411: Finding Your Why, What a Liberal Arts Education Really Is, and How to Figure out What You Actually Want

The College Essay Guy Podcast: A Practical Guide to College Admissions

On Season 1 of the podcast, Ethan had a great conversation with Maria Furtado, then Executive Director of the Colleges That Change Lives organization (also known as “CTCL”). It’s a lovely chat and to date one of our most downloaded episodes.

On today’s episode Ethan had the pleasure of sitting down with her successor, Ann Marano, and they get into:

• Where to start when it comes to the college search
• How to myth bust yourself (a practical exercise)
• What questions to ask when you’re searching for a college
• Some things Ann and Ann and Ethan wished they had done differently when they went through the process themselves
• Busting some affordability myths
• What it means to keep a student at the center of the college search

If you’ve never met Ann, you should know that she is a proud first-generation college graduate of Mount St. Mary’s University (CA) who earned her M.A. in Education-Psychology from Pepperdine. She’s served on several counselor advisory boards, including the Common Application Board of Directors and the Johns Hopkins University Access Advisory Board. After 20 years in college admissions counseling at several different universities and high schools and 12 years as the college bound advisor at the first all girls’ public school in the state of Texas, Ann Marano moved into the role of Executive Director for the Colleges That Change Lives.

We hope you enjoy the conversation.

Play-by-Play

• 1:57 - What is CTCL and what is Ann’s role as Executive Director?
• 3:58 - What’s it like to be a student at a liberal arts college?
• 8:09 - What kind of student is right for a liberal arts college?
• 10:01 - What’s a good place to start in the college search process?
• 14:49 - How to combat myths about colleges
• 19:04 - What are some questions that are important for students and families to be asking themselves as they go through this process?
  • 25:52 - An exercise for picturing yourself on a college campus
• 29:45 - What would Ann and Ethan have done differently in college?
• 32:04 - How does a student get a sense of a school if they're not able to visit the campus?
• 34:15 - College affordability at private schools
• 39:17 - What are some tips for parents about keeping students at the center of the search?
• 43:56 - Another example of what it’s like to be a student at a liberal arts college
• 48:27 - An exercise students can do to begin this process of finding a great college
• 52:55 - Final thoughts / wrap-up

Resources

• CTCL.org
• CTCL How To Choose A College Brochure
• The Values Exercise
• How to Choose a College: A Step-By-Step Guide
• How to Research Colleges Without Visiting a Campus
• Paying for College in Four Steps: The Five College Types
• U.S. Department of Education College Affordability and Transparency Center
• College Cost Transparency Initiative
• The Common Data Set: What It Is and How to Use It in College Admissions