Dean of Admissions Tells Parents This Is How You Can Really Help Your Teen

You might think that since I’m a dean of admissions at a university, that my kids’ experience of applying to college would have been friction free. No. Teenage development includes a predictable entanglement of insecurity, overconfidence, risk-taking, and risk-aversion. A college search is fertile ground to test out everyone’s relationship to each of those characteristics.  

The summer before my daughter’s senior year of high school, she didn’t have a solid idea of what she was looking for or...