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Terms to Know: Match & Fit
Terms to Know: Match & Fit
Deciding on a college can be challenging. Your counselors and CCC staff can work with you throughout your research and application process to help you narrow down your choices. In order to help you decide, we’ll categorize information you’ve collected about schools according to a college’s match and its fit.
Match
Match
The qualities colleges look for in their applicants
GPA
ACT / Test Scores
Course Selection
Fit
Fit
The qualities you are looking for in a college. For example:
Majors / Programs
Sports / Clubs
Professors
Community / Diversity
School Size
Region / Location
and much, much more!
Terms to Know: Safety, Target, Reach
Terms to Know: Safety, Target, Reach
Throughout your research process you may hear your counselor and CCC staff talking about schools in terms of them being a safety, a target, or a reach. These terms will help us, and you, identify the likelihood you will be admitted to a school. A lot goes into how colleges choose their students, so it’s a good idea to have a couple schools picked across each of the three “levels.” It’s important to note, regardless of which level a school falls within, it is still a school that you’d be excited to attend.
Safety
Safety
A school is a safety school if your GPA, test scores, and course selection exceeds the match requirements of the college. A safety school should feel like a good fit, even if it doesn’t have everything you want.
Target
Target
Target schools are ones maintaining academic standards you comfortably meet. If a school falls here for you, you match well within the range of students the school typically accepts. These schools should meet most of your fit criteria, too!
Reach
Reach
These are your dream schools, the schools that’d be a perfect fit if money and grades were no option. Typically, your reach schools are ones that maintain match criteria above your own grades and scores.
College Research
College Research
Picking the right college for you comes down to many different factors: cost; location; programs or areas of study offered; and class sizes are just a handful of some of things you might consider as you're choosing a college that works for you. Luckily, there are a number of different resources that you can use to help you narrow down your college search and pick the right school for you.
Your Starting Place: Xello College Search
Your Starting Place: Xello College Search
MORE TO COME
Other College Search Websites
Other College Search Websites
College research often begins will College Search websites. Most college search databases offer curious students similar information. The ones profiled here can extend the info you may receive from a Naviance college search. Additionally, each platform covered here offers unique quirks that will allow you to dig deeper into the colleges you're interested in, on the aspects that matter most to you!
Remember, college search websites are a great place to start! Checking out the website of the each of the colleges you're interested in is an invaluable resource for specific info about a school and contacts you begin reaching out to!
What Makes This Tool Unique:
Of the college search tools profiled here, College Board can be considered the "one size fits all" option. It features an overview on most of the general info your might be looking for about colleges. Things such as diversity measures, graduation rates, average GPA and test scores of admitted students, and much more are featured. CollegeBoard is a great place to start your research because it also offers the application deadlines for colleges you search on the platform. It can be a great place to end your research as well, as it features a robust scholarship database in addition to info about colleges.
What Makes This Tool Unique:
College Results is a search tool that will be most beneficial for the "number crunchers." If you appreciate data, graphs, and percentages, College Results offers visualizations of the info pertaining to a college in ways that other tools do not.
What Makes This Tool Unique:
Niche is unique in that it offers students a college search experience that can be strongly informed by a students' desired Fit. Similarly to Naviance's SuperMatch tool, Niche offers students the chance to build a list of colleges that takes into consideration a profile of their Fit (and some Match) factors. Check out Niche if you have a strong sense of what you're looking for in a college and want your search results to reflect those desires. Similarly to the CollegeBoard tool, Niche features a scholarship database.
What Makes This Tool Unique:
Of all the tools featured on this page, TuitionTracker puts college costs at the forefront. Searching a college on TuitionTracker allows students to quickly get an estimate* of the cost of their desired college. These results can even be modified in relation to your family's income as well. If you're looking for even more info on paying for college, check out our Financial Aid Pages
* = Remember, you won't know the true cost of a college until you've been accepted!!
More In This Section:
More In This Section:
BIPOC Serving Institutions & The Common App
BIPOC Serving Institutions & The Common App
There are many different types of colleges out there, and we hope to offer students as much info as we can! In addition to the tools highlight on this page, the College Research section of the CCC Corner includes an overview on BIPOC (Black Indigenous & People of Color) Serving Institutions. For students interested in learning about how to maximize the time they spend on applying to college, check out the Common App section! Links for both can be found below!
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