Sunday, March 17, 2013

Waiting nervously...Did the Application Essays Work?

I'm close to the edge of my seat, waiting to hear from clients about where they were admitted - those applying to college and to graduate schools. News will come any week now. In the meantime, my nervous energy led me to a famous college application essay, by NYU grad Hugh Gallagher. What an essay! What a story!

Even the Wall St. Journal wrote about it. AND the WSJ did a video about him too.

It may be the only case when a college application essay converged with the world of on-line dating.

For the story, click here. Watch the You Tube video here, and see what you think.

~~Liz

NYT Essay on High-Achievers & Top Colleges

Today's New York Times has recast last week's SLATE piece about low-income, high-achieving students who do not find their way to the country's best colleges, and provided an important link to QuestBridge, an organization that is in the business of helping such students find schools and resources.      

Please forward these links to anyone you think might be appropriate!

It seems that low-income students in the major cities - NY, Boston, LA - do find their way to top schools, where the financial aid can be significant, but high-achieving students in more rural areas do not know to apply to these schools. As the Supreme Court gets ready to rule again on affirmative action, the colleges and universities might be required to seek out students who are low-income but not necessarily minorities, in order to satisfy new standards.

Clearly more needs to be done to help high-achieving poorer students find top schools with plenty of scholarship money.

In my business helping high school students with their college applications essays, I have scholarships for low-income students. Please contact me at ebenedict@earthlink.net  to discuss your situation.

Thanks for reading. ~~Liz


Tuesday, March 12, 2013

An Important Essay on College Applications & High-Achieving, Low-income Students


Because of my work helping high school students with their college application essays, I'm sensitive to who is applying where to college. In this fascinating exposé in SLATE, Matthew Yglesias reveals that very bright, low income students are not being steered to the best schools, and the best schools are not recruiting them.