One of the first things to consider when creating a targeted list of colleges is budget. If you plan to finance your education through loans and/or income from a full or part-time job, this will help narrow your search significantly. Many colleges offer grants and scholarships, so be sure to include these types of schools on your your list—even if the tuition is beyond your budget. If you want to find out about grants and scholarship programs, visit CollegeScholarships.org. Just about every college website also lists grant, loan, and scholarship program information. Go to each website’s financial aid section for details.
After you have considered your budget, price, and the type of financial aid each college on your list offers, it’s time to think about location. Do you plan to live on campus? In state or out of state? Do you prefer to commute? Once you have decided on a location, this should eliminate a good number of schools on your list. At this point, comparing colleges should be somewhat easy, but an even shorter list will make comparing colleges even easier.
To trim the list to just a few, consider your career path. What do you plan to major in? Engineering? Literature? Architecture? Not all schools offer all programs, so this will help shorten your list to just a select few colleges. If you are unsure about your location, major, and price, you can still compare colleges using the comparison criteria below.
Comparing Colleges
Now that you have your shortlist ready, it’s time to compare colleges. A good way to keep things organized is to use the following comparison criteria:
-Admission Procedures and Requirements
-Campus Life
-Cost and Financial Aid
-Location
-Type of School
Admission Procedures and Requirements
The admission procedures and requirements for any given college discusses the percentage of students accepted. This will tell you how competitive the college is. You will also find out whether an interview and/or essay is required, and any SAT and ACT requirements. The school website will usually list the minimum acceptable SAT and ACT scores.
Campus Life
This information is also located on the school’s website and will tell you whether or not the school is in an urban, suburban, or rural setting. This section also includes enrollment figures, so you’ll know what to expect regarding class size, male/female ratio, etc.
Cost and Financial Aid
Cost and financial aid information covers tuition and fee information for both in-state and out-of-state students. It will also list costs for room and board or room only.
Location
Location is all you need to determine whether you’ll have to commute, live on campus, or relocate to another state.
Type of School
The type of school affects price, financial aid, grant offerings, scholarship programs, and more. For example, private colleges cost more than public colleges, and public colleges offer more breaks on tuition than private colleges do.
When comparing colleges, the best place to find the most reliable and up-to-date information about any given college is the school’s official website. For a directory of colleges visit AllCollege.org.
