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I’m the single parent of a student who started his college career in 2004 (Yes, this is 2011.). By the time he graduates, I’ll have had close to a decade of “making the most of the college experience.”

Blessed is the parent whose child has a clear vision of his or her life path and marches off to college to make it a reality – all in the proscribed four years. I’ve watched, green with envy, while my neighbors’ much younger children have done just that. I’ve also witnessed one former jock down the cul de sac diligently plod through his third year as a senior, working part time and taking one course a semester.

Whether on a fast track at a three-year, career-focused college, a community college or traditional college, the same advice applies. Here are my top five suggestions on how to help your student become an adult and succeed – or not – all on his or her own while maintaining your sanity as a parent. You can enjoy the journey!

• Don’t pin your dreams about a career or a “successful” life onto your child. If you know your child’s passion is computer technology or visual communications, why nudge them into law or auto repair just because that’s the tradition in your family? Your idea of success, be it money, prestige, or the McMansion, may not be that of your son or daughter, who would prefer to live in a smaller, greener abode without all the trappings of what success looks like for you.

• Students should be allowed to make their own mistakes and experience/suffer the consequences. It doesn’t matter whether they’re out of country, state, living at home or just down the block, you can’t – and shouldn’t – monitor or direct what they’re doing. If you were a helicopter parent during grade school and high school, now’s the time to land the chopper and take some R&R. Although this is an overused example, it still applies: Had we not allowed our children to stumble, fall and even earn a few bruises while learning to walk, they’d be crawling to their classes today. ‘Nuf said.

• Be available to hear the good news but not as available for the minor, everyday complaints. With the advent of cell phones, children are far more willing to share – in real time – exactly what’s going on, seemingly all the time. Today, unlimited texting plans have rendered vocal chords optional.

Seriously, if your daughter’s roommate just “borrowed” her favorite sweater, and she is upset about it, don’t get involved. Ignore that text! If your son complains about the lack of lab time in chemistry, “suggest” that he work it out with the instructor. Obviously, real emergencies call for a calm presence, aid, comfort and maybe a call to 911. And, of course, celebrate the many accomplishments and victories that come their way. Those calls and texts are the true rewards!

• Don’t be surprised if your child changes majors once or twice and/or at some point wants to drop out. This can be a bitter pill to swallow but try to take your ego out of it. Whether you’re financing the education, helping out or just rooting your children on, try to understand that changes are happening because they’re growing and finding new interests and avenues to pursue. My son is on his third and, I believe, last major. He dropped out for a few years because he knew he was wasting his time and money by not having a clear direction and passion. When he realized that a degree is mandatory for the type of life he wants (I told him so!), he rebooted and re-evaluated. Today, his vision is clear and he’s enthusiastic about his future.

• Treat your children as the adults you’re hoping they’ll turn out to be. Refer to the first four tips. There’s a saying that we’ve been given one mouth and two ears so we can listen twice as much as we speak. The moral: zip it and listen to your children. The time for preaching is over. It’s not always easy, especially if they come home and leave towels on the floor and dishes hiding behind furniture. But, as they mature, it’s gratifying to hear their thoughts on life, political and religious opinions and see how they treat others. Let them know you care about them and are there as a safety net while allowing them to evolve and become healthy adults and people who will contribute to society.

Harry Truman put it succinctly: “I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.”

Ideally, you’ll end up with a self-actualized college graduate, a person who can think on his own, make good decisions, and with whom to share happy text messages! Check back with me in 2013.

Packaged food mostly consists of processed food which is great for transportation, storage and shelf life, but not so good for your body. Imagine food as fuel, and especially when you need a lot of energy to get all your tasks completed, you want to fuel and nourish your body and your brain with fresh, high quality, and preferably seasonal foods.

Keep it natural

The closer you stay to food in its natural state, the better. For example, something that has been picked fresh off a tree (let’s say an orange) is closer to its natural state than something that has been picked off a tree, sent to a processing plant, extracted, mixed with sugar and artificial ingredients before it’s wrapped in plastic, packaged in a box and sent off to supermarkets thousands of miles away (let’s say orange-flavored candy).

If you can’t pronounce it, don’t eat it

Ideally your grocery purchases shouldn’t have labels, like apples, lettuce and all that good stuff. But if you buy something in a package, read the label, especially the ingredients.  There’s a simple rule when you go through the ingredient list: If you can’t pronounce one or more of the ingredients, don’t buy the item. There are preservatives, flavors, fillers and other artificial ingredients which don’t add anything of value to your diet. They might actually be harmful and cause different kinds of diseases. By the way, ingredients are listed in order of quantity, so the most prevalent ingredient is first, the least is last.

Stay at the perimeter

Here’s another easy way to consume more natural, less processed foods: Stick to the perimeter (outside) of the supermarket. You have your veggies and fruit, meat and fish and dairy.

Cut the sugar (and other sweeteners)

If you wander off into the aisles and pick up a food item to read the ingredients, you will most likely find sugar or some other kind of sweetener, like high fructose corn syrup, on the list, as often times sugar is hidden in soups, sauces and condiments. Most people know that sugar is bad. Hey – it causes cavities and makes us sleepy. You’ve probably experienced a sugar high, followed by a low, and found out that these energy level swings don’t help when you’re supposed to study and focus. On another note, sugar also increases fat storage. You can read up here how fat cells work or check out this blog for some more background, but yes, sugar makes you fat. And please note – it’s not just sugar. Artificial sweeteners confuse the body and our taste sense.

Photo by Dorsolateral

Eating healthy on a budget

While it may seem cheaper to buy fast food or snacks at a convenience store, those processed foods don’t have enough of the nutrients you need to fuel and nourish your mind and body. On the contrary, they are loaded with sugar, saturated and trans fats, refined grains and salt, and they are causing diseases like heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, some types of cancer and diabetes. So, you’ll end up spending way more money in the long run on healthcare-related costs (the American Diabetes Association shows the total cost of diabetes in the United States in 2007 at $218 billion – yes, that’s a b as in billion).

Here are a few things you can do to find that sweet spot in between eating healthy, nourishing foods and staying responsible and within a budget.

• Look for sales on fresh fruits, veggies and meat. Buy lots and freeze while it’s cheap.
• Buy whole heads of lettuce instead of bags. It doesn’t take that long to cut it up, and bagged lettuce, in addition to being expensive, has often been rinsed in a chlorine wash.
• Choose frozen over canned. If you can’t get fresh, or if you don’t have time to prepare the fresh fruits or veggies, pick frozen. Freezing usually happens right after fruits or vegetables have been picked at their peak ripeness when they are most nutrient-packed, and the freezing locks them in a relatively nutrient-rich state. Check out the ingredient list, and make sure that the vegetable or fruit is the only ingredient.
• Buy in bulk. Check out the bulk aisle for nuts, dried fruit and lots of other goodies.
• Skip organic if it’s too expensive. Eating conventionally-grown produce is far better than not eating fruits and vegetables at all. The Environmental Working Group put together this list of the dirty dozen and the clean fifteen, if you want to watch out for the most contaminated ones. Either way, you should always wash your fruit and vegetables well. Simple water is fine.
• Bring your own lunch and snacks. Processed snack foods are expensive and usually provide very little nutrition. Get some re-sealable plastic bags or containers and make your own snacks with dried fruits and nuts, bananas, apples or any other seasonal fruit, plain yogurt (add your own fruit) or unsweetened apple sauce. For lunch, bring a salad or a sandwich – you can change it up every day and the opportunities are endless.
• Eat eggs – they are an excellent high-quality protein and very versatile. You can bring them along hard-boiled as a snack, make an egg salad or pre-cook a big batch of omelet that you’ll just have to reheat.
• Don’t buy any more empty calories. You can save a bundle of money by not buying any more chips, soda and other costly processed items
• Drink water. There’s no need to buy bottled water or fancy enhanced drinks. If you don’t like the taste of your tap water, a water filter works like a charm.

It’s not that hard…

It comes down to a basic concept. Avoid artificial, processed items and satisfy your sweet tooth with fruit. This might sound rough, but having diabetes or cancer is a lot rougher. Take little steps. Before you eliminate soda completely, make it a special treat, or put a little less sugar each week in your tea or coffee.

Start slow and make changes over time. The more you read about this, the more you’ll be motivated to change your habits, especially as you realize that you have a more balanced energy level, better concentration, a sharper memory and a sense of well-being – which is a big plus when you have to manage homework, exams and assignments along with work and your personal life.

1. Quickly reference important information

There are loads of mobile applications that have hit the market allowing students to effectively reference highly specialized detailed information. This information is nearly impossible to remember without using the chart stuffed in your binder or wasting time searching through a book. One such example of a mobile application is the New Oxford Dictionary Application on the iPhone.

If you come across a word that you don’t know the meaning of, simply pull out your phone, pull up the New Oxford Dictionary Application, nd look up the word! In a matter of ten seconds, you will have the word, the meaning, and the language of origin, along with many other important pieces of information about the word.

One other such application that is highly valuable to students is Periodic on the iPhone. This gives you the entire periodic table to reference for that dreaded chemistry homework that you would rather have a friend do for you.

Why this helps you get better grades: Being able to quickly reference important information using mobile applications will contribute to your success in getting better grades because by getting things done more efficiently and accurately, it will help you complete assignments quickly and ensure that you are always getting the right answer every time!

2. Plug and chug formulas

How many times have you solved the quadratic formula by hand? I am sure that number is way more times than you can count, or would like to remember for that matter!

With the power of new innovative mobile applications, solving equations like the quadratic formula and others become a breeze. No longer will you have to suffer from writer’s cramp writing out the same formula repeatedly…instead you can use a simple mobile application!

One such application that helps you solve the quadratic formula is the Quadradic Formula Solver for iPhone. Simply plug in the numbers that you need to solve for (a,b,c), press the solve button, and you will have your answer in less than a second.

Why this helps you get better grades: Obviously many other applications solve universal math equations quickly! Having these plug and chug applications on your phone to solve math or science problems will help you check your work so it is always accurate and cut down homework time, while helping you get the good grades you have always wanted to achieve!

3. Study materials in your pocket

Have you ever wanted to study for a test, but didn’t have your study cards with you? Or had to study the vocabulary for your foreign language class, but forgot to pack your cards in your back pack?

There is a mobile application that allows you to create your own flashcards to study on the fly! Flashcards Deluxe on the iPhone allows you to customize and study every little bit of your vocabulary or assignment essentials.

Why this helps you get better grades: Since your mobile device is small and compact, having this application on your phone makes so much sense. This is a fun application to help you study for that next big exam, while ensuring good grades.

4. Increase productivity and prioritization of assignments

As a student, your time is extremely valuable, and sometimes it is understandable that things fall through the cracks with everything you are juggling. Between homework, projects, and social time with friends sometimes everything can seem somewhat overwhelming.

Knowing when that next exam or homework assignment is due is a crucial part to earning good grades. iStudiez Pro on the iPhone gives you that freedom, and brings you peace of mind knowing it will help you stay on top of your crazy, busy schedule.

Why this helps you get better grades: By staying on top of your schedule, and because this application does all of the thinking and managing for you, there is no way you will miss a deadline, or forget to accomplish a homework assignment. Put this application to work for you in your studies and watch your grades soar!

5. Organize quick notes and ideas effectively

Have you ever been in class listening to a lecture and realized how much you hate taking notes the traditional boring way? Or even worse, have you stopped taking notes because your hand just couldn’t take it anymore?

If you answered “yes” to either of those questions, you are in luck! There are mobile applications on all mobile devices that give you the freedom to take notes and organize them in an interesting way so that you understand them on your terms.

Some applications that help you take notes and organize them in creatively are Mindmeister and iBlueSky .

Why this helps you get better grades: By using these types of applications, they allow your brain to see and organize information that you learn in a way that may be easier for you to remember. You can reference information easier in the future because you won’t be searching through lines of text to find what you are looking for. This will definitely help you get better grades as you exercise your mind using these apps to take notes, and remember the most important facts!

To Infinity And Beyond

The mobile application market is growing rapidly. The capabilities of applications are constantly improving. Fortunately, applications have advanced to the school front to make our lives easier and help us earn better grades. It’s exciting to think about where the mobile market will be in the next two years.

It’s not easy to become a college professor or instructor and those who do teach rightfully earned their positions. However, your expectations should be high when considering your future teachers. Here are a few key factors to keep in mind:

Educational Background: Most higher education instructors have a degree themselves, and many have a post-secondary degree such as a Master’s or a Doctorate. These are all important things to look for, but also pay attention to how your instructors’ degree can help you with your education. Does it directly relate to what he/she is teaching? Can you learn things from you instructors’ educational experience that might not be directly related to your degree program? How is one instructors’ education different from another, and how might that have an impact in the classroom? These are important questions to ask and important considerations that can effect your experience.

Real-World Experience: Some people will tell you that your instructor’s real-world work experience is even more important than their educational background. Do they know what its like to work in the field you are interested in? Do they have any first-hand experience to help you learn about what to expect and what things are most important to be successful in your career? Real-world experience can be crucial to your instructor’s understanding of the ins and outs of the degree you’re working to obtain, and extremely important to how quickly you’re able to comprehend what will be expected of you once you graduate.

Passion for the Subject: Passion can’t be measured by a certificate on a wall, or by reviewing a resume. This is something you’ll have to gauge on your own. The good news is, it should be fairly easy to see. Does he/she seem engaged when you talk to them about your career? Do they get excited when they talk about what you’ll be learning and the career you’re preparing yourself for? Do they keep up on industry news and share it with students? Are they generally enthusiastic about their own job? Pay attention to these things as well. You’ll know and appreciate it when you see it.

People Skills: Finally, when you have the chance to meet your potential instructors, pay attention to how they interact with you. Just like choosing a college that fits your lifestyle and appeals to how you learn, instructors are no different. That’s not to say you’re going to like or be friends with all of your instructors. But things like how they listen to you, and if they are able to relate to your own personal situation, can be important factors in your college experience.

There are many variables when considering college selection. Once your choices are narrowed down, it can make a big difference to take an intelligent look at the people who will instruct you. Finding ways to set yourself up for success is a big part of choosing the right college for you.

Unfortunately this is not always an easy process.  Some disciplines are very broad and others are more concentrated. You may know that you’re interested in helping people and want to get into the healthcare field but does that mean nursing?  Medical Assisting? Clinical or administrative healthcare?  Big hospital or small practice office?  Perhaps you like business but are you interested in accounting, marketing, or maybe management? What’s the difference?  There are so many options how can you start to narrow down the search?

To get started, here are a set of questions for you to ask yourself and a prospective college when evaluating whether a program is right for you:

What is the current level of Employment Demand? First things first, what am I interested in and will there be jobs available for me after I graduate?  There are multiple resources to use to help give you a sense of the employment market.  You can research hundreds of occupational profiles at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the O*Net OnLine, or your state’s department of labor website.  They will give you insights into what day to day life is like in that type of job, training and education usually required, plus employment projections and wage information.  Check employment publications or online sites, such as Monster.com or Careerbuilder.com, for available openings in your area and look at the posted job requirements.  Do I need a bachelor’s degree or higher or do most of the current job holders have an associate degree or a technical diploma?

Are there practical experiences, certifications or credentials required for employment? Some jobs, for various reasons, require certification or practical experience in order to find employment.  These could include professions like teaching or nursing, where you get mandatory hands-on practice and need to be certified with the state or another third party. In other professions, hiring managers may give special consideration to those holding industry certifications such as Microsoft® or Cisco® certifications in technology, or LEED certifications in construction management or drafting.  Do your research and find out what employers are looking for in their new hires and once you believe you’ve narrowed down your list of skills find a school that teaches those concepts in a program that meets your long term interests and goals.

What are the advantages that each institution provides through the course of my program? Does the curriculum include instruction for the skills that employers are asking that their employees have?  What supplemental benefits exist? Things like hands-on learning time, thorough lab components, internship or externship opportunities, scholarships, and career assistance.  Does the program prepare you for the industry certifications if they are required? Even if they aren’t required does the program include instruction on those topics? Are there labs with up-to-date equipment available on the campus?  Who are the instructors and what experiences do they bring to the daily classroom from outside the classroom?  What sorts of industry connections does the program have and what are some examples of employers who hire graduates of this program?

When it’s all said and done the decision to go back to college is an important one and choosing the right program is step one.  New training, a new degree, or a new certification can open many doors for you and it’s up to you to make an informed choice because you’re in charge of deciding which doors you want to open! Start doing your homework now because, not only is it good practice, getting an ‘A’ on this assignment could be the event that helps to kick-start your life in a whole new direction.

Keith Sawarynski
Director of Marketing
Westwood College

We often talk about finding the college that is right for you on this forum—a school that meets your professional goals, learning style, financial situation and personal obligations outside of pursuing a degree, from raising and caring for children to holding a full time job. One aspect of identifying the right college is considering how the college is accredited.

What is accreditation?

Accreditation is a process that most colleges and universities go through. Career-focused colleges like Westwood College, large private universities like Emory and Northwestern, state schools like Colorado State University, community colleges and other institutions of higher education go through accreditation processes to ensure that they meet standards for education and serve their students well.

Who conducts accreditations & what are some of the ways that students benefit from the process?

Colleges and universities are accredited by national and regional organizations that set standards for educational institutions and conduct intensive reviews of schools to ensure that they meet standards in areas ranging from the quality of the faculty to the content of what is taught in the classroom. There are also specialized accreditations that relate to specific professions to make sure that the college or university is doing a good job of preparing students for that given career. These specialized accreditations are found in a variety of program areas such as nursing, education and design.

National accreditation is overseen by organizations that are affiliated with the U.S. Department of Education. If you look up the accreditation process for colleges on the Department of Education’s website*, they describe it in a way that I think puts it nicely: “If an institution is accredited by a recognized agency, its teachers, coursework, and facilities, equipment, and supplies are reviewed on a routine basis to ensure students receive a quality education and get what they pay for”.

What are some of the other benefits for students?

One of the most practical is that national and regional accreditation enables students to access federal loans and grants, which many of our students utilize.* Another important benefit for students is that it affirms the value of students’ degrees when they go out into the job world to start their careers. Accreditation also has profound but less obvious benefits to students in the way it shapes their learning experience.

In what way?

Accreditation ensures that a college keeps the needs of students front and center in their priorities. That sounds obvious, but anyone who has been in education a long time knows that many things compete for attention in an educational institution. The best institutions strive to keep their focus on students and their academic experience, and the accreditation process provides a roadmap to ensure that students are getting what they need to be successful.

What is the difference between regional and national accreditation?

National accreditation agencies typically accredit institutions which specialize in instruction and training for a profession or careers. Regional accreditation agencies accredit institutions that are community colleges and state universities generally located in their respective geographic region. Both national and regional accreditation agencies are recognized by the U.S. Department of Education (http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation). These institutions review student performance by the level of support they receive as well as the teaching ability of the faculty and structure of the curriculum.

David Borofsky
Provost and Chief Academic Officer
Westwood College

* Financial aid available to those who qualify

It’s still a tough job market out there despite some recent economic turnaround. Giving your resume every advantage to stand out of the crowd may help you land a great job opportunity. Search engine optimization (SEO) can help your resume appear when potential employers search for qualified candidates online.

SEO is the practice of developing, reorganizing and link building for a website or document so that it achieves top position on organic search listings. It is possible to optimize your resume so that it appears in both organic search rankings (like Google’s search results) and also comes up when employers search job sites like Monster and LinkedIn.

The very first task is getting your resume online. A beginning step is to post it to basic and industry-specific job sites. A more advanced tactic is to buy a URL that describes the job you are seeking. For example, someone looking for an animation job in New York may purchase the URL www.NewYorkAnimator.com from a domain site such as GoDaddy.com and post their resume. It is then possible to optimize that website for SEO by putting keywords in the page title and title tag.

What are keywords? Keywords are the high-traffic words and terms that people are searching for online. Including them strategically is a critical part of SEO. Think about what terms an employer would use to search for job candidates on a site like LinkedIn. For example, if a recruiter is looking for an experienced graphic designer for a management position, they may search “Creative Director” or “design expertise.” You can then test your guesses with a free site like Google Analytics.

Don’t overstuff the keywords in the text. Insert them where they occur naturally, with an emphasis on placing them in titles and headings. Keep the content short and to-the-point to boost SEO ranking along with readability once a recruiter is actually reading the document. Also, if your resume includes images, be certain the images are labeled with keywords.

Include links to relevant industry sites, publications or other websites featuring your experience or work. You can also try to get other sites to link to your resume, which helps improve search engine ranking. If you keep your social media sites like Facebook and Twitter professionally appropriate, include links to your pages on these sites at the bottom of the resume. Remember, even if you don’t include a link to your Facebook account on your resume, prospective employers may see it so either make it work-appropriate or set the privacy settings very high. I actually recommend doing both.

Follow these tips along with traditional job search methods to give your resume a boost over the competition.

Petra Andrade
Senior Internet Marketing Manager
Westwood College

Over the past 100 years, the college experience has drastically changed for new university students. The technological trends, amazing innovations, and interesting economic shifts have had a great impact on how one goes about completing their college education and achieving their desired degree. Examining the various trends and technological innovations of higher education over the years is extremely interesting.

1. Handwritten to Personal Computers

When was the last time that you were required to write out your 20-page term paper on 8.5 x 11 inch lined sheets, where whiteout was your best friend, and the “neat” strikethrough was something you tried to “hide,” within your paper that took you 15-plus hours to complete?

I am sure the thought of writing 20 pages on lined paper is something that you would rather not deal with, or even like to think about doing, as it would probably drive you nuts knowing about the pain and agony it would cause your hand. With the dawn of the word processor and personal computer around the 1980s, the thought of writing your paper out by hand was considered “a thing of the past.”

Even though the typewriter did have a massive impact on how students completed their written work from the 1870s to the 1980s, it appears that the word processor and personal computer are here to stay and will become the standard in how students complete their written assignments from this day forward.

How does this trend affect the college education experience? Completing assignments on a personal computer makes it easy for students to edit their work and for professors to grade. This flexibility increases the students’ quality of work.

2.  Written Tests to Online Tests

As a university student, when was the last time you took a test and what format was it in? You were probably given an essay question where you filled out bluebooks with your answer, or were handed a printed test and instructed to write the out the answers.

On occasion, the scantron multiple-choice test was a useful alternative. The scantron test would give the teacher or professor an easier time grading tests, and give them the flexibility to hand out different versions of the test to ensure that students didn’t cheat while taking it.

3. Blackboard to Virtual Classrooms and Classroom Podcasts

The classroom environment has evolved significantly. For years, teachers used chalk on a blackboard and then classrooms began using transparencies on an overhead projector.  Now universities around the country are utilizing new and innovative whiteboards.

As the online revolution continues, more options for achieving a degree are revealed. The dawn of the virtual classroom has taken off. Professors can now record lectures in real time. By doing so, students can sit in front of their computer and watch webcasts of the lecture being given anywhere in the world.

There are even cases where professors themselves are technologically advanced enough to create podcasts of their lectures to help students who miss class. One such example is professor Hubert Dreyfus, who is a Philosophy Professor at UC Berkeley. His philosophy podcast can be listened to by anyone in the world.

How does this trend affect the college education experience? Students and teachers are now using innovative ways to package and deliver content. As long as the classroom environment continues to evolve with new and innovative technology, the student will continue to excel.

4. Computers to the Connected Web

The dawn of the computer changed the way students consumed information, and even more so changed the way they completed their written papers. As the internet came barreling into the limelight, everything changed for the better as colleges, universities, and the attending students became more connected than ever before.

The connection that students and teachers have using the internet is extremely powerful. College professors now have the freedom to place any and all of their course work, syllabus, assignments and class notes onto the net for their students to access and download at their leisure. Students have instant access to all coursework materials and can connect with their teachers through e-mail if any issues occur.

How does this trend affect the college education experience? The internet-learning environment creates flexibility for the student and teacher. Students can study from the comfort of their own home and teachers are able to leverage it effectively to accomplish the goals for each semester.

5. Private Universities to Online Colleges

Back in the early days of higher education, only the wealthy were granted the right to attend the most prestigious universities around the country. Most of the individuals attending these schools came from “old money” and always were a step above the rest of those in society.

As time moved forward, the creation of public universities and community colleges brought opportunity. The dawn of the internet and online colleges created an entirely new industry. Attending an expensive prestigious university may be fun to think about, but realizing that there are other options is the first step to accomplishing everything you want out of life.

Currently, earning a degree isn’t as hard as people make it out to be. There are many options for the prospective student. For most, the online college route is extremely convenient, and allows the teacher and student flexibility and achievement. Before choosing online college, make sure that the online college is accredited and has everything you are looking for!

How does this trend affect the college education experience? Having the freedom to get a degree from an online college really levels the playing field for someone who doesn’t have the time or resources to attend a traditional college. Giving individuals the freedom to choose is the best of both worlds, for the market and the individual welfare of those who choose to go down this path.

As new technological advances continue to spread through our national and worldly culture, every single change will forever transform the experiences that university students have during their four-year undergrad college experience.  Although its exciting to think about the effects global technology has on the education system, we can’t forget where we have come from as we progress forward.

David Borofsky
Provost and Chief Academic Officer
Westwood College

As a college student you are expected to work hard and remain committed throughout your education—and most students expect, understandably, their hard work and commitment will help land them a job upon graduation. However, a college should work just as hard – or harder – to ensure its students are fully equipped to pursue their professional goals.

Here are five suggested questions to ask of potential colleges before you enroll:

1. Do you have programs to help students identify a career path? You might not know what career you want to pursue at the time you enter college, so be sure to ask prospective colleges what type of guidance is available to students who are still deciding on a career.
2. What kinds of scholarships are available? Ask what types of scholarships are available for your entire educational experience, not just the first year or two.
3. Does your school offer on- or off- campus employment opportunities? Inquire about on-campus jobs that can help students pay their bills, career opportunities at the school once you graduate if you are interested in higher education, and internship opportunities, paying specific attention to how the college helps students pursue internships that will aid in building a successful career.
4. What do you do to help students find a job before and after they graduate? Ask the college if they have a career center that focuses on helping students identify potential jobs and if these services will continue to be available after a student graduates. Find out how many graduates secure a job in their field of study and ask if the college has any programs that will help students who have graduated, but haven’t yet found a job. For example, Westwood College’s Employment Pledge helps students who graduate in good academic standing but haven’t yet secured a job by offering financial assistance for up to six months (additional terms and conditions apply, see website for details).
5. Does the school offer ongoing support to graduates? Ask your college what types of services are available to graduates beyond landing that first job—such as career advice, tuition assistance for continuing education programs, ongoing access to career counselors, graduate retraining for fields that continually change, etc.

Every prospective college student is different, so take the time to think about what type of college experience is most important to you and do not rush the selection process. Diligence and research on the front end will help ensure your school works hard for you in the areas that matter most for meeting your future goals.

Don Patarino
Vice President – Training and Operations
Westwood College