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- Hello everyone, I'm Dr. Steven Mercer.
I'm an independent educational consultant,
helping students and families apply to colleges
that fit them.
And I'm an instructor with the University of California,
San Diego, extended learning
college counseling certificate program.
And I'm here today to give you
specifically some advice to parents
on how to support your student
during the college application process.
It's challenging sometimes for a family
to watch their student go through a difficult
rite of passage.
There are a lot of steps to applying to college
and I have some simple ideas to keep in mind
when thinking about the best ways to support your student.
So I think the first step in that is to ask yourself,
what is the ultimate goal
that you have for supporting your student
in applying to college?
And in some ways there's two different directions.
It's kind of a crossroads.
Some families I work with say,
"well, the obvious answer is to get them into college
and that's it."
So if the end is to get them into college,
then some families think that the ends justifies the means.
And as a parent or family member,
they're going to do everything they can.
And it doesn't matter what it is
to help them get into college.
But as an educator and as a counselor,
I think there's a different choice.
And there's a lot of evidence to suggest
that just focusing on getting into college
is not the best course for a student
in high school or a community college student
aspiring to go off into a big step of college
and into young adulthood,
and hopefully often into a successful careers and adult.
There is evidence to suggest
that even the college application process,
the steps that students take early
is part of the college education experience.
And that it's not a means to an end
that it's an end in itself.
And so therefore,
if that's how families feel about it,
and I hope you do,
then the ultimate goal should be to support your student
and to walk that fine line between support,
but also realizing that in many cases,
students are adolescents,
and this is an experience that they haven't tackled before,
and it's a project, it's a big experience
with a lot of big decisions involved.
And so finding that right level of support
is really important.
So I have a few small suggestions to keep in mind,
that there are some positive, simple, and proactive ways
that families can help support their students.
The first is to invite collaboration
and I've used that word invite very purposefully,
not to force collaboration but to invite collaboration.
And what that could mean
is sometimes a matter of the language
that a family member uses.
For example, I know that sometimes adolescents,
high school students a little shy
about sharing information about what they're doing at school
or how their school day went
and sometimes even how
their college application process is going.
So as a family member, instead of insisting
that the students sit down and do things with the student
it's to use language that gently suggests
that you're willing to help.
And maybe you could share the burden on some things.
There are some parts of this process
that are more complicated than others.
And sometimes it suggests that a family member's involvement
is the best course.
So not throwing everything in the student's lap
and expecting that a young person
who's inexperienced with a big rite of passage like this
to do everything but to divide and to come up with a plan
of who's going to do what.
Related to that step number two or suggestion number two
is to share information.
So instead of again, forcing your idea
of when the students should do things,
where they should apply,
what they should write their applications on
is to share your observations.
I know I look with a lot of families who as parents,
they have a lot of insight into the process.
Maybe they went to college themselves,
or if they haven't maybe they've been doing research,
maybe they have friends and colleagues
who have some good information about deadlines
or techniques or scholarships that are available.
So a nice technique for a family member
is to share that they've done some research
and ask or also invite again the student to participate
in looking at a group of colleges
that the family member may have researched recently,
or to share that you've researched some scholarships
that might be available and not just to simply email them
or text them to your student but to invite them to sit down
and take a look at them together
A third simple step.
And this is something I mentioned before
is to serve as kind of an operations or logistics manager.
So, the parents can see themselves as part of the team.
And that means that they're not the boss,
they're not in charge of the college application process.
Remember we want the student to lead.
It's their process, it's their rite of passage.
They are going to college and to that end,
we want the student to have the privilege of making
the most important decisions
but their also the responsibility to do that.
But what I have found is
there are steps along the way
in the college application process that are complicated.
Some of them involve money or making travel arrangements,
or decisions around applying for financial aid
the FAFSA or the financial aid
form required by the federal government
is pretty complicated.
And families, parents, as opposed to the student
often have information about family finances
and income that it can help if you have clear roles
as the family member to step in.
Again, I also find that families
when you're able to visit colleges,
whether it's a long complicated trip
that involves travel far away,
or even a local journey to a local college
that's just a short drive away
when family members get involved
in sometimes scheduling those, making those arrangements,
it can help out and take the pressure away from students
who are burdened with school and applications,
and hopefully busy with essay writing eventually.
So, that's a really appropriate role to take.
And finally, and perhaps one of the most difficult parts
of this process that can help support the student
is to have an honest conversation about money
and college affordability.
You know, it's true that many many times
students and families start to seriously consider
the cost of college late in the process.
And that sometimes throws real wrench in the process
and interrupts where the student is applying.
Maybe they're already accepted to colleges
and they're starting to get their heart set
on going to a particular college.
And the family hasn't really had that honest conversation
about how much do they think they can afford?
What colleges realistically fall within those ranges?
That's an important one.
And you know, the truth is as students make a lot
of assumptions about what the family can and can't afford.
And sometimes they assume
that the family can't afford anything.
And sometimes it's the opposite.
They assume that they can afford quite a bit.
Having that hard, sometimes hard conversation
about money early is really really helpful.
And it's something that the parent
or family should initiate.
So, parents and family please support your students.
Those are my simple suggestions.
Stay tuned for my next episode, where I talk about
how not to support your student and things to avoid
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