28 College Prep Resources for Your Senior Year of High School
You’ve made it to your senior year — congratulations! For high school students who’ve heard the oft-cited adage that junior year is the most important year in preparing for college applications, it may seem that you’re past some of the most difficult parts of high school. There’s a lot of fun to be had and memories to be made in a typical senior year.
However, your journey toward college is still ongoing. There’s still the intimidating process of actually putting your college applications together and submitting them to consider. Even aside from this major task, you’ll still need to keep your grades up and stay involved with your extracurriculars. Finally, the year will be capped off by your decision about where to attend college, which can be a difficult choice as well as a celebratory occasion.
In this post, you’ll find links to all of the CollegeVine blog’s best posts for your senior year. We cover topics of special interest to seniors, from the consequences of a senior-year grade slump to whether to join a new extracurricular to how to navigate the college application process and its aftermath. Read on for the best of CollegeVine’s expert advice.
Academics
Obviously, keeping up your academic performance is a key part of preparing for college, and a bad case of senioritis can potentially derail your college prospects. It’s important that you continue working hard and maintaining your academic standards throughout your senior year.
Below are a few posts that cover what your senior-year performance means for you, how to stay on track as a senior, and what consequences a change in your grades — positive or negative — could have on your application prospects.
Extracurriculars
Your extracurricular involvement plays an important role in your college applications, and just as with your academic pursuits, you’ll want to finish strong. As a senior, you may be wondering if your resume is strong enough, or whether it’s too late to start a new activity. If athletic activities are part of your extracurricular involvement, you may also be dealing with the special concerns of the athletic recruitment process. Below, you’ll find our advice about these topics.
Standardized Testing
Ideally, you’ll have taken your first SAT and/or ACT sitting before your senior year. If not, or if you’re retaking one or both tests in hopes of improving your score, test prep and studying should be part of your senior-year plan.
Other standardized tests you may be considering are the SAT Subject Tests, formerly known as the SAT IIs. Again, ideally you would have taken some or all of these tests earlier in your high school career, but if you’ve only just decided to apply to a college that requires them, you may need to catch up during your senior year.
AP tests may also be on the menu during your senior year. Hopefully, you’ll be pursuing some challenging academic coursework, and that may include taking the corresponding exams in the spring. In addition, if you’re an international applicant and English is not your first language, you may be required to take the TOEFL.
Below, you’ll find our guides to these major standardized tests, including all our best advice for maximizing your exam performance.
Application Guidance
In the fall of your senior year, it’s time to actually begin the task for which you’ve spent all of high school preparing: applying to college. It’s an intimidating project, but it’s also one that can lead to life-changing opportunities. Before the process begins, it’s wise to do your research and make sure you thoroughly understand how the world of college admissions works.
Here, you’ll find our overall guides to the college application process, including important dates, resources, and planning information. For many, many more detailed posts about topics like how to answer certain essay questions, what particular colleges require, and how to handle your college interviews, check out the CollegeVine blog posts in our Applying to College tag.
Making College Decisions
After your college application deadlines comes the waiting period, and after the waiting period comes the difficult task of evaluating your college options and making a decision about where to attend. This process is already stressful, and can be even more so if you’re deferred or waitlisted, or if you’re accepted to a school you love but don’t receive the financial aid you need to make it a viable option.
In these posts, we go over some of the top concerns you may encounter in your senior year when navigating the post-application landscape. Hopefully, your decision-making process will go smoothly, but just in case it gets complicated, CollegeVine is here with some advice.
We hope these resources provide some valuable guidance as you prepare for application season, make a final college decision, and transition into this exciting new phase of your life!
Curious about your chances of acceptance to your dream school? Our free chancing engine takes into account your GPA, test scores, extracurriculars, and other data to predict your odds of acceptance at over 500 colleges across the U.S. We’ll also let you know how you stack up against other applicants and how you can improve your profile. Sign up for your free CollegeVine account today to get started!
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