Ep.9/ 1:1 Coaching Session [Part 2]: How to Start Thinking about College Admissions as a Freshman
In this episode We continue our CONVERSATION with a high school freshman who is thinking about college admissions, and we discuss why it is so important to start thinking about it now.
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In this episode of Admittedly Podcast, Thomas takes us through a coaching session with a participant who is currently a freshman. Thinking about college admissions ahead of time can make a difference when it comes to analyzing all the options and alleviating the pressure.
Part 2 of this coaching session is all about Thomas explaining how the experiences learned with a summer/temporary job can be applied to college applications.
Thomas highlights that nowadays schools tend to look for students who have specific interests and talents, besides having good grades. The ‘uniqueness’ of a student is what is making the difference, and a job can really help in this way.
Key Highlights
It’s normal to feel pressure as a freshman when thinking about college.
A good college is fundamental, but it’s not a guarantee of success.
Why is it important to think about college ahead of time?
A lot of students have the same thoughts and concerns by this time.
It’s ok not to know what you’re passionate about as a freshman.
About Thomas
Thomas is a parent and alumnus of the University of Pennsylvania. After earning his MBA at the Wharton School in 2003, he moved to Silicon Valley. For three years, he was director of admissions and financial aid at Wharton School. He worked closely with admissions professionals, students, alumni, and professors to create the best possible MBA class.
Thomas has been an entrepreneur his entire life in the fields of finance, agriculture, wellness, and sporting goods. As the founder of Global Education Opportunities, he works with diverse and underserved communities to help them become successful college students. Thomas started the podcast Admittedly because he is passionate about demystifying the application process for parents and applicants.
Related Links
Apply to be a guest: www.thomascaleel.com/apply-for-podcast
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Instagram: @admittedlypodcast
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Hello, and welcome to the admittedly podcast. My name is Thomas Caleel. I'm the former director of MBA admissions and financial aid for my alma mater, the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. In this podcast, I don't promise easy answers or quick fixes. But I will use my decades of experience to help you achieve your education goals. Now, let's get started.
Hello, and welcome back to the admittedly podcast. I'm your host, Thomas Caleel. And this is part two of my most recent live coaching session. We're talking today with Maui, a ninth grade student based in California, who is understandably skeptical about why he needs to be thinking about college admissions, when they are three years in the future. His parents would like to know how they can help him pursue his interests and what they should be doing now, as a freshman to prepare him for the eventual admissions process. We left off talking about extracurricular activities, and what interests Maori the most. Today, we're going to be talking about how this can be applied to a college application and woven into his story. And then finally, the last thing here is work. Tell us about work. Why why did you get this job?
So our first time Japanese schools, you said, you have to do something on the weekend, you can't just sit on your butt and do nothing. I'm just gonna begins. So as I say, Okay, let's try a couple of things where I looked around the pizza phase, we've been going to for over six years now since we moved here. Have they really short staffed because I COVID. And then they were just like, kind of give you a really short setting when you need help. Said, Okay, can I get a job over the weekend or something? And we worked it out over a couple of weeks. And then I started working there in late August, early September. Okay. Every weekend from 330 to sorry, from three to 730 Every, every weekend.
And do you like it?
It's it keeps me busy. I met a lot of new people there. They're all nice. It's been kind of an eye opening experience, like working the position of the service provider, and food and having to like deal with customers instead of just being customer having to deal with annoying it was the food service provider like for like missing up or something like that?
It's been? Oh, no, I'm sorry. Go ahead.
See the other perspective, you can see the other side of this understanding how he did business.
Her enough, I've often thought that everybody should have to work in customer service or sales at some point in their life. It's a very good, very good learning experience. And so what what do you do with the money that you're in there?
buy clothes, shoes, games, then I'll save a cafe at least I'll just spend more than 100 $200 at the most similar spin. So not to spend too, too.
Great. And is that will you be? We've kind of transitioned over to to the summer. Will you be working at the pizza place this summer or LTS? Okay, and will that be like full time or what what do you plan to do this summer?
Still figuring that out? I'll talk to our manager about it when when it comes. Kind of I don't play by ear in terms of that. I do have a few like summer camps and activities planned social work around those but other than that, it should be just like sitting at home working.
Okay, and what what, what are those camps and activities?
Just one that can't be to sleepaway camp up near Lake Arrowhead in one Junior left for camp that's going to happen down in Santa Monica.
I'm sorry, Junior. You said junior lifeguard. Yeah. And what? Tell me a little bit about that, please.
So I was like kind of interested in doing it beforehand. Because before I started working at a pizza place because of like, I thought I would just like paid better than working at Pizza goes and Pasadena. And one of my friends there was telling me that he was a junior lifeguard. When we sent him he makes it 90 miles an hour as always kind of interesting. So so if you're interested in that, then but it can start training until like 15 or 16. So it's literally the time when I was like start now. Do a little bit now before I start, like fully committed to the training.
Okay, great. And what and how many weeks is a junior lifeguard process? Six weeks somewhere? Oh, great. So, I think that sounds like a very busy. How long is the sleepaway camp?
How long? One week?
One week? Okay, great. Um, that sounds like quite a bit of fun. So we've got sleepaway camp for one week, six weeks of junior lifeguards, and then kind of filling in the gaps, drum lessons and work. Are you excited about that plan?
Seems a little bit better than school.
Okay, fair enough. Fair enough. Fair enough. And I think so I think of all the things that we've talked about, right? What it? Is there anything that particularly stands out for you anything that particularly the, you say, Hey, this is, you know, this is really something that I would like to pursue further, I really want to kind of dig in on this a little bit, are we still at the lots of different things going on.
So I mean, when I can, I do definitely want to go through life by training, it's a very Zulia life skill, I can always use if I need to, especially in southern California, near the beach, where everyone has pools, it's always going to be a useful skill to have on hand. I feel like making myself manage my own money. And then like managing money, in general just feels like a call out to me makes it which is like simple. Just crunch numbers, if you have to just like make rules for yourself. And you just want to be the only person like who's making you do as you said, that will kind of stand out to me.
Okay, fair enough. Okay, and this is why, you know, we loop back to your original question, right? And our original conversation, this is why we start having this conversation around ninth grade. Right. So I think, you know, this summer, we have an interesting, summer planned, you sound pretty busy, right? And generally, between freshman sophomore year, you get a bit of a pass, right, you can kind of explore a little bit, see what it is you want to do, right. But as we move forward through our high school career, or through your high school career, it starts to get important for you to develop a little bit more depth, right. And the reason is, when we go back to your, your initial kind of breakdown of what you think a school might look for, use the term interesting and unique, right? So I would look for somebody, I'd kind of go past the standard stuff and look for somebody who's interesting and unique. And one of the ways you demonstrate interestingness or uniqueness, right, I don't think interestingness is word, but anyway we're gonna go with it is look for consistent performance and progression over time. Because if you think about even if you think about this from just a real life, common sense perspective, if you meet somebody, and they say, you know, for example, if your cooking teacher walked in and said, I love cooking, and you say great, you know, tell me like, how did you develop your love of cooking? Where'd you learn how to cook? And you said, I don't know what few Tiktok videos and thought would be a good idea. Right? You might not take that as seriously, as somebody like your teacher who comes in and says, Well, I owned a big catering business. I've been cooking professionally for 25 years and you know, went to the CIA, and, you know, did all the Culinary Institute of America, I don't know, maybe at the CIA, they also train you how to cook has a good cover story, but but we're talking about the Culinary Institute of America here. And, you know, or something similar. And so what schools are really looking at is when you get to senior year, and you're telling them, okay, I'm Maui, this is who I am, this is what matters to me, this is what I want to do, they're going to look for evidence of that. Right? And this is the trap that most students get into is they start trying to put that evidence together, late junior year or early senior year, at that point is a little bit too late. Right? And so, without trying to make you feel like we're, you're being pushed into a specific direction, or onto a specific track, right. It's more thinking about, okay, how am I thinking about my extracurricular activities? How am I thinking about school class selection? How am I thinking about my summer activities, right. And so also just to kind of, you know, arm you with a good argument for your parent with your parents, so that you can say, if you develop something that you really think is something you're passionate about, and you really enjoy. You can say, Listen, I would like to spend a lot more time here, right? So I've got these other extra things that I'm doing that I think need to fall away a little bit because this is really how I want to spend my time, right? Because as you're looking at this field of super qualified, super interesting applicants, you look for the ones who are very deep in a particular area. So when And your parents brought this up, you know, the things are more competitive, not necessarily more competitive, but just different. So when we were applying to college, the schools would look for people who were well rounded, right. So you had to have good grades, you had to do some sports, you did a little bit of volunteering, and you kind of wear this all around involved person. But what they realize is that that created, in effect, kind of horizontal layers in the class of people who are very, very similar, right, don't get a lot of diversity in the class, by those metrics on any level of diversity of thought, socio economic diversity, you know, all the metrics of diversity that you want when you're trying to build a very interesting class. So now, what the universities are doing is they're looking for people, schools in general, not just universities, but they're looking for people who are really, really deeply invested in interesting in one or two things, right. So you get somebody who's very into biology, somebody who's a very gifted musician, somebody who's a very gifted athlete, somebody who's a very gifted artist, when you put them all together in a class, they share, they grow. And that's a really interesting, that's where you call your parents, you say, oh, my gosh, like, I've got this person, my study group, and they're the most, they're, they're this crazy, you know, chemist, and they're always thinking of new ways to combine things. I'm learning all this interesting things I never would have thought about before, right. And that's what the universities are kind of looking for. And so what we want to do, what we hope happens over this next year or so for you, is you start to develop an interest in different things that we can then you know, that you can then talk about in the admissions process later as who you are, right, because you're standing up and unapologetically saying your senior year, hey, this is me, this is what I'm interested in. And this is what I want to get out of my education experience. Right? And it's okay school, if that's not a good fit. Because I'm also interested in this school and this school because I know myself and I know what I want out of this process. And that's what we're trying to get to not this lockstep path forward, where you're kind of, you know, having to commit to things right now, it's just more of a thoughtful process of exploration on your point. Okay. So, I heard something interesting. Sorry, I'm gonna, just gonna, kind of gonna kind of bring this up where there was a conversation around, well, how does the work? Matter? Right? I don't want to own a pizza shop professionally. So how do you think your How do you think your time at this pizza place would be valuable? As an admissions officer is looking at your file?
I mean, I like the very basic, bare minimum, which is something different, like somebody's going to see. So like, a lot of my friends will ask me like, how do you start with them? So here are the three like 14? How did you know? So I think it's a very nice to say something. That's not the same as like all the other applicants. It was like, just take a look at the standards a little bit more, like increase your chances to get in. And also, like, target every single day saved up for Lord knows how long to get a computer, right? Volunteers are like New Year's birthdays. So it feels like oh, that's kind of cool, right? Spending, like saving up and spending my money. When I was like, Okay, can I start making more money. So I can, like, you know, do that on my own afford not to ask my parents who tend to want something. So then, it kind of happened at the same time as the game was happening at school. And then my mom said, during the weekends, I said earlier, and the Beatles were short staffed. And so I said, Hey, can help out here. And they're friendly with everyone he looked like he was, especially as this is shared once you come in on the weekends. So then I started just gonna, I came in one day, you give me a shirt, and then I'm just gonna start doing my job. You went at
it. And so I think, you know, I think that that is a great story. I love the fact that you want to or want to earn your own money, you want to have that autonomy and independence, which is great. I think that too, from an admission standpoint, right. What are some of the things that that an admissions officer would would note on that? Something you said before, right, being able to deal with difficult situations, right, being in a position of service, which is not easy, right? Responsibility, work ethic, right having to work when you're tired or don't feel like it or you got to burn from one of the pizza pans or it's slammed and everybody's yelling at you, and you're overwhelmed, right. So all of those things, I think, help build Build a an outline of you, right and a description of you, that is a really good foundation. And obviously, you're not doing it for that you're doing it, your parents are encouraging you to do that, you know, also for life skills, right? These are all things that will serve you very, very well throughout your life. Right. So, all of these things come into play. Now, I don't want everybody to go run out and get a job just for the sake of doing it. I hate it. I mean, it's, it's, it's something where there has to be intent and there has to be meaning there. But it is something where you are learning things. You know, it's like, athletics, right? Athletics matter. Because you learn teamwork, you learn sacrifice, you learn how to win gracefully, you learn how to lose and improve yourself, right? So that when you go then to a good university, and you don't get the best grade in the class, you know how to deal with that you know, how to step back and assess, and, you know, change your habits and attack it again, right? Much in the same way you would if you didn't swim well, and you went back in the pool and work with your coach on your stroke or your turn or, you know, all of those things, your reaction times? Right. Okay. So I think that, you know, we've covered a lot of ground here, we have one more small bit to go. And that would be academics. Because at the end of the day, you know, and you made a statement where, you know, for the, for a lot of the applicants, this kind of 4.5 GPA, high test scores is expected, right? And you're correct. But it's very important, and a lot of in some people will lose sight of this, you know, it's very important to realize that at a university out of college, the professors really are the most important constituency at the school. Alright, it's not the administration, it's not the deans, it's not the students, it's the professors. Because if you think about what a university really is, it's a place where knowledge is sought and generated. And that's led by the professors, the professor's, the faculty that are doing research, supported by PhD candidates, Masters candidates, and then they're taking that knowledge that they're actively creating and passing it on to the students and disseminating it out into the wider world. So as an admissions office, right, you have a lot of stakeholders. So you have the coaches coming in and saying, Listen, we need, you know, these kind of athletes to fill out our rosters you have the arts department coming in and saying we need to violinists and oboist a drummer, and our sculpture cohort is a little bit low. So we'd like some more people interested in sculpture and visual arts, right? And you have literally dozens, if not hundreds of these stakeholders. But your primary stakeholder, of course, are the faculty and the faculty are saying we want students who are intellectually curious, who burn with a desire to learn, right? Somebody who's going to come in our classroom and be active, and engage with us engage with their fellow students, and really add something of value. And that is not just about good grades. Okay. Your mother was kind enough to share your transcripts with me and you're doing well. Right? You should be you should be proud of that. There's there's no, there's no glare required there. You've done well. Right. So what and I'm not going to read your transcripts on the podcast, don't worry. Tell me a little bit though about you as a student, what do you like to study what interests you if if you've developed an interest yet?
I really don't like English, or history in general. Just that kind of feels repetitive like every US always was at the same learning the same things especially in English really. Maybe the biggest thing there was music another quote from email but even further back in history, your ruler read like to kill Mockingbird this year. Let's read Shakespeare next year at work. I don't want to make them read this. But this is 400 years ago. I don't need to learn about some old old do writing in England if I'm living in now, America. And then the math I feel like he's always getting something on there's always building upon what we learned. The past week, the past semesters has years. We're always building upon it and going somewhere else with the we worked on. Especially with my teachers. I've always been lucky with any good teachers for math especially. We're like, let us like lead us through tell us exactly what's happening like kind of make us figure out what's happening on a periodic let's see, like one day we were within the project equations, as they were taught us once a week of the completing the square which is in itself method of excellent voice Edexcel all those words, humaneness dude, I humanistically, to swear on the standard form of quadratic, to get to work with a quadratic equation, which is, you know, which is a type of the standard method that everyone was used to solvers. And so his method of having us do the work or like leading us through the work to get to, from point A to point B, instead of just telling Oh, this is what a disappointing here's how you get there, ahead of leading us through the path through taking us through the steps, and building upon what we already had. The past couple weeks is kind of what's the thing is see this? Oh, this is going to be able to see Juliet, they like each other, their families. Deal with it.
Fair enough. Fair enough. And and, and my question is, with, there's so much to unpack here, with the math, does that translate to physics as well? Is it generally like stem that you're interested in? Or is specifically math?
Physics, so it just kind of like laid back he is very, like, enthusiastic about teaching, which is very, like, I appreciate that from him. And this is like, it's definitely something I don't dislike doing. But I'm not gonna go out of my way to pursue a degree in physics itself. I think it's just more it's definitely more like simple mathematic. I don't, I'm not trying to do calculus abbc are here because I don't know it's like logarithms and I'm looking forward to that. But if it's something as simple as just putting in numbers doing the work within if I was, you know, that's I like doing that, instead of just building bridges.
Okay, but like calc A, B Calc, BC that falls on the math side, not on the science side.
I think it's just, I enjoy like building upon what I have, instead of just plugging in formulas. To get more engaging, and stay based want to learn more than just having just totally memorize this. This is.
Okay, I think this is a good time to take a break, and we'll pick up in our next episode when we discuss summer activities in more depth. We will also discuss how your path can change over the next three years, and how you can use these experiences to determine the best college for you. We will then talk about how to craft that into a compelling narrative and story that you can put into your college application essays. Thank you for tuning in today. And if you are a parent or student who would like to be a guest on a future episode of the admittedly podcast, please apply at Thomas caleel.com. Thank you. Thank you for joining us today. Please take a moment to subscribe to the admittedly podcast and download this episode. I welcome to share your thoughts and questions with me. You can find us on social media at intuitively podcast. I look forward to continue our journey together.
