College Apps: Meet Naviance, the Life-Saver

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There’s no doubt that the whole process of college applications is difficult – whether it’s figuring out where you’re applying, staying on top of due dates, or making sure you’re really taking care of everything you need to be doing. As a typical life-saving website, Naviance can help to ease the stress of it all. stop-searching-for-the-next-big-thing-tips-for-building-the-best-business-for-you.jpg

Finding Colleges

If you already have an idea of at least a school or two you want to apply to, the website can take those colleges and tell you ones like it based on other students and trends in applications. So, for example, if you were looking into UC Berkeley, it might show you some other UC schools or California universities because that follows the trend of what you’d been looking at.

Also, under the “college match” section, you can find a compiled list of colleges that have strong acceptance histories with students who match your profile – meaning your chances are pretty good based upon your GPA and the information you have inputted into the system.

Finding Your Chances

If you want to sort out which of your schools are safeties vs. targets vs. reaches, a cool way to do this is by clicking on a school and finding the scatter plot graph with data from students specifically at your school. This is incredibly helpful when trying to figure out where might be a good fit for you, even though the college admissions strategy may not be the same from year to year at different schools.

Along with that, if you go under the ‘school stats’ section, you can see acceptance data for regular decision, early decision or early action, which surely can’t hurt when deciding which applications you’re wanting to prioritize to help you most when trying to get into your dream schools.

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Keeping You on Track

Since Naviance can connect straight to your Common Application account, it’s easy to keep track of progress you’ve made and requests you’ve sent in to your school (for transcripts, etc.) just by logging onto a computer.

Along with that, it has what seems like an endless source of information when it comes to colleges, acceptance statistics, and scholarships, so covers all of the bases just in one small toolbar on the screen.

With so much data consolidated in one website, it's sure to help you out - whether you know nothing about applying to college or have been preparing for it forever.

WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT COLLEGE ADMISSIONS? CHECK OUT THE YGITW BOOK HERE!
LOOKING FOR A HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE INTERNSHIP? APPLY HERE!
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5 Effective Steps to Brainstorm the Perfect College Essay

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Believe it or not, the time for submitting college essays is just around the corner. If you’re anything like me, summer break has given you major writer's block. I’ve compiled a list of ways top stay motivated and dig you out of that creative funk!

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1. Ditch the Computer and Stop Erasing Your Ideas

Researchers, like Claire Bustarret, a specialist from ‘the Maurice Halbwachs research Centre’ in Paris, suggests that writing by hand allows the creator to visually see the creative process, thus allowing for growth and greater ideas to come up, as you’re writing.

Adding to that, when you’re writing on paper, don’t erase your ideas—allow your writing to grow from those ideas you didn’t like so much and let new, better ideas rise from them. I had an ‘ah-ha’ moment researching this because it’s happened often where I have an idea but I can’t word it right, so I scrap it. DO NOT do this. Get all of your first draft, non-sense, messy ideas out on paper, and then organize.

2. Talk to People and Get Their Opinions

Talk to your friends about your ideas and their ideas. Let them read your work and critique it. You never know, someone could say something that sparks a brilliant idea. Human interaction and feeding off of others opinions and thoughts help us grow as learners and writers.

3. Get Into Your Flow and Out of Your Head

This is the simplest tip. Just start writing. No matter how bad you think it is, just write. If I ever get into those awful writer’s blocks I just start writing—get out of the mindset that everything you write isn’t ‘perfect.’ Just be patient, and the ideas will come.

Get into your flow. I know that’s easier said than done, but getting into a good head space for writing isn’t all that difficult. The main aspect of this is to know what you’re writing about and what needs to get done. This can help focus your mind and get your ideas flowing. Make a list of the things you want to say, and do your research. Then take a break. I find that if I soak up all the information and ideas  and then let that settle, the inspiration and words flow out of me.

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4. Drink More Tea and Take More Naps

This is my favorite tip, for obvious reasons, but it’s actually more helpful than it seems. Drinking warm green tea with lemon has helped me get an incredible amount of work done. It is an excellent source of caffeine and the lemon helps restore your mind—and all around the tea helps you relax.

Napping is going to let all those ideas settle—I’m not sure if there is some science to this or if it’s just me, but I write best when I first wake up or when I’m super tired.

5. Listen to Music

I’ve found that this actually doesn't help everyone, and some people prefer silence when they’re creating. But I get a lot of inspiration from listening to music—make a playlist of your favorite songs for writing time. If music is too distracting, put on a podcast; listening to people speak is very relaxing and gives me tons of inspiration.

Bonus: Get Rid of Self-Doubt

Whether you’re writing a college essay or making an application for a job/internship, the most important, and sort of clichéd tip, I can give is to not doubt yourself.  If I erased everything I didn’t like in a piece of work, I’d never finish anything. Colleges and potential employers are looking to see your personality and your best work—so if you do that, there’s a huge chance for success!

For more tips on staying creative check out this YouTube video: ‘40 Ways to Boost Your Creativity’   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqUfn9wOzZI

WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT COLLEGE ADMISSIONS? CHECK OUT THE YGITW BOOK HERE!
LOOKING FOR A HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE INTERNSHIP? APPLY HERE!
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