a senior here at p c h us today we're going to be discussing my experience applying to college i've gone through the process myself and know just how difficult it can be so what was the first step you took in applying for college first i visited every colors i want to apply to i went there i met with some professors and discuss fafsa and everything that you have to go through to go to college so the school you're looking at they have anything particular that you like about one more than the other yes i visit a few first time to clemson and south carolina it's very warm there loved it and they had programs where you get free tutoring and i know the very best beneficial for many students including myself and i was a big factor about going there getting free tutoring help with math and any other subjects i need to pursue my career and then i visited silver rock and kent state around here and i also like those schools as well i would probably stay around here comes a little far for me you'll be more beneficial for you to stay here so that you could come back and forth so hones totally agree that i should be here by him because i don't think my freshman year should go far so with applying to college in your applications did you get a lot of help from counselors they helped me do my common application and the other essays that i had read for college so when you were putting your resume together was there anything that you really wanted colleges to notice about you and set you apart from other candidates well i wanted to put things down that were different about me so i wrote about things i did at my church and a lot of things i'm on the dance team at our high school so i did a lot of things that i did in the community with dance and fundraisers and i also put down just about my family and personally as well in your college essay did you write any of those things that were on your resume yes i wrote about work and how work has changed me to put me in a new place to mature me to go into the new world in like the workforce did you  in your college in the future do you plan on dancing or working or anything like that i think that after my freshman year i would definitely dance because i love dance and that's all amazing if you could be on a high school team to go to college nationals is so fun but i think my freshman year i would take off just to get used to college and everything i think every student needs like a little bit of time to just get in the groove of things so that you apply undecided or you have a clear major when you applied well for some school i applied undecided because they did not have my major i think i want to go into special education in elementary school so i applied to some schools and that major but i'm still on the edge i don't know one hundred percent so for the schools that don't have your major is that a deciding factor for you or you're not really sure yet i'm not sure yet because some school i didn't visit yet and i don't know one hundred percent of i'm going to do special education so it's really if i go visit i like it and see what made you want to go in a special education where my mother is a special education teacher and i'd like to see her over the years do all that and i really enjoy and i like helping people that's good so using your mother's had like a strong influence on what you want to do doctor helping a lot through high school and i just want to pursue which he does well so in your transition to college next year one of the things you most nervous about on well first of all probably finding a roommate i know you can go into chat rooms on facebook and find out different people that are have the same interests as you and you can chat with them figured out i'll probably balancing school work and if i do decide to dance later in college probably that because a lot of work i know they have open study hall the stuff you can take so i'll be probably taking a lot of those do things the things you are doing right now like dance or stuff like that are going to help you in the future balance your activities yes i work dance and do school obviously so i'm busy every day of the week but i thought time to balance school work and dance and i think working really really is a good idea for high school students to do because it lets you have a field like controlling your own money and like really feeling well whenever you get your own money and then you can spend that sort of like pair spending your parents money really gives you a feel for how you going to be when you're an adult so going back to college roommates would you like a roommate in your major already not really care to someone you have similarities with i think that i would like one of my major i know whenever i visited comes in they had buildings and buildings and dorms for each major that they had and you could be like if you're a nurse there's a nursing building if you're engineers engineering building and then they all have study hall and they work together and help each other out they have any questions they can always go to each other and how we got or i'll do things that with a roommate that it's important maybe for someone you similarly know or a friend or do you want on the you don't know at all i think i'll be fine with either i know some people say that they won't get along with their friend if they're roommates with them i don't think i've personally would have a problem but i think it's personal preference that's like a lot of aspects of college is like what you personally believe not what your friends are doing have you started looking for a roommate and any of those facebook chats or anything like that i've joined a few but i don't really know if i'm which cotton picking to like  on the edge so coming down the line a little bit was a meteor deciding factors for each of the schools probably my major and which school bus has my major slippery rock has a rare event a good education program along with duquesne my mom went to duquesne she said she loved education program so probably whatever has the best fit for me in my major i'll probably go there slippery rock whenever i went there they told me all about how if you go there for special education in elementary school education they'll send you out into the field after like your first few months of classes you can go to schools help student teach and personally for me i don't like sitting like all day i like to go out and do things so i'll probably be out there doing not have your counselors help do it all make these decisions are going to go and talk to them or anything like that yes i've had multiple meetings with my counselors they have helped me tremendously with everything they've sent my transcripts and everything i've talked with them and they're helping out with my best interests in mind so i know it's common in a lot of schools to do an overnight to kind of get a feel of the campus have you done any of those have not done any overnight yet because i'm still deciding on a few schools so once i have a set one in mind i definitely will go do that and once i commit so on each of the campuses what was the thing that you are you kind of going for what it looks like or how it feels  definitely like the feeling of it i think because it doesn't really matter or looks like it's like you visit a place and if you your personal preference if you think that's right for you it's right for you like i love slippery rock when i visited there it was such a good feel the campus i ran was so nice and i think you have to really feel that in a place where you're going to go if you go and you're like i don't really like this i really like this like and other people would say so your mom's like oh you go there you go there like don't go there just because of that go where you want to go personally and whatever's best for you in your major so you said the people on rock are really friendly do you think that's important that you have like an automatic click with a view on the campus i think so personally i really believe that you should enjoy where you're going if you're going to go somewhere and you can always switch you can always switch we're going to college if you don't if you really don't like it that much i have a friend who's switching colleges she didn't like to school she was and it's easy transition they transition over all your raid and everything so i think that you should just really like we're going but if you don't i mean you can always change it isn't important you said  with a friend but is it important to you that you would know a couple people there do you not care about that at all i think would be nice to know but if not you can always make friends so what is a high school done for you that use the sides like we are to talk about work in dance that has prepared you for school like writing classes anything like that definitely and bush has helped me with all of my college essays english teachers they're amazing here they've really taught me how to correctly write an essay and use big words and stand out and write about things that are different  just what everyone else is writing about say like everyone's like writing about sports or whatever i chose to write about work and how work is the chore to me to be an adult and i think you should write about stuff in your college essays that help you stand out in the english teachers here the high school really really helped me information and you can send it out to whatever school you like not all of them are on the common app that a lot of a lot of schools are that i've led to the most are so when you were doing your common app how early did you start so you said a couple weeks before ok i definitely did a few weeks would you recommend people doing a little more time a little less i know a lot of students are their junior year i started my senior year summer going into senior year definitely started your new year a sort of a little bit later but i've haven't really had any problems with a pretty smooth  that did you have any questions you just go to the guidance office and ask them if you have any questions p t a just guidance office will definitely help you with anything you need in your common app sending your transcripts letters a wreck they can put those in an audience and your teachers can just so i just made a list write it down went to the guidance office my counselor helped me we wrote down everything i introduce she said i wanted i would finish all the other stuff i didn't get done yet and then everything just worked out so you'd applied early decision the school because you've already he so you've heard back from everyone yes then you have until may first of side so in these last months do you think that you're going to do anything different or is your mind changed a little bit to think about where you want to go i think that i need to visit a few more schools and seek out wh programs i would like to visit and talk to professors i know a lot of colleges do that you can go in meet with a professor they can tell you everything they were on the class if you like there's a big huge meeting halls they have meetings with all the students talk about all different kinds of their majors you can talk with them individually and they tell you all about their class i don't know some people have preference on big school small school what how do you feel about that like classroom size i think that classroom size definitely depends on the person i think that a lot of students do better in a smaller classroom because it's more one on one with a professor and sort of a huge room with a professor on the screen and i need the face to face talk and they so they can really really help you out so when you visited these colleges have you made sure to ask those questions about some of the best minds in america are doing more than imagining american brain foundation seeking 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more about protecting your family go to prevent very grateful to have her here to get her perspective on college thank you for joining us today mattie you're welcome thank you for having me i was just going to ask you what is the most important thing that you're doing right now as a senior to prepare to prepare you for your transfer into college ok that's a good question because there's a lot of things that you could do to prepare but i think the most important one is honestly keeping your grades up because it's really hard to see near enough motivation to keep your grades like in a good range because like obviously  was committed to ohio state so and i'm sure like others other seniors are committed to but just like having the provision to keep your grades up time management just like finding like a good balance between like having fun senior year and also like getting down to business and getting your work done yes is there a specific like g p a or anything that you have to keep like as a senior or does it depend on the school i don't want to brag or anything but i personally i haven't gotten a b in high school yet so i've had a four point zero g p a like this this entire time and honestly i've been cutting myself a little bit of slack this year and i got to be the first quarter but i feel like that's a person like ok can see it again like if you're committed to a college you don't necessarily have to like keep like perfect grades i just would let myself fall too far down so i keeping the time management the same and like making sure that like your grades are like ok so ok think i heard that there's like some colleges that they require a certain g p a throughout senior year even after you've committed is that the case for it it's definitely different for every call to not necessarily sure i'm pretty for ohio state they didn't say to have a certain  get into a specific college that you wanted to do this personally i would suggest taking honors classes and a p classes if you want to get in like a good school this year i took eight pieces to six because i knew i'm a marketing major so i would need that for like my major personally and also like calculus i took that because it's important in the business world just like classes like that pertain to your major so if you're like an art major take there are classes that you need but don't push yourself too far because like you would one to be taking like killing yourself senior year when you don't need to ok did you do anything to help you out like to prepare you for going into your major for college on a team with kareena stole an alley when ok and we took the marketing test that was like for states like to qualify for states and we actually like got first the first place excited it was really good and i really felt like it helped me from a marketing major because you have like a study guide that you had to study  other terms certain terms and everything and it was good like interact with like other people that like had the same like business interest as as me so i would suggest like if you're going it like whatever major going to or what your interests are go and like clubs or like extra curricular activities like what have the same do you plan to continue like taking maybe is there a club like that at your college or there are like i i was looking because i mean it once you know where you're going that you it's like specific so like ohio state has over a thousand clubs i'm pretty sure which is like insane but there is a business club and like there's also not like that necessarily going to do this but they're like a business for tardy that you can join to help you like with opportunities for internships and like just like getting yourself out there getting your name out there and see like what jobs you can get so that'll help a lot ok did you do any other extracurricular activities to help you like or are you continuing anything into the college while i was ok so i work at noodles and company right now and there isn't you know think of me out ohio and columbus i was considering going there i also play softball but i don't think i'm going to continue that just because it be too much there are like like club sports that are i would be cool if i joined but ok i'm not sure but i really i think that having a lot of extracurricular activities like after school is like a very good idea to pick up like in the high school because it helps you so much with time management because i would come home and i go to softball practice and like be like have to go to work also and like you just have to make time for like homework and i think that's really important because when you go out of college like you don't have like your mom or your dad like going out there that 's like hey you get your homework done like you know you have to do it yourself you know ok i think that's important how did you manage that with high school especially you said you work at noodle securely how do you balance like curricular extracurricular activities with education what i personally do because i'm just it's very important for me to be very disciplined because i know that if i let myself go home like sit on the couch i'm not going to go up off the couch i have to go home and take up my homework immediately and do my homework because most times i like work at four or practice will sort of for saying i'll come home get all my homework done and then i'll go to practice like you have to prioritize or things like homework will always come first or like if i have right after school i will like i'm really come home and do my homework to so it gets done because a lot of times like you'll watch like netflix or listen to music or something really one more episode like what you had like i just you can't let that happen in college has no one's going to be there like over your shoulder telling you to get so done would you recommend like doing a sport or job or one of the other i would definitely recommend a job like it is like i know it gets a little bit rough sometimes but you need to have like the discipline of like having like your own money and not like just keep getting it from your parents or like once again like you're going to be in college your parents are going to be there for you you're going to have to have your own money and like a sport i would just recommend in general just because you make so many new friends like different people that you wouldn't talk with normally like if you place where they like you just get so much closer to different groups and it definitely teaches you time management like how to work in teams and like what you definitely need for a job any job you go into you're going to have to work with people so i think a sport would definitely be a good idea was it impressive do you happen to know how many colleges did you apply to i applied to five ok so did you have one that was like in your mind your ideal college versus like one that you didn't want to know well i would definitely so the way i apply for colleges is just advice from like what i've heard is you have one reach school ok and then like two that like you know that you can get into like a few like safety school so personally like me i applied to how university which was like my safe school because my scores like i saw that my scores like met their requirements ok and i got in their sleep i knew that i would like would least get in somewhere and also james madison i met those requirements too ok and then ohio state and penn state were kind of like well like i could get in but like maybe not and then north carolina state was like my read school  doing i stress myself out so much about like it was like i would like i would check every day like if the schools were getting back to me like it's just really stressful also when i was applying like you have to like ri ses which can be like really toxic sometimes like especially when you're like in school you don't want to come home and like write a whole new essay for a college yes so i would definitely miss take a weekend like a chunk of time like just get them all done because i know like i had to write different essays for each call and i applied to and i like waited until the school year started and then i would like come home from school and not want to do it so i procrastinated and tell like i need to get them done also i would do early action for everyone because it's just it's just so much less stressful to get them over with if you know what i mean like what is early x and so there's an early action where like you can apply earlier than the regular decision ok like i just like getting in early which like it's it's awesome better to because  they look like they'll consider your application first just like it's so much like nicer if you just do or do it early and then like regular decision is like regular like it's going to be later like early x is probably going to be around like late october early november and then or january but it's not like you're going to necessarily like be penalize for doing like regular but i would just early action so much better use that oh yeah yeah i do that for all but it's a good idea when did you start your college essays so i did like i said i waited until the school year to start which is not a good idea i wouldn't recommend it at all but i started probably in september ok like when i started and it probably took me until like mid october to get that like get them all dogs i'd come home and  little bit and i didn't know i'd be like never mind i'd say so it took me a while to get them all done i just definitely start early so you give yourself time to like how many did you have to write i used the same essay for like about three and then like ohio state i had to write like a separate one and then penn state like they really present was different because they really didn't want you to write a lot like you had like a five hundred word like maxim on is that just for that college or i like what is that w limit is it it's usually they don't really care like the other guy they do like there's probably a thousand word limit but like pence it was like get to the point like i don't like a liar coming you know so and like especially because i'm applying for scholarships now what is that like another really important thing they have essays to they're like a thousand word limit like but pence it was just like it to the point like we don't really care did you have someone read your essays for you yes well my mom helps me i hope you know when i went to like why so my english teacher is just like g ideas like i didn't they didn't like proofread at the end but i was like so what's like important like you know did you ask any peers yes i mean my friend actually applies i gather other guy really like we we wrote down things like we were like really because i think it's really good to do it with a friend because like they kind of keeping motivated so like ok this side they were in a sit down we're going to write our essays from college so that was actually helpful to like have a friend like me you know yes would you recommend anything differently anything that you've done throughout this whole process probably go visit your schools are ok because that's like you can hear about a school all you want but like when you actually go there like you get the feel for it ok that was very