How to Narrow Down a College List

Last week we talked all about building a college list.  Once the list is created, your student will spend the next bit of time prioritizing and categorizing the list.  By the beginning of senior year, your student should at least be working towards narrowing down their list or have it already narrowed down and finalized.  Some students may find this an easy process, and some students may really struggle with crossing colleges off their list!

Narrowing Can Start Immediately

There’s nothing that says the process of narrowing down your student’s list can’t start as soon as they’ve finished it.  As I shared last week, this is a living, breathing document.  Schools will be added, removed, and moved up and down the list, even multiple times.  That’s okay.  Allow your student to make changes and know that nothing is set in stone until they apply.

Factors That Cause Changes In the List

There are lots of factors that can change your student’s perception of a school or that cause changes to the college list.  The first is due to research.  The more research your student does on a particular college, the more confident they will feel that the college is right for them, or isn’t right for them.  This research can be visiting the school, reading about it online, doing a virtual tour, hearing from current students, etc.  Another factor is the student’s academics.  Their GPA may go up or down during their junior year.  With this being such an important year for grades prior to applying to college, it could push a college on or off the list, or into a different category for admissibility.  This is a good thing, because it’s important that your student not have a college list with a healthy range of options.  Test scores can also cause changes in the list.  Test scores often open up options for merit aid and some schools use test scores for admission (but this is drastically different for the class of 2021 - be sure to check with each school!).  Lastly, your family’s financial situation may change which schools make sense to apply to.  If someone loses a job or things become less stable, you may be more reliant on financial aid than you were previously.

Ending Up With a Solid List

By the time your student is applying to colleges, my professional recommendation is to apply to no more than ten colleges, with at least two of them being what I call “high chance of admission” schools, otherwise known as “safety” schools; at least three being “target” schools; around two being “low chance of admission” schools, or “reach” schools; and students have the option to throw in a “wildcard” school, which are typically schools who admit less than 10% of those who apply.  I recommend applying to no less than six schools in total.

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While narrowing down the college list may come easily to some students, it can be difficult for others to no longer consider some of their options.  Encourage them to think of this part of the process as moving towards stepping foot on their chosen college.  This has to happen so they can end up where they’re meant to be.