With college applications looming on the horizon, many rising high school seniors are feeling the pressure to figure out in the next few months, not only where they want to study, but what they want to study.  This choice, many believe, will determine the path of the rest of their lives.  That’s a weighty burden for a 17-year-old student to bear, and some may wonder if all this stress is really necessary.  Find out from former Barnard and Whittier College admissions officer, Mary Sue Youn, in this installment of the College Coach video series, Ask the College Admissions Expert. Mary Sue answers the burning question on the minds of rising seniors and their parents, “Is It Okay To Apply To College With An Undecided Major?”

Once upon a time, a boy in my middle school Math League questioned why I was a member because “girls weren’t really good at math anyway.” The remark stung and happened to coincide with my own self-doubts. Although I had always been a very strong math student, I was struggling with that particular unit of 8^th grade Algebra. I really questioned whether to go to the next Math League meeting.

I hadn’t thought much about that moment since then, until my own daughter, at age 13, came home with a similar story after attending a tech club meeting. I would have thought we had progressed more in thirty years, but apparently not.

For many parents of middle schoolers, the transition to the often bigger high school can seem overwhelming. There are so many curriculum choices and students are often given more independence in their course selection. College applications require a student’s transcript to display grades since the ninth grade, so the choices they make now may have an impact on their later opportunities. Here are a few of our tips to help your child make a smooth and seamless transition to their next school:

As a Senior Associate Director in the Barnard admissions office for eight years, I had the privilege of reading the college application essays of many wonderful Barnard applicants. Those that stood out had a fantastic sense of self, and were able to convey their personality through writing. It truly is a special community where women are encouraged to reach their potential. When writing your Barnard supplemental essays, it’s important to keep these ideas in mind. Here are the essay prompts for this year’s Barnard supplement with some of my thoughts on answering them:

If you are a student struggling with clinical depression in high school, it can be tough to know how to broach the subject of mental illness with prospective colleges. Should I ask questions about counseling when I visit? Should I write my essay about my treatment for depression? Will sharing my mental illness cause a college to immediately deny my application?

In our last blog post, Using Naviance: How to Get Organized, we discussed how to get started with Naviance. This installment focuses on how to best utilize the program.

Naviance is a powerful web-based tool that many high school guidance offices use as a way to organize and inform their students about the college process. The program can help you search for colleges by location, major, size, and so much more. It can show you when deadlines are for every college, and which application type the school prefers. It can also show you if you are academically in the right range for a college. If you are a senior, it may also be the way you request transcripts and recommendation letters from your school and teachers.

In my last blog post, I reviewed the pros and cons of applying to accelerated BA/MD programs. If you’ve decided an accelerated medical program is a good fit for your educational goals, let’s move next to what the programs are looking for from successful applicants.

Have you always known you wanted to be a doctor? Maybe you have always been fascinated by medicine, or perhaps this is a more recent but intense interest. As you begin your college search, you may become interested in an accelerated medical program where you apply in high school and could be admitted to a seven- or eight-year track to obtain both your Bachelor’s degree and your Doctorate in Medicine. But is this type of program the right fit for you?

Middle school is an important transition time for students between childhood and the teen years, and yet it fills so many parents with dread. Many questions arise, like: What do I concentrate on now that my kids are older? What do they need to do now to get into a “good” college later? What’s the balance between hovering over them and letting them try and possibly fail?

While middle school is too early to truly start the college admissions process, there are a few skills that can make great advances during those tween years: