The Importance of Selecting the Right School for your Student

The biggest decision related to college that a family will make is ultimately, what school the student is going to attend. When a family makes that decision, there are several components that should be considered, as well as many pitfalls to avoid. 

Remember, the primary goal is to get your student out of school with a good degree for their future, at the minimum cost of time and money that can possibly be achieved. When it comes to pitfalls families make, we are trying to avoid three major problems that can be catastrophic to a college plan: avoiding low graduation rated schools, changing majors, and transferring schools. How do we avoid these? The first way is to be aware of the graduation rates at the schools the student is interested in. If the four-year graduation rate for a school is below 50 percent, budgeting for four years may not be enough. These low graduation rates can often arise from schools being overenrolled, causing students to not be able to enroll in prerequisite classes and they are now behind through no fault of their own. Another way to avoid issues is by ensuring your student has developed their career cluster to dial in on a desired major. This avoids the student changing majors while in college, which will also delay graduation. Of course, one last goal is to ensure the school is truly a good fit for the student. The school must have a good path for their major, but the student also needs to be happy at the school. The last thing we want is to transfer schools, which will also delay graduation. 

As you may have noticed from the pitfalls described above, they all revolve around ensuring that families avoid delaying graduation. What is the true cost of a delayed graduation? Of course, this tacks on more semesters of college, which costs the family another semester or more of tuition. However, that is not the beginning and end of the true cost. Keep in mind college cost inflation has historically exceeded standard inflation. This means the later semesters will be most expensive on a time value of money basis. We also cannot forget opportunity cost. When a student delays graduation, not only are they incurring a higher cost for their degree, but they are also foregoing the opportunity to be in the working world for those extra semesters, causing them to miss out on income that they could have earned by graduating on time. 

With the true cost of delaying graduation in mind, it is crucial that families choose the best school for their students. How should families determine this? We look into three factors that should all be equally weighed to make that decision. They are the head, the hand, and the heart. 

The Head: The head is addressing what the school can provide academically. By this point, the student should know their career cluster and know their desired major. The head is where a family decides if the school has a good program for the student’s desired major. 

The Hand: This is where the family decides if they can afford the school based on the net price. Each family must determine the net price, which is the cost of attendance after need and merit-based aid before they let the cost of college impact their decision. The biggest mistake families make every year is crossing good schools off their list due to the sticker price, before determining what it will actually cost them. 

The Heart: Lastly, but equally as important is the heart. This is where families must determine what school feels right for the student. Do they like a big or small campus? Do they like the campus environment? Do they want to go out of state? Are they close enough to their family? Every year we find that the heart is the most over or underweighted by families. You cannot discount the heart because if the student is unhappy or unmotivated, the risk of transferring increases. In the same way, families cannot outweigh this and send their students to a school that does not have a good program for their desired major or a school that the family cannot afford. 

While making the ultimate decision of where to send your student is not easy, taking these components into consideration will hopefully build confidence in making the right choice. A+ College Planning is always available to be a resource if your family needs help with any of the decision factors that go into picking the right school for your student.