Filmed in Chicago at the American Marketing Association
2011 Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education
Author, psychologist, humorist and frequent contributor to Smart College Visit, Dr. Nancy Berk launched the release of her new book: COLLEGE BOUND AND GAGGED: How to Help Your Kid Get into a Great College without Losing Your Savings, Your Relationship, or Your Mind at the AMA's higher-ed symposium in October, 2011.
Today, we're pleased to share with you a video excerpt of Nancy's talk: 
Did you laugh? Cry? Want to book Dr. Berk for your parent or college event? Contact her here.
#CampusChat HomeSchool Parents PanelOn November 30, the #CampusChat topic will be:
HomeSchooling the College-bound Teen/Preparing for the College Admissions Process.
We're seeking parents of home-schoolers (teens still at home and/or those who have kids in college to spend an hour with us on Twitter sharing tips and experiences.
If you are interested in being a panelist on November 30, please RSVP by adding your Twitter handle as a comment to this post. Teens and college students who were home-schooled are invited to participate as well.
For more information about #CampusChat, please see: What is #CampusChat?
Upcoming chats:
11/16/11 Guest: author Dr. Nancy Berk debuts her book: COLLEGE BOUND AND GAGGED: How to Help Your Kid Get into a Great College without Losing Your Savings, Your Relationship, or Your Mind
11/23/11 - Open Mic
11/30/11 - Parent panel: Home Schooling and College Admissions
Dr. Nancy Berk releases new parent survival guide: COLLEGE BOUND AND GAGGEDOctober 27, 2011
Gail Billingsley
Does the mere thought of getting your teen through the college admissions process cause anguish or make you want to cry? What if instead of crying your eyes out, you were laughing you head off?
With the introduction of her new book, COLLEGE BOUND AND GAGGED: How to Help Your Kid Get into a Great College without Losing Your Savings, Your Relationship, or Your Mind, Dr. Nancy Berk has accomplished the impossible: she put humor and fun into the college search process.
You'll find yourself laughing along with her as she lends practical advice with a beautiful light touch, sense of irony, and tales from the trenches. And with a smile on your face, you will realize that you've found the best guide for you and your teen to survive college search.
Smart College Visit users know Dr. Berk from her popular "College Mom Minute", weekly one-minute, humor infused tidbits designed to bring a smile and lend advice for parents.
College Bound And Gagged is available for $15.95 through Amazon.com. Click here to order your copy today. Click here to read more about Dr. Nancy Berk and her other books.
Nancy Berk and Smart College Visit founder, Z. Kelly Queijo, are both on the docket as speakers at the upcoming American Marketing Association 2011 Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education. Nancy will keynote the luncheon on Tuesday, November 8, and Kelly is leading a pre-conference tutorial session titled "Build a Better Community of Bloggers."
Smart College Price Calculators No longer must families wait until their student is accepted to learn about their “real” price of attending that college or university – the price after all sources of aid are considered. With the new transparency in education, families will have access to net price information long before they send out applications. Perhaps even before they decide upon a campus visit.
Starting in October, the federal government will require undergraduate institutions to offer a net price calculator on their websites to give students an estimated cost of attending their college -- a sort of Expedia or Carfax of higher education.
Given that the price of attending college often equals the cost of buying a new car every year, this makes sense. People are concerned about borrowing heavily for higher education and more likely now to consider net price as a major factor when deciding among various colleges.
The manner of arriving at the net price of a college for a student, after taking into account all scholarships, grants, work study, and loans can be the most frustrating aspects of the admissions process. Some colleges have been posting net price calculators or "estimators" for several years, and the federal government also has provided a template.
How good are these various price calculators? How do they compare? It’s important that the information used in these calculations be up-to-date and factor in a student’s unique financial and academic circumstances. The federal net price calculator template is a model and understandably must take a "one size fits all" approach to aid-awarding criteria across all institutions. However, standards and packages vary with each college.
The biggest plus and major drawback of the federal template is that it asks only eight questions to determine a student's dependency status, expected family contribution and price of attendance. Key questions about family assets and income exclusions are not asked, nor does it consider merit-aid criteria.
Price calculators built on the federal template show net price, but don’t calculate up-front, out-of-pocket costs, which means students won’t see how loans and work-study could reduce their net price.
Some college and universities are using price calculators customized especially for them. They may take longer to complete, but they incorporate the institution’s grants and methods of determining aid and a thorough examination of the student’s financial and academic situation. That’s 15 minutes well spent.
Related Reading
- When Your Child Turns 18 and Goes to College: What Parents Need to Know (SCV)
- Panels of Experts Address Net Price Calculators and Financial Aid Award Letters (NACAC)
- The Net Price Calculator: Financial Aid ‘Game-Changer’? (NYT)
Choosing which Colleges to Visit: The 5-Hour Drive Limit
Academics. Extracurriculars. Costs. Any of these are important factors to consider when deciding which college makes the list of schools to visit, but often even that is not enough.
We talked with Celeste, mom of a high school junior, about the other factors that influenced the college selection process for her son.
Check out what made this family's list, then tell us, what's on your list of criteria?
SCV: You mentioned visiting three schools with two more on the list for fall. How did you/your son decide which schools to visit?
Celeste: My son is VERY interested in doing Air Force ROTC in college. (In fact, his first choice is actually the Air Force Academy.) He wants to go to a college where the ROTC program is actually on campus, which severely limits his options. My husband and I created a list for him of those schools that were within about a five-hour drive of family members on the East Coast--we can't afford to fly him back and forth across the country and we want family members to be able to reach him if there is an emergency.
SCV: Aside from ROTC and location, what were the other factors related to deciding where to visit?
Celeste: My son looked at the web sites and found that most of them had programs for what he most wants to participate in for extracurriculars--cross-country and band--so that was not a deciding factor. He then looked at the acceptance rates, GPAs, SATs. The ones that were more demanding were more interesting to him because he likes a challenge. The schools that made his list were: University of Virginia (UVA), Virginia Tech, Duke, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-Chapel Hill) and the United States Air Force Academy (the only exception to our 5-hour drive rule).
SCV: What were the visit experiences like for you/your son?
Celeste: The first one was amazing, possibly because everything was new and a bit overwhelming. By the fourth one, we were tired of information sessions. Some schools, like UVA and UNC-Chapel Hill, did a great job of making it interesting and engaging. We walked away with a good sense of the school's culture and what they stood for. Duke's was average--it provided a good overview, but it was too long. Virginia Tech's seemed boring--although it might have more to do with our early-morning drive there than the speaker herself, I didn't feel I had a sense of what Tech was all about. My son felt that way about the information session as well, but he really enjoyed the tour there.
The groups tended to be too large to hear everything on the spring tours, although the guides did their best. I would really recommend visiting in the wintertime if possible--it might be cold, but the groups are much smaller. I noticed the guides showed only parts of campus, partly because of time, and partly, I suspect, to make you feel as if these universities weren't as large as what you feared! It really didn't matter, because by the end we had a pretty good feel for the school. Also, the combination of information sessions and tours usually ran about two to two-and-a-half hours, and by then we had reached our saturation point! (If you're going to Duke, bring snacks and a drink. Theirs went three-and-a-half hours!) Virginia Tech actually showed a dorm room. No other college did.
SCV: What do you wish would have had happened or that you would have had time for on any college visit?
Celeste: Questions! All of them except for UNC-Chapel Hill were morning tours that went through lunch. By the time they were done, we were practically shaking from low blood sugar levels. Even though we wanted to stay to ask questions, we were too hungry to do so. This was unfortunate, because the only colleges that talked about ROTC were UVA (because someone did ask during the information session) and Virginia Tech. Knowing only a few students are interested in ROTC, we would have preferred to ask about it after the tours, but the tour guides typically did not know anything about it (except at Tech) and we were too hungry to go back in and ask the admissions people. I would also liked to have had a chance to ask about spiritual life on campus.
SCV: Was your son engaged with the visit?
Celeste: For us, these visits were overviews, so he did not ask many questions at this point. He tends to absorb things, reflect on them, and come back with questions later. I think he asked one question during the four visits. For these visits, he wanted to get a feel for the campus and the culture and decide whether he wanted to apply. He typically separated from us to stay closer to the guide (and on one tour the students were actually ordered to separate from the parents and be in the front) so he could hear better. We usually dropped back so other students could be up front as well. We believe that while parents play a part in this decision, it rests primarily with the student, so they need as much information as possible.
SCV: What's your #1 concern/priority regarding where your son ends up going to school?
Celeste: I have told him very plainly: My concerns are he attends somewhere he can continue to grow in his relationship with God, he gets a good education, and he has fun. In that order. I am not concerned with name recognition, I just want a college that is a good fit for him.
Do you have a college visit story to share? What's it been like to tour colleges? How do you decide where and when to visit? Click here to share your story with us. We'd love to hear from you.
Do You have a College Visit Story?
We've shared these stories from parents about their experiences visiting college campuses across the country
- Don’t Pick a College Sight Unseen
- Twins and College Visits: One Parent's Story
- 7 Months + 4 Colleges + 2 Visits Each = Time for a Prius
- Father-Daughter Adventure (Mike O’Donnell from Seattle)
Now, we'd like to hear from you! What's the college tour cycle been like for you and for your family? Were there things that stood out that made the experience memorable either on a personal level or as it relates to college choices? How important was the college visit to your teen's college choice decision?
Your submission is appreciated and, in the spirit of providing family-friendly, useful, engaging information, will be reviewed by our editors prior to posting.
Thank you for sharing!
