Its that time of year again, let me give you a clue...
Bells are ringing, carollers are singing, buildings are being decorated with red and green and if you live in the north, there are snow men are being built and snow fights are taking place every place you look.
What time of the year is it? Yup, you guessed it!
College Applications time!!
What do you have to do?
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Take the SAT and SAT II
You should have taken the SAT by now, if not, you can still take it on December or January. Some universities require you take the SAT II. To register, or learn more about what the SATs and and when you can take them, visit College Board.
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Search for Universities and Colleges you might be interested in.
You can complete this search online, a list of links can be found at the bottom of the page. You can also talk to your College Councillor. If you are already interested in a particular college or university, try and visit them at their campus or at their website.
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Talk
to your parents or legal guardians about your plans
Your parent are just as concerned about your future as you are, and they may already have some plans for you. You need to know how far away from home your parents will allow you to go study, or what their opinion is about your major (they do know you quite well) and how much money they can spend on your college tuition.
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Visit your college counsellor for advice
Once you have most of your thoughts in order, you will need to talk to your college counsellor to make sure you are not missing anything out and to get any tips or advice he/she can help you with such as Financial Aid or do's and don'ts about writing the essay.
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Decide on roughly six colleges.
My college counsellor advised I applied to six colleges. From these six, two of them have to be safe schools, colleges I'm certain I'll get accepted. Two other colleges in which there's about a 50% to 75% change I get accepted, and finally two top colleges that might not accept me, but that I really wish to go to.
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Write your essays, collect recommendation letters and anything else that your colleges might ask you for.
Each college or university has different rules. You need to find out early, what your college asks for and make sure you have enough time to complete it all.
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Send the applications early, before the deadline.
Early admission deadline is roughly in November and Regular admission deadline is roughly in February. Find out exactly when the deadline is for the schools you are applying to and try to apply early to avoid any last minute problems.
But how exactly can you manage to do all this?
1) Write down important dates on your calendar or agenda
2) Make a time table to organize your activities during the day or during the week.
Examples Click on the thumbnail to enlarge
Calendar
Time Table
MS Outlook
MS Excel
You can find more detailed notes on how to manage your applications and much more at:
Useful SAT and University Information websites