Narrowing it down to one

The grey page opens in front of you, decorated by varying shades of burgundy, as it previews the colleges that have accepted the site. Its simple, welcoming nature makes it seem almost innocent as you create an account and enter the page. As you delve further in the process, you are haunted by the red, yellow and green completion arrows. It is the epitome of your high school career. “Welcome to the Common App!”

Although daunting and arduous, the process of applying to college is perhaps not your biggest obstacle. Following college applications, you continue to scavenge for scholarships or may be scrambling to finish the forms for financial aid. Despite all this work geared for your future college career, you continue to ignore the impending days of late March and early April. Those are the days you have been waiting for and have been dreading since you submitted your applications.

Yet, you eventually have to put some thought into ranking the schools you applied to. Everyone has three groups to organize their schools into: safeties, targets and reaches. Within those sections, you rank the colleges further, exploring the cost of attendance, available curriculum, prestige and simply your personal preference toward the school.

Let’s be honest. Almost everyone applying for college dreams to be accepted into an Ivy League school, at least here at Saratoga. With family friends and relatives all inquiring where you are attending in the upcoming year, you want to be able to proudly state that you are attending a top-tier college. Yet, that may not always be your best choice.

Do some research and educate yourself on how fitting the schools are to your major. Although some schools may not be as widely known as the Ivies, they can provide a better education for you depending on what subject you plan to study. According to US News, for instance, the University of Illinois ranks fifth in engineering while Cornell University and Princeton University falls to eighth and 10th, respectively. Before deciding on some big-name college, talk to friends who attend those colleges or do some research online to reinforce your ultimate decision.

You may also want to consider how you applied to the college. If you listed a different major than what you are intending to pursue in the upcoming years to “make it easier to get in,” as some may say, it may not be as easy to switch majors as you believe. In UC Berkeley, however, switching into the engineering program is incredibly difficult and you may not even be able to switch over. If you are unable to study what you want to, it will not be worthwhile to select that college based on its name.

There, however, are other factors that influence the appeal of the school. While most privates have a tuition of about $50-60,000 a year, the UCs cost around $30,000 a year. Going to a private, you are provided more opportunities and the faculty is more accessible to you.

However, the education provided to each student is not necessarily better at privates. While taking in consideration of your major, you may want to check the resources provided at each school, like researching programs, varying academic courses and extracurricular activities or clubs.

You may see the privates as a better opportunity to further your education, but that may not always be the case. The professors may be better at certain public schools even if the class sizes may be slightly larger. It may not be worthwhile to pay $60,000 a year for an education you could receive at a UC for half the price.

There also remains some simple characteristics to separate the schools that are still tied on your ranking list even after considering national rankings, quality of professors, tuition cost and class sizes. A quality that jumps out at numerous people is location.

If you are fond of the East Coast you may want to select a college in that area, but if you prefer warm weather, you may want to stay in California. Furthermore, if you are moving to a college across the country, you may want to consider how you plan on transferring your possessions over to your dormitory.

Obviously, you will have to purchase some new items that are too large to ship over, but you will be opening yourself to a whole new culture and experience. Selecting colleges by location is equivalent to determining what you want to be exposed to in the future.

As the terrifying month of April nears, you may want to begin considering what you would do in all situations, ranging from only being accepted by your safeties to being accepted by all your schools. In the end, you (and, of course, your parents) are the only one who can make your choice.