Surviving The Admission Blitz - Brief Article

Careers and Colleges, Sept, 2000

Coordinating a college admission strategy requires almost military precision, and our intern Heidi Pauken pulled off one of the most comprehensive college searches we've heard of. Targeting schools in the East, Heidi mapped out a plan to sweep through 18 colleges in two separate week-long trips. She sampled Cornell, Colgate, Bucknell, Chapel Hill, University of Virginia, Princeton, Vanderbilt, and more.

"When I got home [to Cleveland, Ohio], I had trouble remembering half of them," Heidi says. To keep them straight, she devised a chart to evaluate each school's features with either a plus or minus. When she tallied her scorecard, Duke University, in Durham, North Carolina, was on top.

Fortunately, Heidi had what it takes to get into this highly competitive school--at Westlake High School, she was both valedictorian and student body president. Teachers raved on her recommendations, and admission officers appreciated her thoughtful essay on Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead

This issue of C&C reveals how to be a successful college candidate like Heidi. You'll learn how to decide on a school, how to get organized, and how to get in. After you've used all of the hints, tips, and inside info, let us know how it all worked out. Post your experiences (successful or not) on our bulletin board at www.careersandcolleges.com, or write to us at staff@careersandcolleges.com. Good luck!

Don Rauf

Editor-in-Chief