College Admissions Cracked: Saving Your Kid (and Yourself) from the Madness

Readers with children will find a good deal of useful information, along with a potentially irritating type-A parenting philosophy, in this primer to preparing teenagers for higher education from Shulman, the founder of a college essay coaching company. Readers will encounter discussions of SAT versus ACT tests, what a good score in either actually means, and how to reduce test anxiety. Ready to visit colleges? Shulman provides a helpful comparison of campuses, big and small, urban and rural, along with “dos and don’ts” for visits. Each chapter features mostly helpful “to-do” lists and other useful lists, such as the “Thank-you Note Checklist for Students” and “Strategies for Motivating Your Kid to Just Write the Thing” (i.e., personal essays). Some of the advice seems geared more to a second grader than a soon-to-be-college freshman (“When she’s not working, let her play”). On the other hand, “What to Expect on Drop-Off Day” will be good prep for parents used to thinking of that day as a long way off. Depending on where readers fall on the helicopter parenting issue, this book will seem either an invaluable guide to prepping teens for college, or a surefire way of making them eagerly anticipate leaving the nest. (Aug.)