If you’ve been fretting over which standardized test to take, we come to you with good news: it doesn’t matter which test you take! Below you’ll find our tips:
Virtual vs. In Person College Tours
The pandemic has upended nearly every aspect of normal life. The college admissions process is one of them. Finding the college that’s right for you is a very personal experience. One size most definitely does not fit all and figuring out what exactly you’re looking for in a college requires more than just research—it often requires just feeling things out and seeing what your gut says. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), college tours look a little different these days. In this post, we talk about the differences between seeing a campus in person and taking a virtual tour in the time of Covid.
Should I Study For Standardized Tests During My Sophomore Year?
How to Show Demonstrated Interest During Covid
There are a lot of things that are important in the college application. We regularly emphasize the fact that grades are of the utmost importance. In a normal year, tests matter a lot, too. If you want to beat out the competition to a highly competitive school, your essays are going to be key. Then, there are all the ancillary things that add up to help put you over the edge in a very competitive college admissions environment. Demonstrated interest is certainly an ancillary component—in fact, it doesn’t matter all that much but it’s something that parents and students care a lot about. It’s also one component over which you can exert a lot of control.
Best College Major for Extroverts
On Monday, we published a blog post about the best college majors for introverts. Spoiler alert: your personality has absolutely nothing to do with what you study in college! For arguments sake, let’s say that you truly identify as being a very extroverted person. At best, this might influence the kinds of schools that you apply to. You might be looking to attend a big, fun, Greek life-loving college. But what you study? That’s entirely up to you. Keep reading for our tips on how to find the right major:
Best College Majors for Introverts
We’ve been getting emails from our blog readers recently asking about how to choose a major based on your personality type. And while it would be nice if choosing a major was as easy as taking a Buzzfeed quiz about what kind of potato you are, the reality is that your personality has little to no impact on what you should study in college.
Tips for a Stanford Alumni Interview
A lot of our clients and blog readers come to us for advice about interviews. They’re stressful, often hard to come by, and it’s hard to feel truly prepared to speak to someone who once attended your dream school. Below, we compiled a few tips for those students who are preparing for an interview at Stanford:
West Coast "Ivy League Schools"
People often ask us about the other Ivies…you know, those that aren’t in the northeast. The reality is, there actually are none outside of the northeastern region and there are definitely no Ivy League schools on the west coast. That’s because the Ivy League was formed a trillion years ago as a sports league. While the Ivy League wasn’t officially formed until 1954 (though the term was used as early as the ‘30s), most of its partner schools have been around since the colonial period. Harvard has been around since the 17th century. Columbia University (then known as King’s College) awarded degrees to the likes of Alexander Hamilton in 1777, nearly 100 years before California joined the union. While the west coast is devoid of ye old American collegiate institution, there are plenty of ivy-caliber schools to consider checking out:
Best Virtual Internships for High School Students Interested in Politics
If you’re planning on majoring in Political Science, or want to see if you’re genuinely interested in the field, trying to find a remote internship or opportunity for this upcoming summer is a good place to start. There are a lot of offerings on the internet, which is why it’s important to be thorough in your research. Everyone is still working through the transition to virtual opportunities and work, so it’s unlikely that you’ll secure a job that has you knocking on doors and shaking hands with the big wigs. Even still, internships are great ways to get your foot in the door and test out a potential career path.
Best Virtual Internships for High School Students Interested in Economics
Best Virtual Internships for High School Students Interested in Computer Science
Computer Science is a field that lends itself nicely to virtual work. This isn’t to say that finding an opportunity will be completely seamless, but it’s definitely a plus that coding and developing has always been done almost exclusively on a desktop or laptop. In an effort to start your research process, we poked around the internet and found a few links that are worth considering. We haven’t vetted every single opportunity, but click here, here, here, and here to get a feel for what’s out there. You can also look into programs by clicking on this link.
Yale University Transfer Acceptance Rate
Yale is an incredibly hard school to get into. In fact, its acceptance rate is about 6 percent. Transfer rates are notoriously hard to pin down, but a 2017 Yale Daily News article said the transfer rate at Yale was about 2.5 percent. Why is the transfer rate so low, you might ask? Well, very few people leave Yale each year. You see, when a university accepts its freshman class, it doesn’t typically leave spots open for transfer students to join in sophomore year. A school like Yale has high matriculation rates anyway, so they’re really hoping to seal the deal with the 6 percent-or-so of applicants they admit each year. So, if you’re hoping to be in the teeny, tiny fraction of people who does make it in as a transfer, we have some advice for you:
How To Show Intellectual Vitality
It’s no secret that getting into Stanford is incredibly difficult. Despite the lengthy supplement and the tragically low acceptance rate, many of our readers still choose to throw their hat in the ring year after year. If you were to google the holistic admissions process at Stanford, you would come across a section that is titled “Intellectual Vitality.” Here’s what they say:
What Is Intellectual Viability (Stanford)?
Getting into any college these days is much harder than it used to be. But getting into Stanford is like, really hard. Getting in requires, not only excellent grades and a strong resume but foresight and thought regarding your application. If you are really dead-set upon getting into Stanford, you’re going to need to push the envelope.
How to Balance Fun and Function the Summer Before Your Senior Year
Summers are for relaxing, right? That’s what just about every movie or book tells us. Summers are when young people get to relax, let loose, and forget about the stresses that follow them around the other nine months of the year. The problem is, this isn’t really the case anymore. As colleges have become more selective, what they expect of applicants has grown. Nine months isn’t enough time to squeeze it all it, so summer break has become less about letting loose and more about getting something to throw on your resume.
Best Non-Ivy League Schools East Coast
If you’re familiar with our blog, you know by now that we don’t subscribe to the “Ivy League is best” line of thinking. The schools on this list were chosen for various reasons – strong academic programs, heavy research emphasis, and special opportunities. Keep reading for some of our favorites, and we encourage you to do your own research as well!
College Board SAT and SAT2 Updates
On Tuesday of this week, the College Board put out this statement about updates that are being made to the SAT. The release is called “An Update on Reducing and Simplifying Demands on Students,” and it highlights three changes. We’re diving into them below:
8 Best Colleges for Political Science
Students who major in political science study the government, both in theory in practice. The most common tracks are American Politics, International Relations, Political Theory, and Comparative Politics. Below you’ll find eight schools with political science programs that caught our eye. As always, we do not make these lists based on rankings. Instead, we look for special opportunities that might interest our blog readers. Keep reading for our list:
Best Non-Ivy League Schools
It should go without saying that there are tons of great colleges out there. When working with TKG clients, we like to start by assessing academic viability and then move on to metrics like academic programs, location, size, and culture. When you’re open-minded about the college research process, you’ll stumble upon tons of gems that you might have not considered before. Keep reading for a few of our favorites:
Freshman Year of High School Tips
We’ve written before about the three things that you can do as a 9th grader to prepare for college: read, discover your interests, and maybe take an SAT II. While these are all true, we wanted to expand a bit upon what 9th grade really means within the context of your college application and perhaps reframe your thinking on your freshman year.