a 4.0 GPA, you really need to decide WHY you are applying to this college.  Are you going to be ok getting a rejection from that school?  Because statistically speaking, you are not going to get into this college which is why, if you choose to apply there, it would be considered a reach school.  There are different levels of reach colleges.  If you are applying to that same school with an 8% acceptance rate and your GPA is above a 4.0 it is still a reach, but it makes far more sense that you'd be a viable candidate for admission.  When you are getting ready to fill out all of those applications, having a hard, honest conversation with yourself can help make sure you are prepared for any heartache that might come this spring as admissions decisions are released.

Sometimes students will ask me if they HAVE to apply to a safety school and my answer is no.  Just like students do NOT need to apply to a reach school either.  In fact, there are plenty of students who will apply to just 1 college.  This is often the case for students who plan to start at Columbus State.  We often see students applying to just 1 college if they know they want to go to OSU no matter what and will be happy at a branch or at main campus.  And I also have had many students apply to just 1 college if their top choice school utilizes rolling admissions because they can apply now, have a decision back in a few weeks and know if they need to keep applying to other colleges or if they can be done with their applications after getting that first decision back.

As a general rule of thumb, you are probably applying to anywhere from 3-7 colleges.  If you are needing help narrowing down your college application list, feel free to stop and see me so we can talk through your intended colleges.  With all of the college application fees, it will save you a lot of money and a great deal of time if you narrow down your college list.