UPPER ARLINGTON HIGH SCHOOL COLLEGE CENTER
Welcome to the College Center Information guide for the 2007/08 school year! CEEB Code: 361-630 – Identifies UAHS to All Colleges/Universities Family Connection Software: We are pleased to announce that Upper Arlington High school has selected Family Connection from Naviance to offer a comprehensive website that you and your family can use to assist in gathering information for making decisions about colleges and careers. Family Connection is a product of the Naviance Corporation, which is use in our office to track and analyze data about college and career plans, therefore it provides up-to-date information that's specific to our school. Try out the system by visiting the website: www.connection.naviance.com/uahs. The guest password is HarryBear (case sensitive – one word). Freshman, sophomores, juniors, seniors, and parents who have not joined Family Connection: Please e-mail the College Center: collegecenter@uaschools.org at your earliest convenience. Mrs. Hartfelder, the College Center Secretary, or Mr. Davis, the College Counselor, will respond to your e-mail, to provide you with the necessary instructions for joining Family Connection. In your e-mail please provide the student’s name and grade level. Parents with more than one student attending the high school should list the names of each of their students and his/her grade level. Family Connection’s software is the College Center’s fastest and most comprehensive communication system available for providing information to students and parents. Please take the time to contact the College Center to sign up for access to this program. It is important to note that the developers of this software will not sell your names to third party organizations. Naviance Corporation uses state of the art security systems to over see the software and guarantee their customers that student information will not be accessible to Internet hackers. Evening Meetings to place on your calendar: There will be two senior student and parent/guardian meetings this fall, three junior student and parent meetings this winter, one sophomore student and parent meeting in the winter, and one freshman student and parent meeting in the winter. Each meeting will occur in the West Cafeteria and take place between 7:30 PM and 9:00 PM for the senior, junior, and sophomore programs with 8:45 PM until 9:00 PM being dedicated time for questions from the attendees, followed by an optional Family Connection Demonstration from 9:00 PM until 9:30 PM. The freshman program will begin at 7:30 PM and end at 8:30 PM with a question and answer session from 8:30 PM until 8:45 PM followed by an optional Family Connection demonstration ending no later than 9:30 PM. The following are the meeting dates and a title of each meeting: Senior Student/Parent: Wed., Sept. 12, 2007 - College Planning, “Where are you in the process?” Senior Student/Parent: Wed., Nov. 14, 2007 - Financing College Freshman Student/Parent: Wed., January 23, 2008 –Basic College
ACT, SAT, and possibly SAT II: These tests should be taken for the first time during the second semester of the junior year. Some students self select to take these tests earlier during his/her high school experience. Registration may be done at anytime prior to the deadlines established for each college test. However, UAHS students are encouraged to register at least 4 months in advance of the published test day to improve the odds that they will be able to take the test at our high school. To register for the ACT, SAT, or SAT II (subject area tests), applications and practices materials are located in the College Center. Additionally, both college testing organizations have websites for registration on-line or to gain more information regarding their testing program and test dates. The website for the ACT is: http://www.actstudent.org. The website for the SAT is located at: http://www.collegboard.com. Once an individual is in this website it is necessary to click on SAT, as the College Board sponsors numerous testing programs. The UAHS testing code, which guarantees that your son/daughter's scores will be sent to Upper Arlington High School, is 361630. When Upper Arlington High School is a test center, the test center code (ACT: 182200, SAT: 36-265) will appear under the State of Ohio and the City of Columbus. If the UAHS testing center code is not present, this is an indication that UAHS is not a test site on that particular date or that UAHS has reached its capacity for that date. To guarantee that your son/daughter is registered to take either the SAT or ACT at UAHS. The ACT and SAT can be taken again through December of the student's senior year. Neither organization has summer testing dates. School and College Counselor meetings with Juniors: In the spring of a student’s junior year (either in April or early May), your son/daughter's assigned School and College Counselor will have small group meetings to discuss preparation for the senior year. During these meetings, students will be provided with an unofficial transcript to review for accuracy. If an error(s) is (are) found of the transcript, the error(s) will be corrected by the high school's records secretary. It is important that students review this transcript carefully and bring it home for parental review. Additionally, students will be provide with a packet of materials contains important information on preparing for life after high school. Students are asked to share all materials with his/her parents. Juniors and seniors: College/University admission representative visits to UAHS: Beginning in early September and ending in early January, over 175 college/university admission representatives will visit the College Center to provide information on their respective postsecondary institutes to juniors and seniors. These meeting are scheduled during the school day. Juniors and seniors need to sign up in advance to attend these information sessions by stopping in the College Center. Information regarding these visits is available in Family Connection, on the UAHS television monitors, and in the College Center. If the visitation occurs during a student’s academic class, the student must have permission from his/her teacher to attend the specific meeting. The College Center staff encourages students to meet with representatives from prospective college beginning in the junior year. Over the years, the College Center Staff have found that college/university representatives do maintain lists of students who visited with them during their meetings at UAHS. Representatives have indicated that the number of contacts with their particular college does play a part in admissions when the college is determining which students will be offered a last minute admission and who will be waitlisted. Students may begin reviewing the list of colleges that will be sending a college representative to UAHS this fall. Information regarding these meeting may be found in Family Connection under the heading “About College,” subheading, “Visit Schedule.” Many colleges will contact the College Center during the months of September and October to establish meeting times and dates. Therefore it is very important that students check this list at least once a week to review updated information through Family Connection “Visit Schedule”. If a student is interested in attending a meeting with a particular college representative, the student may click the box located after the date and time of the scheduled visit. By doing this the student will receive a reminder e-mail the day prior to the College Representative’s meeting date and period. Juniors are highly encouraged to begin making contact with college representatives by attending these meetings. Seniors are encouraged to attend scheduled meeting to assist them in narrowing down their potential college applications by gaining additional information about colleges of particular interest. College Fair information is also located in this section of Family Connection. Sophomores, juniors, and seniors - College Fairs: The Suburban College Fair is an excellent opportunity for sophomores, juniors and seniors to pick up college/university information. As you will see on the enclosed flyer the date for this year's fair is Wednesday, October 3rd. We asked that students wear a sweatshirt or t-shirt during this school day to advertise the college/university that he/she is currently considering as a first choice after high school. On Thursday, Sept. 20th, Gahanna Lincoln High School will sponsor a College Fair for students with Learning Disabilities. Approximately 40 colleges/universities will be in attendance at this fair. As this information becomes available the College Center will e-mail students and parents through Family Connection. Columbus City Schools will sponsor another college fair on Thursday, October 4th at the Aladdin Temple across from Easton Shopping Center. This college fair begins during the school day for Columbus students but extends into the evening for students from other area high schools. Juniors and seniors in need of an unofficial transcript from the College Center: Please e-mail the College Center at collegecenter@uaschools.org requesting an unofficial transcript. In the response you will receive a PDF copy of your unofficial transcript to keep on your computer and print copies when necessary. Unofficial transcripts are acquired from PowerSchool; therefore the information on the unofficial transcript will only be as accurate as the information stored in the student’s academic history. If an error is found on the transcript, please contact Mrs. Fackelman, the UAHS Records Secretary, at 614-487-5240 ext. 208 for assistance. NCAA Clearinghouse and seniors: If you are considering the possibility of playing Division I or Division II sports at the college/university level, you are encouraged to begin the required NCAA Clearinghouse process during the summer months. Family Connection has a link to the NCAA Clearinghouse application website. The NCAA Clearinghouse charges $50 to process an application. Once the school year begins, you will need to stop by the College Center and pick-up a Transcript Request Form (TRF). This document is necessary to authorize the College Center to mail an official transcript to the NCAA Clearinghouse. For the College Center to process a TRF, it must be signed by the student’s parent/guardian and the student. If a student is age 18 or older, the parent/guardian signature is not required. When returning the TFR you must include the two NCAA Clearinghouse transcript permission forms that must be downloaded and copied from the NCAA Clearinghouse website. In addition to sending a transcript, student athletes must send official ACT or SAT scores to the NCAA. The NCAA Clearinghouse Code is “9999” for both the ACT and SAT. Please visit the link in the left hand column to contact either the ACT or SAT to send official scores on-line. There is a nominal fee charged for this service. Students who have transferred to UAHS after the beginning of the individual’s 9th grade year, must also sent a transcript to the NCAA Clearinghouse from each high school he or she attended prior to enrolling at UAHS. Please see additional NCAA Clearinghouse information at the link located on the left margin of this page. When making an official campus visit, athletes are often asked by college/university coaches for a copy of an unofficial transcript. If the student is asked to provide this information to a postsecondary coach, please use the process described above to obtain an unofficial transcript. Senior year college testing (ACT and SAT): Both the ACT and SAT provide fall testing dates for seniors. Testing dates will begin in October. The last opportunity a senior has to retake the ACT or SAT for consideration under regular college admissions will occur in December. Any ACT or SAT taken after the December testing dates would not be available in time for a college/university to use when making admission decisions. The testing dates for both the ACT and SAT are available on line at: www.actstudent.org or www.collegeboard.com. Both of these websites may be accessed through Family Connection. Students are encouraged to apply as early as possible for retesting to guarantee their preferred test site location. UAHS is not a test site for the October 2006 SAT. Junior year college testing: It is very important that you begin your junior year college testing with the P-SAT on October 20, 2007. By taking the P-SAT as a junior, the National Merit Scholarship Program will be looking at your results to determine whether you will qualify as a National Merit Semi-finalist in the fall of your senior year. Qualifying students are notified in early September of 2008. Sophomore year college testing: It is very important that you begin your sophomore year college testing with the PLAN (P-ACT) on October 6, 2007. Registration information is available in this newsletter. For those of you that want to begin preparing for the SAT, you may also consider taking the P-SAT on October 20, 2007. While this test is written to test juniors, the College Board (the not for profit cooperation that generates the SAT) does norm the test results (establish comparisons to other 10th graders that take the P-SAT) for sophomores. Preparation materials for both of these tests will be sent to you through homeroom a few weeks prior to taking either the PLAN (P-ACT) or P-SAT. It is important that you review these materials and commit to memory the instruction for each section of each test. By doing this you will save valuable time while completing each test. Mr. Davis, College Counselor, will schedule optional PLAN (P-ACT) and P-SAT interpretation meetings during study halls and lunch periods on dates that occur after student results have been returned to the College Center in early December. These meetings will occur in early January. Students are highly encouraged to attend the interpretation meetings. Just prior to Winter Break, student results will be posted in Family Connection under the heading “About Me,” sub-heading, “My Test Scores.” Freshman Year College Testing: The College Center does not necessarily recommend college testing during the freshman year. As the fall is a transition period for freshman, college testing may add more stress to an already stressful period for students. However, for highly motivated freshman, taking the PLAN (P-ACT) and the P-SAT as described above is an option. Family should take great care in making this decision, as over testing during high school year does generate testing fatigue with some students. While these scores are never reported to a college/university as a part of the senior year college/university application process, they may be useful to students considering the “Postsecondary Option Program” during the sophomore year. This option is described on page 16 of the 2007-2008 Program of Studies.
Please feel free to contact the College Center staff with questions or suggestions. Our general phone number is: 487-5232 and our e-mail address is: collegecenter@uaschools.org Mr. Davis, College Counselor, may be contacted at: 487-5240 ext. 120 or by e-mail at: mdavis@uaschools.org Mrs. Hartfelder, College Center Secretary, may be contacted at: 487-5240 ext. 112 or by e-mail at: jhartfelder@uaschools.org Thank you for visiting the College Center Website. We hope that you will continue to do so on a regular bases or visit Family Connection for updates and new information. If you notice any inaccurate or confusing information, grammatical errors, or have suggestions on how to improve our website, please e-mail the college center.
|
|---|