Why engage the services of a private college consultant?

Independent college consultants are

• Available. Consultants aren’t tied to a school, a school district, or a school calendar. They work with students in the immediate neighborhood or across the world thanks to readily available technology. Not surprisingly, consultants do much of their most important work over the summer months getting seniors ready for the admissions process, and many work long weekend and evening hours. Lee Academia's experts worked 24-7 for the past 10 years, and have never complained about their hours, as their dedication to work with students always comes first.
  

• Responsive. It’s part of the business model. Consultants have to respond promptly to emails, phone calls and other forms of inquiry or they’re quickly out of business. Deadlines are everything in the world of college admissions and no one is more aware of time constraints and the need for immediacy than independent educational consultants.

• Knowledgeable. Consultants spend significant time visiting college campuses and attending professional workshops or conferences. It’s no secret that colleges have different personalities and management practices. But it’s virtually impossible to get a feel for these personalities or keep up with changes in programs and facilities without visiting on a regular basis. Lee Academia's experts visit over 80 schools each year to update their knowledge about campuses firsthand, despite the availability o
  

• Credentialed. Reputable independent educational consultants maintain memberships in organizations such as the National Association of College Admissions Counselors (NACAC) or local NACAC affiliates—each of which sets individual membership requirements demanding years of specialized experience, education and training, and a firm commitment to continuing education.

• Ethical. As members of the above-mentioned organizations, consultants subscribe to specific Principles of Good Practice governing the actions of consultants in their relationships with students and families, schools and colleges, and with colleagues.

• Parent-recommended. Anyone in the consulting business will tell you no amount of marketing will ever bring in as many clients as simple word-of-mouth. Informal surveys of educational consultants suggest that as many as 90 percent of families seeking college consulting services are referred by other families. The best consultants are well-known in the community and are respected for the service they provide. It’s as simple as that. So ask to speak with our satisfied clients and former students or check out the Testimonials.
  

Contributed by Douglas Lee, Case Western Reserve (Class of 2016)

• Get a job

This piece of advice may sound tired and you’ve probably heard it too many times, but there is really no better way of learning financial independence than through this experience. It helps keep you accountable for your spending and also helps you develop professional skills.


Finding a job is easier than you may think. Across the campus, there are many departments, labs, and other outlets looking for students for work. Try to find a job that suits you and one you can work up to 10-12 hours a week. It is awfully grueling to work 20+ hours a week while also handling a full course load.

Also, remember to be a good employee. Work hard in your position, and especially in internships/research jobs. These first experiences may lead to full time jobs after graduation. Later on, it’s often who you know, not what you know.

• Open a banking account

Now, with all your hard earned money from your campus job, what are you going to do with it? You should open a banking account with a debit card to store all that money so you don’t have those Benjamins just lying around! Having a debit card may help curb your temptations and impulses because you can only spend what’s in your account.

Try opening a bank that is local to your college town. You may have already opened a bank account back home, but if there aren’t many branches or ATMs around your campus, that account won’t do you much good. 

• Learn to work with a budget

Great, with a well-paying campus job and a bank account to store those $9.50/hour wages, the next step is to set up a monthly budget for yourself. Set up a monthly and weekly budget and keep track of your spending. It is very easy to lose track of your spending, with weekend outings with friends, local concerts, and great restaurants tempting you to empty your wallet.

You don’t necessarily have to spend money to have fun in college. Be on the lookout for campus activities / economical outings that your school provides.

• Make sure your financial aid is in check

Remember to keep track of deadlines and paperwork to hand in. Your financial aid may decrease substantially if you miss those important due dates. You don’t want to lose your chance at those tens of thousands of dollars that you have already been awarded just because you forgot about a deadline. Also, you may not get to register for classes in time, which only leads to disaster.

You never want to be in a rush for these financial aid matters because mistakes can be made in these situations, so make sure to be prepared.

• Apply for scholarships

This last tip may seem the most intimidating for students who have never applied for scholarships before. There are thousands of scholarships out there and they can range from a couple hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars. Don’t disregard the scholarships with smaller awards, as those will be easier to attain since they have a smaller applicant pool.

Hey, getting $500 for writing an essay about a random topic, or spending a little time to fill out an application and including a resume to earn a thousand big ones sounds

*For any Financial Aid Assistance, contact FAConsultant_Elisa@gmail.com.

Follow our very own, Stephenie, on the Homeschool website, as a guest blogger this week at Educational Adventures. In the article blog titled, "Technically Homeschooled," Stephenie shares what it was like growing up in two diverse cultures, and becoming the Educator that she is today; with the drive to keep learning and educating herself. "With my mother’s sacrifices and encouragement in education and learning, I have technically homeschooled myself in many ways."

I know most students are preparing for their midterms right now. Getting ready for these exams do not need to be a painful process. Being a great test-taker is about learning how to maximize your time, so start planning now!  Just a little bit of extra preparation will help you learn and retain more for test day.  Read on and good luck!

1. Make the TIME to study

• Count forward from the day the study guide or questions are handed out to the day of the test to put your plan into effect.  
• Schedule every hour of every day of your study plan, including breaks. What matters is setting clear and realistic goals for the hours of time that you do set aside for studying.  Also, remember to set aside time for social networking and gaming (they don’t mix well with study time).
• Draft your study plan 3-4 weeks before the test.  It’s hard and takes practiced discipline over time.  Meanwhile,  it’s important to account for lost time by making a plan now.   If you have to shed unnecessary commitments in order to create more hours for studying, this is the time.

2. Use the TIME wisely

• Prioritize your study hours.  If you are better at a certain subject or you know that one final is going to be easier than another, then you can spend more time on the class that you slept through half of. Also, make sure to take breaks and rewards in the form of snacks and exercise, which will help you stay motivated and keep your mind fresh.
• Clarify the content and format of your finals.  Will it focus on material taught since the midterm or will it be comprehensive or cumulative (meaning on everything taught since the first day of school)?  Will it be comprised of short-answer, essay, or multiple-choice questions?  A combination of these? Knowing this info will help you set goals in your study calendar.
• Take advantage of study guides, review sessions, and your own notes.  If your teacher holds extra review sessions, go! They will often drop clues and hints to what might appear on the exams, or use certain examples over and over again in a study guide. Most importantly, though, figure out how you study best.  Try rewriting or summarizing your notes and/or the chapter instead of just re-reading them.

3.      Apply the TIME well on the test

• Get a good night’s sleep.   Sleep reinforces memory and cognitive retention, so whatever you are staying up cramming for is going to end up competing with your brain’s fatigue on the day of the test.  Overdoing it on caffeine and energy drinks can only make the situation worse, so try to naturally energize yourself instead.
• Develop your answers fully.  This is especially important if your teacher allows you to have a cheat sheet or notes on your final.  Pretend you are writing for someone that knows NOTHING about the topic. 
  
• Stay until the bitter end.  Proofread your answers or add extra details to your essay or short answers.  Teachers notice when you make an extra effort! Just becareful and trust your gut before you switch answers around.
  

With just a little bit of time on your side, you will surprise yourself with how much you know and retain for test day. Your formula for finals success is easy: TIME x 3!

• Read, read, read! (novels, not comics)
• Get a set of flash cards (SAT/ACT Vocabulary) and start on them early.
• Read the newspaper.
• Visit a news website such as NY Times, CNN and read the top stories.
• Do crossword puzzles.
• Write in a journal or as much as possible.
• Solve logic puzzles.
• Answer the SAT question of the day on-line.
• Take the practice tests offered on-line or at your school .

When it comes to college admissions, there are three pieces to the puzzle: your academic record, your personal record, and your standardized test scores.

The first two parts take years or even a lifetime to build, the third part represents just a few hours of a Saturday morning. And did you know that since March 2009, College Board's new policy allowed students to pick which scores a college sees, giving you even more control over how your scores are perceived?

Some say that preparation doesn't really make a major difference and recommends students take the SAT only once or twice. But many people still believe there are strategies you can use to outsmart the SAT, particularly with the new score reporting policy. Here are the four tips these people cite most often:

Make a calendar and start early
The PSAT can be taken as early as freshman year. Students can start taking the SAT as early as sophomore year. Map out a plan by looking at the College Board's test dates, and then check your academic calendar and extracurricular schedule. Don't take the SAT the same week as your midterms. Next, plot out a week-by-week schedule where you review a lesson on a specific topic each week and do targeted practice in Math, Reading and Writing.

Practice, practice, practice
Use real SAT questions to practice your weaker topics.

Stage a dress rehearsal and keep taking the SAT
Lee Academia suggests taking a monthly practice test in realistic, timed conditions on a Saturday morning. Don't take the practice test in a quiet room at home—go to somewhere where there is ambient noise so that you'll practice with distractions. This way, when you go to the real test center, it will seem more familiar.

Students raise their scores by an average of only 40 points on the second test. But if you have a very large sample—say, 10 tests —there is a good likelihood that one of those tests will be an outlier—that a particular test will fall on the high end of the test range. The test is an approximation, affected by many factors: whether the students happen to get more questions on topics they handle better, whether they guess better, whether they are more seasoned test takers, whether they got enough sleep and food, and the general testing conditions.

Apply only to schools that let you select which SAT scores you report
Under the new policy, some colleges may still require applicants to submit all test-taking attempts. If you take the SAT 15 times (which you shouldn't do), apply just to schools that let you hide your scores. If students band together in applying only to schools that let them hide their scores, that will put pressure on schools to give in to the score-choice policy.

It is PSAT time again.  If you haven't already heard from your school's guidance counselor, you should soon because students will register for and take the PSAT at their high school.


For many high school juniors the PSAT is a practice SAT, an opportunity to take an official test under timed conditions.  But for top test takers the PSAT can mean big money in National Merit Scholarship recognition.

Most schools have had a chance to distribute PSAT scores from last October’s test.  Here are some ideas of how you can get these numbers to work for you.

Juniors
Your PSAT scores will not be sent to colleges or used for admissions purposes, so use your scores to identify strengths and weaknesses prior to taking the SAT this spring.

Sophomores
You want to prepare for next year’s PSAT, especially if your current score is over 170 because with practice, you may be able to qualify for National Merit recognition in your state.

Below are the most common areas for improvement:

1. Reading.  50% of your PSAT reading is based on knowledge of college-bound vocabulary.  You don’t need to study the dictionary, but focusing on frequently used words will help.  Lee Academics offers a vocabulary program because there is such a need for vocabulary improvement for every student.
   
2. Too Many Wrong Answers.  Unlike school, answering 100% of the questions on the PSAT and SAT can hurt you.  Wrong answers subtract points from your score, so you want to find the right balance between answering questions correctly and leaving the impossible questions blank.
3. Math.  PSAT math is different from math tests at school.  Review your test and see if you are able to solve more questions correctly.  Practicing with questions, such as Lee Academics' SAT Questions of the Week from the E-Newsletters, can help make SAT-style questions more familiar.
4. Not Enough Time.  If you ran out of time and left a considerable number of questions blank, you can benefit from taking practice tests and familiarizing yourself with the exam.  Keep in mind, unless you are attempting to score 650 or above (65 on the PSAT) in a section, part of your SAT strategy will be leaving some questions blank.
5. Writing.  PSAT Writing is 100% multiple-choice grammar.  If your score is lower than you’d like, try additional practice and a review of basic grammar.  (Hint:  on the PSAT / SAT you can’t rely on how a sentence sounds.  They create errors that “sound good” and correct sentences that sound terrible.)

Finally, use your PSAT results to set your expectations and future goals.  If you are not a great test-taker, you probably aren’t shocked by less than perfect results.  Try to match your PSAT scores to colleges that interest you and see how much you may need to improve.