July 2024
For Rising Seniors thinking about your lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer [i] . . .
Before your Senior Year begins, with its gauntlet of final, challenging classes, sports, and extracurriculars (not to mention Senior fun), how many unhurried summer hours are yours?
The Rising Senior Summer promises limitless hours for reflection and creativity – the ideal mood for drafting college application essays, and fine-tuning your activity list and portfolio. Such creative and reflective work happens best in summer’s ease.
So, how many of those days do you actually have?
For some, that number might be only thirty-one!
Now, in early July, many students have only one month of summer vacation left, with some schools resuming in August – even August 1. Schools in the U.S. East South Central region have almost 70% of their students back by the first full week of August.[ii]
Yes, Rising Seniors, you have only one month left to get your application into a solid, first-draft state. And, once the school bell rings, those essay drafts and activity lists still face numerous revisions until your college deadlines.
Shorter Summers
and Early Admission
To narrow your window even more, informed students seek the advantages of early decision or early action.[iii] Some of those deadlines fall in mid-October! [iv] Indeed, some regular decision deadlines arrive in November.
Rising Seniors are feeling pressure by one more factor: shorter summer vacations. It’s not unusual for a school district to allot only sixty days for summer vacation.[v]
Squeeze through that closing window two more big items: preparing for and taking standardized tests during summer to be ready for those autumn deadlines.
Planning and Pleasure
The Rising Senior’s summer is no longer lazy and hazy – but it’s crazy without a plan.
This planning need not be stressful. It will improve your executive ability and sharpen your self-understanding. Your confidence that you can succeed in college will increase with every step.
You’re planning one of life’s great adventures – college! And, like any complex adventure trip, you need to plot your schedule, strengthen and stretch yourself, and assemble your “gear.”
All this can be a pleasure.
Research has shown that planning an adventure may make you happier than actually taking it! That applies to the adventure of college.
Contact me to strategize your schedule for your Junior and Senior years.
[i] Okay, I’m dating myself. What kids know this Nat King Cole song?
[iii] https://counselors.collegeboard.org/college-application/early-decision-action
[iv] Georgia Institute of Technology, UNC Chapel Hill, UNC Wilmington, Hampden-Sydney College, Mercer College, Siena College, University of Georgia. For most of the Military Academies, nominations from members of your congressional delegation must be requested during your junior year!
[v] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-school-summer-vacation-so-long/