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College Search By Major

College searches can be an extremely baffling and anxiety producing experience for the student and family. If you break the decision process down into simple steps choosing a college can be a stress-less experience.

Having just done a college search by major for one of my children, I can tell you the first step is to determine what your student is interested in studying. Some kids know exactly what they want to do and others have no idea. For the kids who know exactly what they want to do this part is easy. You and your child should look at a repuatable college guide such as Barrons, Petersons or Fiske. Then look for schools that are reported to be strong in those areas. At this point don’t rule out any schools. Personally, I found the print version of these resources easier to use than the online version. You can find current versions of these college guides at your local library.

If your child has no idea what they want to major in they should consider a liberal arts college. If they are not academically strong, consider a local community college. Again use the college guides to locate reputable liberal arts colleges.

Community college courses generally have smaller classes, more faculty interaction and lower costs. These factors can help a student prepare themselves for transistion into a four year program. Most courses will transer to four year universities so that the student will only have to attend the four year college for two years.

Community college is also good for those who want expert training in many of the new technologies and fields that do not require a four year degree.

If you are not going to go with the community college option, at this point after searching through the various college guides you should have a list of schools that are strong in your child’s academic interest. Now there are a variety of factors you need to consider to choose the college that is right for you:

Geographic location - Do you want to be close to home or far away? If you come from a warm climate can you tolerate four years somewhere that is very cold or vice versa? Would you enjoy being in a large metropolitan city or are you looking for more of the college town experience?

Size of school - Colleges and universities come in all shapes and sizes. Some state universities are huge and class sizes especially freshman and sophmore are very large. There are medium sized schools and very small colleges where your class size is only 25 to 30 people. Where would you be most comfortable? If a huge campus overwhelms you, you probably don’t want a big state school even if the cost is lower.

Personality of school - Often the college guides will also give you some indication of the personality of the college. Once you have narrowed it down to a list of 4 to 6 schools, you can search various online sources for additional information about the schools. You will find forums which discuss groups of similar schools and actual students and parents may post and tell you what their experience has been.

Cost - This will actually be the last consideration and I’ll tell you why. One of things I learned from reading a lot of books on choosing colleges and my own personal experience is that the more expensive school may be the cheaper option when you consider college financial aid. Some schools are better endowed than others as far as college financial aid and therefore able to subsidize a larger portion of tuition. So apply to four to six schools, request college financial aid if you need it and fill out your FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) and then evauluate the college financial aid packages you receive.

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