Posts by Michael Trivette:

Is There a Private School Advantage in College Admissions?

Posted on: 29 Mar 2014

Prior to the 1920s, attendance at a top-flight prep school was nothing less than a prerequisite for admission into an Ivy League college.

What students should know about the new SAT

Posted on: 07 Mar 2014

This past week, College Board president, David Coleman, announced plans for a major SAT overhaul.  The new SAT, which will be introduced in 2016, aims to realign with the “work of our high schools” and more accurately assess what students should be learning before college.  Much of the commentary around Coleman’s recent announcement has been […]

What to do if you’re deferred

Posted on: 26 Dec 2013

Deferred.  It’s a word that every early applicant dreads. Neither accepted nor denied, deferred students often feel as if they have been banished to college admissions purgatory, sentenced to a state of suffering and uncertainty from which they can do nothing to extricate themselves. Fortunately, deferment is not the hopeless state of limbo it appears […]

About That D in Freshman English…

Posted on: 02 Dec 2013

If your high school career has been an uninterrupted parade of top notch grades, near perfect standardized test scores, and saintly behavior then you can stop reading… Except you probably won’t since you perfectionists like to finish every single thing you start, right? Academic blemishes come in all shapes and sizes, from bombing sophomore year […]

Showing Colleges Some Love: How to Demonstrate Interest in Your Prospective Schools and (Perhaps) Earn Admission in the Process

Posted on: 10 Sep 2013

As colleges move to data-driven means of tracking information on prospective students, they have become increasingly savvy about predicting enrollment behavior and gauging an applicant’s true level of interest.  Schools often refer to this as the “interest quotient,” and admitting students with high scores on this measure can improve a college’s yield rate, and in turn, […]

When it comes to your courses, choose wisely

Posted on: 26 Jul 2013

“It’s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game.” This age-old maxim applies not just to sports, but to high school and to college admissions as well.  Many students would be surprised to discover that their strength of curriculum, or the types of courses in which they enroll during high school, […]

Making $ense Out of Summer School

Posted on: 07 Jul 2013

When most high school students and college students think about their summer break, most usually don’t think about taking summer courses.  Increasingly, colleges have realized this as well and many colleges are now offering tuition discounts for summer courses in an effort to increase their summer enrollment.  Duquesne University offers a 25% tuition discount to undergraduates […]

Get Ahead This Summer

Posted on: 23 May 2013

Despite belief (and perhaps wishes) to the contrary, summer plays an extremely important role in the college admissions process.  These next few months give rising seniors, many of whom are otherwise bogged down with projects and exams, the opportunity to prepare their applications, round out their applicant profile, and bypass the crunch that many other […]