Attending college, especially an elite school, is a huge investment of both time and money. Therefore, planning for college should take place long before one’s junior or senior year in high school. You want to make certain that you chose a school that is a good match and that you have done everything necessary to get accepted and to be prepared for the experience. There are aids available to help with this process. Here are a few.

 

College Planning for Gifted Students: Choosing and Getting Into the Right College, by Sandra Berger. provides a hands-on, practical guide to college planning. The book’s author focuses on helping gifted students match self-awareness to the right postsecondary experience. She also provides practical advice for writing college application essays, requesting recommendation letters, visiting colleges, and preparing for the college entrance interview.

 

Imagine Magazine is published by Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth. The magazine is geared toward gifted students in grades 7-12. Each issue is theme oriented and also offers advice on planning for college, student reviews of selective colleges, and profiles of fascinating careers. By reading the college reviews, students get a sense whether their particular intellectual and social styles will be a good match with each school. Many of the career profiles go way beyond the traditional careers one has come to expect (i.e., SeaWorld veterinarian, forensic paleontologist, and medical anthropologist).

 

Counselor-O-Matic is an advanced search engine sponsored by The Princeton Review. It combines your academic and extracurricular history with your preferences to help you find the right college.

 

If you want to have the greatest number of opportunities for your post-secondary education, you should start learning as much as possible about the process by grade 7.