Most colleges do not interview sophomores, but sometimes this policy can be flexible when there are extenuating circumstances such as yours. Contact the admission official in charge of your geographic region at each of the schools you’ll be seeing. (The admission office receptionist can give you the name and contact info, if it’s not on the Web site.) Tell him or her about the family trip and ask if an exception might be possible. In doing so:

-Be sure to ask an admissions officer for this exception, not the receptionist who might ordinarily schedule interviews since this is a policy decision which a receptionist may not be authorized to make.

-If you feel that you are an especially strong candidate for a particular college, you should try to include this information as well when you contact the admission official. You don’t have to say anything brash like, “To know me is to love me,” but you could mention in passing that you are a straight-A student or that you’ve taken PSAT’s already and feel that you’ll be in well within that college’s “admit range,” etc.

Finally, when you say that you live “really far” from the colleges that you’ll be visiting, be sure that we’re talking some serious miles. “Far” can be a relative term, and each family may view it differently. I’ve worked with students in Queens, NY, who think Philadelphia is “really far” from home … “even too far” … although the fittest of the lot could probably get there on a bicycle.

Don’t be surprised if the admission officials you contact recommend that you attend an info session on campus and take a tour with your sister but ask you to schedule an interview with an alumnus close to home next year rather than allowing one on campus for a sophomore. However, you may find that the practices will vary from school to school, so it certainly doesn’t hurt to ask.

Good luck and safe travels

Do females stay closer to home than males? Maybe so, but that’s a stat I’ve never seen. In fact, when I do a mental inventory of my own high school classmates and their college choices, harking back nearly four decades ago, the results don’t support this conclusion. The two who journeyed farthest (to California, from our Philadelphia home turf) were both female. Conversely, more men than women went to the University of Pennsylvania close by, and the rest of the choices–near and far–were pretty evenly balanced between the genders.

But, let’s just say that your hypothesis is correct … then my best guess is that it’s true for a couple reasons:

1) Mothers and fathers may be more protective of daughters than sons. I’ve counseled 12th-grade girls whose families didn’t want them to leave home and live in dormitories. The parents urged them (or, in some instances, actually required them) to commute to college. In the case of these students I’ve known personally, they were first-generation Americans whose parents did not attend college themselves. Several had older brothers who did leave home for college.

2) In some families, it is still expected that male children will become heads of households and chief breadwinners so that they thus may be encouraged to attend the best possible college for preparation in their prospective career field, regardless of cost or location. For daughters in such households, however, being a wife and mother may be the primary expectation post-college. So girls may be pushed toward in-state public colleges with lower price tags.

I would conjecture that such thinking was more prevalent decades ago than it is now. But, as I noted above, in my own orbit in the Sixties, this wasn’t true. However, the vast majority of my classmates came from affluent families with college educated fathers and mothers. I suspect that parents in this demographic were more open then (and still are) to their daughters flying far from the nest.

Depending on your current preferences and your goals in life, choosing a Historically Black College or University (HBCU) could turn out to be a big plus. For instance, if you decide to apply to graduate school, you may find that admission officials are especially interested in you because of your atypical undergraduate experience. Most grad school admission committees seek students who come from a range of undergraduate backgrounds, so the fact that you attended an HBCU might help you stand out in the crowd.

Also, there are a number of alumni associations that welcome graduates from all HBCU’s, which can be a great way to take advantage of social and career networking opportunities once you’re out of college. Sure, individual colleges and universities of all sorts usually have their own alumni groups, and many of these are also great ways to make and maintain connections, but as a member of the broader community of HBCU alums, your network will be even wider.

Keep in mind that there are some HBCU’s (e.g. Spelman and Morehouse colleges, Howard University) that are quite renowned and draw their students from across the country and beyond. Other HBCU’s enroll mostly local or regional students and are not so well known–or as academically challenging. So, depending on where you matriculate, you can expect that some people will nod with understanding and approval or simply stare at you blankly when you provide your college’s name. Of course, this is true whether you attend an HBCU or not … some schools are familiar to many; others are obscure.

As with most colleges, too, there are pros and cons to attending an HBCU. I’ve known some students who missed the racial diversity that they had in high school so they transferred out of an HBCU, but there are also many who relished the support that an HBCU provided. I’ve also known African-American students who attended primarily white high schools and valued the chance that an HBCU provided to make strong ties with others who shared their own racial background.

So, the short answer to your question is that there is definitely nothing “wrong” with attending any Historically Black College or University. But, as with every college choice, the key is to find a school that seems to be the right fit for you, and even among the 100+ HBCU’s there is a lot of variety, so choose wisely.

The statistics will get you in the ballpark, but there are a couple considerations that may make colleges appear at least a tad more selective than they really are. For instance, some lists or guides provide mid-range SAT scores for students who actually matriculated; some supply data on all accepted students and some on all who applied. These numbers can be fairly different, depending on the institution.

At the more selective colleges and universities, admitted student and matriculated student scores will, of course, be higher than all applicant scores, since many candidates with lower scores were turned away. At less selective schools, however, you may find that the mid-range scores of applicants are actually higher than those of students who enrolled, if this college was a “Safety School” for many who didn’t ultimately land there.

Moreover, some colleges do a bit of fancy footwork when it comes to how they report test scores. For instance, they may not include students taken off the wait list in their “Admitted Student” figures. Likewise, wait-listed students who eventually get in may not be counted in the “Admitted Student” percentages. And, if a student submitted both SAT and ACT scores, and the college officially used the higher ones, then the lower results may not be computed in the averages that the college reports.

Finally, some colleges have a more “self-selected” applicant pool than others. For instance, I’ve worked with students who don’t have a prayer at an Ivy League college but who apply anyway with reasons along the lines of “My dad said, ‘What the heck, it’s Harvard–give it a shot!’” But I’m less likely encounter that sort of “Nothing to lose” attitude when it comes to lesser known “elite” schools like Swarthmore or Pomona. So those who apply to those places are probably well in the running to begin with. I’m not saying that Swarthmore is really more competitive than Harvard, only that the numbers rarely tell the whole story.

So, the bottom line is this: Take those guidebook stats with a few grains of salt, but also be realistic. If a student’s test scores, grades, etc. are below the range reported, don’t hold up high hopes of admission without other factors that will compensate for the deficiencies. However, there are many such factors out there (unusual background or talents, geographic diversity, minority status, legacy status, etc.) so also don’t shy away from a top-choice college based on the numbers alone.

Colleges and universities that belong to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (better known as the NCAA) typically offer sports at either the Division 1, Division 2, or Division 3 level. Division 1 is the most selective and Division 3 the least … but, even so, there’s a big jump between being a good high school athlete and being qualified to play at college on any level, even Div. 3.

NCAA rules prohibit athletic scholarships at Division 3 colleges. You’ll have to go to Div. 1 or 2 for softball dough (more on that in a minute). But, if you qualify for need-based financial aid or some other form of merit scholarship (e.g., for academics, arts, etc.) then you may indeed receive $$ to attend a Div. 3 school … you just can’t get the money specifically for softball.

Note, however, that some Div. 3 colleges do tend to “sweeten the pot” for athletic prospects. For instance, let’s say your family qualifies for need-based financial aid. Instead of giving you an aid “package” that is mostly loan and some grant (the good stuff that you don’t need to pay back), you may find that, as a sought-after softball player, your aid package turns out to be all–or mostly–grant money.

If you’re an especially strong Div. 3 player, then you might even be a contender at some Div. 1 or 2 institutions, too, where athletic scholarships are permissible. If so, you’ll have to register with the NCAA and make sure that your course selection, grades, and standardized test scores meet certain minimal standards. For more information about these standards, as well as most everything you want to know about playing a sport in college, see the NCAA’s Guide for the College-Bound Student-Athlete: http://www.ncaastudent.org/NCAA_Guide.pdf

Note, however, that scholarship money for sports is hard to come by–only the most talented athletes will qualify–and even if a coach is considering you for an athletic scholarship, most of these scholarships are not the “free rides” that we all hear about on TV or through the rumor mill. Many coaches are given a fixed amount of scholarships but then may divide them among several recruits, so the result is that no single player receives more than a few thousand dollars. Thus, if a coach expresses an interest in you and mentions the possibility of scholarship help, don’t hesitate to ask whether you’re looking at serious bucks or just pizza money.

To find a list of colleges with NCAA softball teams, go to: http://web1.ncaa.org/onlineDir/exec/sponsorship Note that this list indicates if the program is in Division 1, 2 or 3. There are also other colleges that are not affiliated with the NCAA but do offer softball as well.

To find more softball schools, use the College Board “Matchmaker” at http://collegesearch.collegeboard.com/search/adv_typeofschool.jsp Under the “Sports & Activities” heading, select “Softball” in the “Women” column, and then, down below, you have the option to narrow down your search to Div. 1, 2, or 3 (and also intramural).

Keep in mind that, even if the Division 3 colleges can’t offer scholarships for athletic prowess, what they may be able to provide is a boost in your admissions odds, if you’re a promising recruit. In other words, if you find that you’re a borderline candidate at a top-choice school, the coach’s clout may make a difference in your admissions verdict. So, as soon as you discover any colleges—at any level–that interest you, feel free to contact the coach to express your interest. At the Div. 1 and Div. 2 levels, the NCAA has strict rules that govern the sort of exchanges that coaches can have with recruits, but at Div. 3 colleges, those rules are laxer.

A final thing to keep in mind is this: Some Division 3 coaches are straight shooters and some are not. At Div. 1 and 2 colleges, prospective students often sign a “Letter of Intent” which helps the coaches know which athletes are sure to matriculate. At Div. 3 schools, however, it’s hard for a coach to assess which players will eventually enroll. So, it’s common for coaches to suck up to all potential athletes with the hope that at least a couple will show up in September. So be wary of promises made by Division 3 coaches. The nice guy who tells you that you’re a “likely four-year starter” in December may forget about you entirely by the following fall, if his recruiting season has been successful. So be sure to query coaches about team size, returning players (and their positions), how many players will be cut after try-outs, etc. This will help you to determine if the coach is serious about you or maybe leading you on.

Good luck with your senior year and you college search. I hope you find a lot of colleges that are in the ballpark for you and at least one that may even be a homerun.

Question: My daughter is interested in a few different areas as potential majors including classics. Is it better to pick one or declare “Undecided”?

The great intuitive powers of The Dean—coupled with the recognition of identical e-mail addresses—have led us to discern that you are a mother and a daughter asking similar questions that can best be answered in tandem.

It is indeed true that some borderline candidates are admitted to top schools because they plan to study in undersubscribed departments. Each year, most colleges and universities have what they call “institutional needs.” These include academic departments that may have dwindling enrollments or to which they want to attract more students for a variety of other reasons. While these priorities are rarely made public (in other words, you won’t see a rotating banner on the Yale Web site that proclaims, “We want more Italian majors and astronomers next fall”), if your area of interest coincides with one of these “institutional needs,” then you may have a better chance of admission than a candidate with similar credentials who is pursuing a more popular field.

Classics is commonly one of the less sought-after fields and thus can catch an admission official’s eye when named as a prospective major. Some college catalogs and Web sites list a school’s enrollment by major. If the number next to “Classics” is a low one, then it’s a good bet that aspiring classics majors will get at least a small “hook” in the admission process. However, admission officials will be looking for prior accomplishments in this area or at least a reason why you hope to study it. If you’ve done a number of courses in Latin or Greek or related fields already, then they’ll spot them right away. If not, an explanation of your choice is in order (e.g., a supplementary note that says something like, “My high school doesn’t have a classics department, but I have read the poetry of Catullus in translation and would now like to read it in the original Latin.”).

In addition, it may be a good idea for you to contact classics professors at your target colleges, if you have real reasons for doing so and aren’t just trying some “suck up” strategy you read about in a guide book. If you don’t know where else to start, department chairs can be a good bet, but you can also use course catalogs and Web sites to identify profs who teach classes that specifically interest you and then write directly to them. Tell them about your interest and ask any questions you have that are genuine, not obsequious (good SAT word!). It’s possible that you’ll even establish an e-mail rapport with a faculty member who will put in a good word for you with admission officers. At the very least, this sort of correspondence should help you decide which colleges will land at the top of your list—and which may not make the final list at all.

We feel that it is always preferable to list a prospective major on applications—or even several—rather than saying “Undecided,” unless, of course, your choice will be binding (this is rarely true at liberal arts colleges but may be at universities). If a college has an unusual offering that truly catches your eye then admission officials will be pleased that you have researched their school and selected it because of this particular opportunity.

Many candidates do write “Undecided,” and it’s not heinous to do so if you truly are, but—by selecting your current top choices instead (even if they change down the road)— you’re sending a subtle message that says, “I really am interested in something that’s academic and am not merely eager to get away from home and live in that great new dorm I saw on the tour last month.”

“The Dean” is delighted to encounter a student who is sensitive to the high price of gasoline these days. Of course, this may also be your way of trying to wheedle out of a family junket to deserted campuses when you’d rather chill on the beach after seven weeks of box-stitched key chains and capture-the-flag.

In a perfect world, summer is not the best season for campus visits. Ideally, you should see schools at the same time of year when you might be there yourself. But, realistically, June, July, or August may be the only practical months to hit the road. Remember, once September rolls around, most seniors are flat-out with school work, soccer games, or debate-team tournaments, and it may be hard to squeeze in so much as a weekend for college visits, especially for those heading more than a few hours from home. Moreover, Sundays–especially the mornings–can seem so quiet on many campuses, that it can feel like the middle of summer—even if there’s a foot of snow on the ground.

So, in your case, father may indeed know best, and your August plan may be the wisest despite the drawbacks. Even though you won’t get a true sense of a school when the students are missing, at least you will get to see what the buildings look like and where the school is situated in relation to the surrounding community.

So here are some tips to getting the most from your summer visits:

-Find out if any colleges on your list have summer sessions (and, if so, when they end). Even though enrollment may be smaller than in the fall and winter terms, at least you’ll avoid seeing the campus when it’s dead. When selecting schools that you will–or won’t–visit during your summer trip, give priority to those with summer terms.

-Dress appropriately. Leave the flip flops and cut-offs at home, but do dress to beat the heat. Wear comfortable walking shoes (an imperative at ANY time of year).

If I had to pick the best time to see campuses, I’d vote for April of 11th grade when many high schools are on spring break but colleges aren’t. Typically, it’s not quite the crazy time of year as the fall of senior year can be. Of course, many high school juniors haven’t honed in on target colleges by then or may want to see more colleges than can fit in a week’s vacation.

So, often summer ends up being the most pragmatic time to “trod the sod,” as my College Confidential partner Dave Berry says. Bring your imagination (along with a sweater for uber-air-conditioned info sessions and an umbrella for summer showers) and picture what each campus might be like when it’s rife with bicycles and backpacks or with 1,000 cell phones ringing all at once and a couple dozen Frisbees in the air.

For starters, you are making too much of the differences between Cal Berkeley and USC. Unless you’re talking about the University of South Carolina (and I suspect that you’re not) then the admission standards at the two colleges you cite are strikingly similar. I urge you to make your choice based on the campus that you feel is the best one for you now, and not that will serve as the most likely springboard to affirmative grad school verdicts down the road.

But let’s pretend for a minute that these standards really are far apart, as you seem to believe. Even so, graduate schools like to admit a diverse swath of applicants, just as undergraduate colleges do. “The Dean” is often asked if private high schools are “better” than public ones, when it comes to Ivy and “elite” admission, and that always spurs a long diatribe that ends up sounding a lot like “it depends.” Both paths will certainly get you where you want to go, so the “it depends” part pertains to what you’re looking for along the way.

Similarly, graduate admission officials endeavor to select a variety of applicants and, in doing so, they draw from a range of undergraduate institutions. They are far more interested in the individual student’s achievement and potential than they are in the name on his or her college sweatshirt. However, they do take into account the rigor and competition of the undergrad school, and they understand that B’s at one college may be closer to A’s at another.

In your case, however, I suggest that you try to decide where you can best see yourself for the next four years rather than attempting to view each option through the lenses of the grad-school admission committees. You have two excellent choices, and I wish you well as you make your final decision.

How do you seek out your best bets? There are numerous approaches. For starters, if you have not done so already, try an online search engine such as the College Board’s “Matchmaker” at http://collegesearch.collegeboard.com/search/adv_typeofschool.jsp .

Answer the entire questionnaire, selecting your preferences for type of school, size, location, majors, extracurriculars, etc. When you get to the “Admission” section, enter your current SAT scores and check “50-75% had GPA of 3.0 or higher.” When you hit “Results,” you’ll find a list of colleges where you are likely to be admitted. While I can’t guarantee that you’ll be accepted by all the schools that come up on this search, you should certainly be a very viable candidate at most of them. If you play around with the questionnaire and check the other GPA options, you’ll get additional choices.

Another place to look for college possibilities is on the “Colleges That Change Lives” Web site. See: http://www.ctcl.com/ This site and its 40 member schools are the by-product of a book by the same name by education writer/consultant Loren Pope. The book points out that it can be the less renowned, smaller institutions that really give students the chance to know each other, their professors, and themselves–something that can get lost in the shuffle at a bigger …or bigger NAME .. institution. Note that the Colleges That Change Lives organization holds events throughout the country, and there may be one coming up near you.

Finally, don’t discount the grapevine … i.e., word of mouth … as a good way to learn about possible target colleges. Ask any adults you respect where they attended college Eavesdrop on conversations in elevators or supermarket checkout lines. Read the College Confidential discussion forums to see where students with similar profiles have been happy and engaged. Obviously, once prospective schools land on your radar screen, it’s up to you to do additional research to see if the place is really a good fit … and visit campus whenever possible.

But don’t think for a minute that college acceptances will be an uphill battle for you. Sure, the application process can be confusing and onerous at times, but if you plan carefully, you should have some excellent choices when the dust settles.

Good luck!

I assume that you’re talking about fine arts programs as opposed to performing arts, which is a different story altogether. But, actually, in both cases, the answer to your question is an unsatisfying, “It depends.”

Since most fine arts schools require a portfolio for admission, even students who have Ivy-caliber grades and test scores will be turned away if their arts submissions aren’t up to snuff. On the other hand, the admitted-student rate at the nation’s top art schools is somewhat higher than at the most selective liberal arts colleges and universities. For instance, Rhode Island School of Design, one of the nation’s most renowned art colleges, accepts about a third of its applicants, while the Ivies and most “elite” small schools admit anywhere from about 10% to 20%.

Admission to an arts program within a larger university is typically portfolio-based as well. Sometimes these programs may have lower standards when it comes to grades and test scores, but, even so, the portfolio evaluation may make them more selective than the university itself.

When my own advisees ask me to assess their chances of admission to art programs or art colleges, I cannot provide the answers they seek because I’m in no position to evaluate their creative work, even if everything else in their “profile” meets–or exceeds–the institution’s standards. If you want to get an assessment of your own work, you can begin with your teacher(s). Ask how your portfolio compares to those of past students who have aimed for the same or similar colleges. You can also attend a National Portfolio Day event. (See http://www.portfolioday.net/ ). This is a free and (fairly) stress-free way to have your work critiqued by experts. National Portfolio Days are held throughout the country and attract representatives from many arts programs. Think of this as a college fair, which provides a chance to learn about a lot of colleges at once, but the twist here is that you can lug your portfolio or slides along and get some feedback that can help you strengthen your application (or spur you to pursue an entirely different career!).

Although performing arts programs require a different approach (auditions, head shots, etc.), you will also usually find that admission chances depend greatly on a subjective evaluation of your talent, and grades and test scores may take a back seat if you are very gifted.

However, if you wish to study any type of art in college .. fine arts or performing arts … you can also look to the liberal arts. Many colleges have excellent programs in these areas that do not require a portfolio, an audition, or even a commitment to a major until the end of your sophomore year. Although your course load may not be as focused on your specific interest as it would be in an art college or school of art within a university, this can still be a great way to pursue a passion without locking yourself in to just one field.