One of the things I love most about what I do with students is that we learn so many things together. Yes, we learn about building a smart college list, and how to put together an excellent resume, and what types of essays make a committee applaud. But we also learn so great life skills: how to address an envelope and where the stamp goes (this one kills me – technology has really changed communication!), how to understand debt in the context of projected future earnings, and how to write a professional email to an admissions officer, dean of an honors college, or professor.
 
There are quite a few reasons why you might find the need to email your admissions officer. These include:

1. Requesting a meeting when you are on campus visiting during a weekday
2. Asking a question about the college’s programs or application process
3. Checking on your application status after you’ve submitted your app
4. Letting them know you saw a bug on your morning walk (Just kidding. Don’t do this. AOs are busy people. Don’t annoy them with a pointless email or a question you could easily find for yourself).

 
There is a good chance you will find yourself needing to email several admissions officers or college faculty in the course of your college planning process, but many students are stumped with how to do this. We’ve put together a little guide to help (life skills are where it’s at!).
 
First, let’s get one thing out of the way: The email has to come from the student, sound like a student wrote it, and be responded to by the student. Mom and Dad, definitely help and guide, but students have to own their process and be in charge of their communication. Colleges expect this and might flag an applicant’s file if there is too much evidence the student is not college-ready or independent enough yet to handle the college environment.
 
Here’s an outline of how to do this:

1. The subject line: Keep it simple and to the point.
   1. Examples

                  i.On Campus Interview Request
                  ii.Meeting request during campus visit
                  iii.Checking on application status – CAID 975674
                  iv.Inquiry: Ability to double major in CS and Electrical Engineering

1. The addressee: Check the title you are using to address your recipient. For women, use Ms. instead of Mrs. or Miss unless you have met their spouse last week for a quick golf game and are certain she is still married. If you are emailing a dean of professor, there is a good chance they have a Ph.D. Use Dr. in this case. If the professor has a masters degree (you can find all this in their faculty bio and/or CV online on the faculty page for the department in question) use the title “Professor”. Bonus tip: spell their name right (this happens A LOT. Take your time and be thorough)
2. Writing the email: Start by introducing yourself. Include your full legal name  (you don’t have to include your middle name, especially if it’s Thelma and you are still salty for having to write that out on the forms for all your college apps), your high school and home city, your year in school (freshmen, sophomore, junior, senior), and your date of birth (this part is helpful for admissions to match to your file). You might also include your application ID if you have already applied and have one.
3. Ask your question: Jump straight in to your point. Keep it to one brief paragraph. If it requires more than that, you should be setting up a phone appointment/calling in the question.
4. End with gratitude: Say “Thank you” or “Thank your for your consideration” or “With gratitude” – something to show you appreciate their help with your process and are a lovely, polite, amicable human being (which you are!)
5. Wait for a response (give it three business days), and respond (if needed) when the email comes in: This means you need to check your email once a day! It’s a good habit to develop. Maybe do this right when you get home from school each day.

 
Here are a couple real example emails students have sent recently.
 
Dear Mr. Pederson,

My name is Firstname Lastname and I will be touring SMU this Friday. I'm emailing you to ask if there is a class I could sit in on, preferably an intro to journalism class or any class involved in the Fashion Media major. Going into SMU the Fashion Media major is what I would like to pursue and I would like to see a preview on how the classes interact and the involvement of the students. Thank you for your consideration! 

Firstname Lastname
 
                                                      _________________________
  
Hello Mr. Jackson,
 
My name is Firstname Lastname from Flower Mound High School here in North Texas. I wanted to give you my thanks for hand-writing that postcard in regards to my acceptance to KU! That alongside the notification of the KU Distinctions Scholarship really meant a lot to me.
 
I went to the NorTex College Fair in Denton that The University of North Texas hosted, and I had the opportunity of meeting Allyson Peters! She was extremely helpful and gave me a lot of useful information.
 
I wanted to point out something I discussed with her: The KU Excellence Scholarship. I had mentioned that I have taken the ACT exam three separate times, and that my highest score was a 26, which qualifies me for the Distinction scholarship. Would it be wise to take the ACT exam a fourth time to try and score a 28? The lady at the college fair mentioned that I could email you if I scored a 27, and while my tests superscore up to a 27, I'm aware that you guys don't superscore. Getting the Distinction scholarship is such an honor, but knowing that I'm still on the college search, should I take it one final time to see if I can raise it up higher than my past three exams?
  
Thanks so much!
-Firstname Lastname
 
These both sound very much like high school students because they were written by high school students. We as adults might look at a phrasing here or there and want to correct it, but resist that urge. These are great – they are authentic, they reflect the student’s actual questions, and they communicate very professionally in the way that a 17 year old would communicate professionally.
 
Guide your students to learn to write great emails and communicate well on behalf of themselves. Empower them by giving them examples and offering to review their work and give them feedback. And encourage them to reach out to build rapport to do the best job they can in their college planning process.
 
Questions? Email me at [email protected]

​Along with time at the lake, a job at Bahama Bucks, and mornings spent sleeping in, the college essay is the often a fixture of summer for rising seniors.  Many students, however, run into a mental wall shortly after starting. What sort of topics are best to write about? How can I make my writing hold the reader’s attention while showcasing the types of qualities that will support a competitive application? How do I keep the essay from sounding braggy?
 
Writing the college essay is often the first time students are confronted with the task of writing a personal narrative. It’s an essay unlike anything they’ve written in school thus far, and if students try to approach it like an essay they would write for English class, there’s a good chance they will submit something rather mediocre. We wanted to start your summer off right by putting together a bunch of FREE resources your student can use to write a compelling personal narrative that strengthens their application instead of dragging it down.
 
What’s a personal narrative?
First, let’s define a personal narrative. A narrative is a fancy literary term for story. Your college essay is a personal story. A well-written personal narrative has focus and uses one story from the student’s life, allowing room or a deep dive so the reader can understand more of the student’s nuances and complexities. 
 
What does a strong personal narrative with focus and complexity look like?
Great question. Example here, and here, and here. Oh, and try this one on for good measure.
 
Ok, so where do I start?
My best advice? Go sit at the top of a mountain for an hour and think about who you are. Want something more practical? Use this values exercise to clarify what matters to you most as a person. There are a couple pieces of advice that if you do nothing else for your college essay I’d want you to do these things:

1. Be yourself, warts and all. We call this authenticity. Think of your favorite novel or movie. Are the characters perfect? Does the plot line have everything go perfectly for them all the time? No! That would make for a terribly boring story. Consider the same with your essay. Life is perfect. None of us is perfect. Don’t pretend to be perfect or manufacture experiences that you believe sound impressive because you will end up annoying your reader. Just be yourself.
2. Write about something the reader can’t otherwise learn about you. Your resume lists your activities, your transcript shows off your smarts, use the essay to be human and connect with the other real human(s) who will be reading your essay.

 
Which prompt do I choose?
Want to hear something crazy? My students don’t write to prompts (at least at first). I tell them to just write me a essay that tells me a story from their lives that teaches me something important about who they are. That’s it. That’s the heart and soul of the personal narrative anyway. Don’t limit your thinking by introducing a prompt prematurely. Also ignore word counts until the editing phase.
 
Once the first draft is done, then go back and see which prompt it best aligns with from the Common App and Apply Texas.
 
Just write
Struggling? Just write. Put pen to paper or fingers to keys or even voice to recorder if you think aloud like I do and let the story flow, perhaps in a stream-of-consciousness the first time to see what’s there, perhaps in something a little more formed, but either way, just write.
 
Ready to edit? Great. We have some handouts.
First, see if the topic of your essay is falling into one of the categories for things we suggest not to write about. There are exceptions to this, but most students are well-advised to steer clear of the things listed here.
 
Here are some suggestions on how to turn good writing into great writing. This handout was put together by Wendy Reimann, a professional writer who also partners with us for our essay workshops.
 
Are your students younger and this is not quite on your radar yet?
Have them keep a summer journal. Journaling is one of the greatest precursors to writing in the style of a personal narrative. Pick up a book of journal prompts from Barnes and Noble (and stop by my favorite place, The Flour Shop, while you are there!).  Have your student do three prompts a week, with a paragraph minimum.
 
Want to run through all of this together? We can do that.
Option 1: Essay workshop (camp focused solely on the college essay)
Option 2: College App Camp (essays + most everything else you need to apply)

It’s likely not a surprise that (most) students will have to write essays as part of their college application process. Yet, many are stumped when they see prompts like these:
 
“Tell us about the most significant challenge you’ve faced or something important that didn’t go according to plan. How did you manage the situation?” -- MIT
 
“The lessons we take from failure can be fundamental to later success. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?” – The Common App
 
“If you feel you are in a black hole, don’t give up. There’s a way out,” Stephen Hawking said. Describe a time you faced a problem that seemed impossible to solve. What did you do to find a solution?” – Oklahoma State University
 
These students wrack their brains, look at their resumes of successes, and freeze. The F-word! They cringe. Their whole lives they’ve successfully avoided any sort of failure (yes, that f-word) only to find it’s everywhere in their college essays! Is it a trick question? If they divulge a weakness are they dooming themselves to the “no” pile?
 
I’ve learned a few (well, actually a ton) of things having worked with students in the college application process for many years now. One of those things is that they don’t know how to fail, so when it does finally happen (and it will because life is full of failures), it’s debilitating—even crippling in many cases. Their self-image, self-worth, and self-confidence is blasted by what should be a normal engagement in appropriate exploration or risk-taking.
 
I’m saddened, deeply, when I hear of a student who diligently worked on an application for a summer research fellowship, gathered her materials and letters of recommendations, wrote and rewrote her essay with insight and depth of thinking, only to open her email to see, “On behalf of the admissions committee we wish to thank you for your application…” But I’m alarmed when the student devolves to tears and isolates herself for the following week, neglecting her studies and other activities.
 
Or when a student is not selected for a scholarship when one of their “less talented” peers is, and refuses to apply to anymore believing it’s a waste of effort and time.
 
Many students haven’t been taught they are not entitled to opportunity. In the great big world of adult-life, hearing “no” is normal. Think about what we know to be true (and important) in our lives as capable adults. When you are job hunting, do you send out one resume and wait expecting a yes answer? Do you expect even a response to each resume you send out? No. 
 
Do we only begin only those things which offer us a guarantee of success—do we want that for ourselves and our children? I’m decently confident the answer is no, and I think we as adults all understand and accept failure on a regular basis. But the question is this: how do we expect our children to do the same?
 
If we do not encourage and normalize failure in high school (or earlier), we are leaving them to figure it out on their own later in life – in situations that are less safe and more high stakes. Colleges know this, and they also know that failure is nothing to be ashamed of. Failure is the result of risk-taking, and exploration, and often curiosity. Failure is going to happen in college, in small, or maybe big, ways. And colleges want kids who are prepared to not only "deal" with that in a healthy way, but leverage the failure to improve themselves, their ideas, and their communities. Hence, there are lots of essays asking students to reflect on their failures. 
 
Here’s my suggestion: normalize failure. Let your kids get used to hearing no. And let it sting. I have little kids, and already I know how difficult it is to see my child upset because I’ve denied her something that would make her genuinely happy. I imagine that gets even harder as they get even older and work for things they may not end up getting (leadership positions, summer opportunities, spots in an admitted freshman class at an Ivy League school). Don't swoop in to justify their shortcoming by blaming other factors to preserve their egos (and sometimes our own). Let it simmer and shake, then let them move on.

They will fail, and you will be there to teach them and help them understand the failure in context instead of be there to fix it for them, as much as you may want to (or be able to – that’s where this gets really tricky. When parents have the power to fix their student’s failures, sometimes that’s not in the long run the best thing for the student).
 
Teach them instead to see the “no” as an acronym (I’m about to get cheesy on you, watch out). N.O. stands for New Opportunity. If you can’t do the thing you wanted to do (you failed--I said it! And it's okay!), try something else out. There are many ways to reach success, and no one guarantees that the first thing you try is the thing that will work. Teach resilience by helping them learn how to use a growth mindset in which they learn to view failure as a New Opportunity (a N.O. moment--cheesy right? But kinda spot on).
 
The added bonus is that they will end up with a killer essay topic for their MIT application.

A new data analysis from the Department of Education has found that 68% of students opted last year to have the FAFSA sent to just one school. The conclusion we draw from this? Students are either deciding too early in the process where they will attend college or not applying to enough schools in the first place.
 
National Decision Day, the day when students must notify their chosen college of their intent to enroll and pay their deposit, is May 1st of the senior year. However, this report as well as my own work with students suggests that many are making up their minds much earlier, even before financial aid packages are awarded, which usually happens in March or April.
 
This number is troubling, and likely an indicator of the want to be over and done with a process that can be riddled with anxiety and uncertainty. For most families the cost of college is a big factor in their decision where the student will attend. Yet, many of these same students and families start the enrollment process before having their financial aid award. You don’t truly know how much your education will cost until you have filed all financial aid forms (FAFSA, CSS Profile) and received the results of those filings from colleges.
 
My suggestion to parents and students is this: the fall application season is about creating smart options from which to choose in March or April, after you have all the pieces of the puzzle in front of you (admissions decisions, honors college decisions, scholarship offers, financial aid awards). When financial aid and costs truly are a driving factor, deciding in November, right after you get an admissions offer, where you will attend is premature. Why not wait and use these interim months (between the offer of admission and the time you get your financial aid award) to really compare on a deeper level the differences between your prospective schools?
 
I hear and understand the concern about housing, and it’s my opinion that colleges often use housing as leverage to entice students to deposit before they really need to do so. Here’s what I recommend: call the housing office. Ask about when housing actually fills up. Most colleges prioritize housing for freshman, and many guarantee it. Call and get the facts straight from the housing office itself before feeling the pressure to deposit from admissions.
 
Students, families, and college counselors work collaboratively for many months helping to create a smart list of colleges that will provide a good set of options for the student in the senior year. Let all those options play out before rushing into a decision, especially when cost is an important or decisive factor.

We are pleased to announce that this summer we will be offering several college application bootcamps for rising seniors (class of 2016). Details are still coming together, but we would love your feedback to help us plan. If you have (or are) a rising senior, take this short survey. This will also let you put down your information to reserve a spot because space will be limited for lots of individual support! 

Survey link: http://goo.gl/forms/wo3bkTzm2X 

by Shannon Presley Alexander
      Connect with me via email: [email protected]
      facebook.com/ecubedcoaching
      twitter.com/ecubedcoaching 
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This post is brought to you by the talented and insightful Shannon Presley Alexander. Through eCubed Coaching, she works with students to help them create and maintain good habits, establish and work towards their goals, and become the leaders of their own lives, amongst other things! She's awesome, and she has some awesome advice for how to cope with the stress that can accompany the increasingly competitive college admissions process. 
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As if life isn’t hard enough, many of you are now facing one of the most difficult things you’ve probably ever had to tackle.  Applying to college is strenuous for any student, but with the rising cost of tuition, a cut throat admissions process, the acceptance rate diminishing, and an unstable job market, it's more taxing than ever before. 

To make that perfect impression, you’ve put yourself through the ringer: pursued a rigorous curriculum including advanced classes, increased studying, athletics and community service, all to demonstrate your skills, abilities and remarkable character. While those activities may have put you in a better position in getting accepted by the college of your choosing, the admissions process can still be anxiety provoking.  I’d like to share a few things for you to consider as you go through this phase as well as techniques to assist in minimizing the stress. As you continue reading, understand that devoting time and attention to one of these will make a difference; however, taking advantage of all of these will boost your confidence, drastically reducing your anxiety.

1.     Make a strategic academic game plan, be organized and maximize your time! These are critical components in keeping your anxiety in check. When you are prepared there will be fewer “surprises” to deal with throughout the process.  Knowing what you want to do is essential in figuring out where you are going and how to get there. Sounds pretty clever, right?!?! However many students are clueless about what they want to do after college, some don’t take the time to do their homework to learn what it takes to achieve their dream career. Once you have your major selected and an idea of where you want to attend:

• Get on target with time management – make a schedule, a visual reminder of upcoming deadlines. Each college may have more than one deadline: for early acceptance, early admittance, regular admittance, etc. Allocate time efficiently as you fill out applications; do not procrastinate. 
• Be organized – keep a notebook or digital folders on colleges you’ve researched, deadlines, pertinent points and / or facts regarding each. You may also want to consider keeping up with an application checklist to monitor what’s been completed, unfinished tasks, etc. Track your progress in comparison to the deadline dates. 

2.     Don’t be afraid to ask for help… parents, mentors, school counselors, academic coaches, etc. Rely on your resources to assist you through this stressful time. If you have questions about the process, ask. Remember the only stupid question is the one that’s not asked. It’s better to ask now than look back at some point in time and realize you’ve taken a wrong turn because you were afraid to do so. Or maybe you just need additional support during this time, reach out! Many of those around you have been through a similar process and at this time you may even have friends encountering the same pressure.

3.     Maintain a healthy mindset; be positive and optimistic yet also realistic.  Have realistic expectations. I'm not saying don't stretch or challenge yourself; however, if you are a ‘C’ student don't cross your fingers thinking you’re going to get accepted at Stanford. If you didn’t do the work, you probably won’t make the cut.

4.     Learn to accept rejection; this is part of life. While it isn’t fun, learning how to cope with rejection is an essential part of growing up.  And chances are, during this process it is likely it will happen.  Stay focused on the things you actually have control over; remember if you aren’t accepted into a specific school, it is not personal, other opportunities await.   

5.     Stay mentally and physically focused. I’m sure this is easier said than done; however, aim for 8 hours of sleep each night. Maintain a balanced diet and exercise. Not only does this create endorphins, a stress blocker, but is a great way to release tension. Find ways to work in fun; take time to enjoy your family and social life as well as a bit of quiet time for yourself.

Remember, while the college admissions process can be stressful, it doesn't have to be a gut wrenching, palm sweating, heart pounding process. Try and enjoy this time. It’s exciting to discover who you are and where you are going. As you go through this process, keep these tips in mind and just breathe. Soon enough you will look back and realize it wasn’t as bad as you thought. Good luck!