Students and families can spend a great deal of time looking for a college that matches their child’s needs, interests, and other criterion. There’s an easy way to pare down on the time it takes to find good matches and it doesn’t cost you a dime! The U.S. Department of Education's "College Navigator" (available at http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/) is a terrific FREE tool to help you with your college search. Search for schools by location, type of degree offered, campus size, athletic options, campus setting, religious affiliation, test scores, admissions criteria, etc.

One of the neatest things about this site, or so parents tell me, is that they can put in some very specific criteria (say an SAT score or score range) and the system will pull the data on all colleges that have matching criteria that fit. For some students, especially those that are not familiar with colleges outside their local area, this kind of matching system is helpful in identifying additional institutions that could be good matches. It helps broaden the scope of options. That’s a good thing, really. Especially if you thought your options were previously very limited.

Of course, the drawback of using this kind of system is the lack of personal interaction. No online system, no matter how well its structured, can provide you with all of the information you will ever need. So, once the student has identified his/her list of possible matches, the next step is to actually contact the college or university for more information. Final decisions should be made only after visiting the campus (if possible) and actually taking a look at the setup, academics, etc. from a personal perpective.

Until next time!

Lynn Byrne

Preparing for college admissions? Trying to find direction? Need a little help with the planning? Check out my college planning series:

• College Planning Made Easy--the planning and preparation workbook for the take charge, college-bound student,
  
• Paying for College Made Easy--a college financing guide designed to assist students and families in preparing and planning for higher education expenses; and
  
• The Great Scholarship Search--my guide for students and parents researching and applying for scholarship funding.