College Application Season: A Stress Survival Guide
College applications are quickly approaching for the class of 2023, and many juniors feel that preliminary college-app stress that we’ve all heard seniors complaining about. With their complaints of heavy workloads and high stress levels still fresh on our minds, many wonder how we can possibly survive this dreaded stage of highschool: college app season.
With advice from Kimiko Sera-Tacorda, a former admissions officer, and Mark Van Warmerdam, an Athenian college counselor, we tackle the issues that past seniors have faced during the application process to learn from their experiences going forward. Here is a guide to lessening that burden and making the process easier on yourself.
How can my application reflect who I am?
Kimiko: Ask yourself: what do they want to hear from me? You’re not doing it for them, what do you have to say for yourself?
How do I know which colleges are worth applying to?
Mark: A part of our conversation is, we get to know students and talk to them about their interests and their goals and aspirations. Compiling that with our information and the data that we have about colleges, [we] provide suggestions and help students broaden their search. There’s definitely a large amount of it that falls on the student to do the research and the exploration to see what works for them and what they’re interested in. We also do our best to keep a pulse on what’s happening in admissions to use that information to help students understand or estimate the likelihood of admissions.
What are colleges looking for?
Kimiko: Depth of involve-ment and a true passion will show up in your writing, and that is much more meaningful than a big laundry list of activities. I would extend that to be true for classes. They want you to absolutely push yourself to do your best, but that you’re doing something that interests you.
One senior brought up a concern about the difference between college essay style and the way students are taught how to write in school. How can students write good college essays?
Kimiko: We write reflections —that’s what they’re looking for, to be reflective. You do have more practice than you think. Reflect on college apps about what your passions are.
How can a non-humanities student approach college essays?
Kimiko: Everyone has to be a good writer and communicator. Colleges aren’t shifting their expectations based on your interests. There’s a sense of being sincere: that doesn’t mean that as a science person you can’t talk about your passions, your passions are just different. Tell a story, no matter if you consider yourself humanities or science. We are all human and we are all storytellers.
In a senior survey, over a third of mentioned difficulties balancing school work and college apps. How would you suggest seniors find this balance?
Kimiko: Seniors should have most of the college applications done by the time school starts. Most of that work you can do over the summer when you have less stress and your brain is free to write well. When you’re trying to balance all the other due dates, it’s a lot harder.
Mark: We’re really trying to encourage students to begin early, so leading into senior year, a lot of the foundational work has been completed already. What tends to happen is that students don’t make spring a priority to make progress on the process because it’s not a it’s not an immediate deadline, and that’s when it becomes stressful in fall of senior year.
How can deadline-driven students keep on track?
Kimiko: Use the resources you have—ask teachers for extensions, if you have to. Plan out the week before based on the Canvas agendas. If you care about it, you should plan for it.
Mark: We are providing, particularly through the Canvas now with target deadline dates for the different items to complete. And so sticking to that structure, and making a commitment to that, and building time to do that work into their schedule. A little bit of time every week will allow them to make a significant amount of progress that will benefit them down the road.
How would you suggest a student resolve differing wants and expectations with parents?
Mark: We encourage open communication both ways, between students and parents. A common way to do that is to set up a designated time to talk about the college process. This is about [the student’s] next steps and their college experience. In many cases, if the student can put forward a strong argument, and make a case for what they want, why they want it, and how they’re going to go about doing it, most parents are going to be receptive to that. We’re happy to be part of that conversation at the family meetings or additional meetings if it’s helpful to try and facilitate that communication in any way that we can.
What if there’s a lack of communication between the student and their college counselor?
Mark: We’re sending out a lot of information. We do our best to be available, approachable, and accessible to students. I encourage them to reach out to us if they have any questions or if they have any needs that they feel aren’t being met.
What would you say to students who find the process especially arduous?
Mark: It depends a lot on how you approach it. There is a lot of work to do but if you plan and manage that in an effective way that can help minimize some of that stress around the workload. If students approach that in a realistic manner and if they’re open to a broader range of possibilities, that’s going to help them. Knowing that there are lots of great options out there can make it a much less stressful process.
If you had to give incoming applicants one piece of advice, what would it be?
Mark: Start the process by being self reflective, and thinking about what’s important in their college experience. Continually ground themselves in that, and not in all the other noise that goes around the college process.
Kimiko: Plan and start early. As for essays, tell your story.
