Taking Charge of Your College Education

The Essential Checklist

College Preparation Checklist

(Download .pdf)

In High School (“Getting Ready”)

  • Start dreaming about what you’ll do after high school and college.
  • Learn about jobs you find interesting.
    • Talk to people who have those jobs.
    • Take classes related to those jobs, even if they’re not “cool.”
  • Build your analysis skills.
    • Work especially hard in English and math.
    • Dig deeply into the subjects you find interesting (Google is a great tool for this kind of analytical digging).
  • Build your people skills.
    • Be friendly to everyone, especially kids with different perspectives than yours.
    • Learn how to learn things from everyone you meet.
  • Build your moral sense.
    • Learn to judge how the things you’re doing today will affect your goals for the future.
    • Create your own personal rules of behavior and honor.

Before College (“Choosing a School”)

  • Prepare for the ACT/SAT and take it until your score represents your true ability.
  • Decide what you want from college; try to answer questions like these:
    • “How much do I want to pay?”
    • “How much do I care about prestige?”
    • “Do I like big schools or smaller ones?”
    • “How much should I care about staying close to home or going to college with friends?”
    • “Do I like competing for grades and recognition?”
    • “Am I likely to go to graduate school or straight to work after college?”
    • “What subjects do I want to study?”
  • Build your own college “ranking.”
    • Call a department.
      • Study the web site in advance.
      • Test their friendliness.
      • Ask about graduate placement.
    • Visit the campus.
      • Attend a class.
      • Visit with a professor.
      • Walk the campus.
      • Visit the Institute of Religion.
    • Seek spiritual confirmation.

In College

  • Always have a career dream.
    • Try to find a career that aligns with things you enjoying thinking about.
    • Aim high and broad at first.
  • Always have a major.
    • Don’t wait—act as if you know, and seek confirmation as you go.
    • Learn to think like the successful people in your major do.
  • Customize your degree.
    • Modify your major “blueprint” to include courses—maybe a whole minor—that will make the major “work.”
    • Be careful about majors with many required hours; be sure that you need them all to meet your career goals.
    • Try to satisfy the requirements for an associate’s degree on the way to the bachelor’s.
  • Find great teachers.
    • Seek out the teachers who challenge and reward their students the most.
    • Pay the price to be mentored.
  • Do your best work.
    • Put your studies ahead of extracurricular activities and part-time jobs.
    • Stay ahead of the game by preparing for class and completing assignments before they’re due.
    • Always attend class, participate in the discussion, and take good notes.
    • Seek guidance from the course syllabus and the teacher.
  • Connect your degree to what comes next.
    • Participate in out-of-class activities related to your career.
    • Do off-campus internships.
  • Get all the HSJ skills you can.
    • Take courses that teach analysis skills, people skills, and moral sense.
    • Engage in fieldwork (courses that take you out of the classroom).
    • Think about analysis skills, people skills, and moral sense in all of your studies and activities.