Applying to College: Log On, Get In

• It's never too early to start thinking about colleges. Get involved in activities like volunteering, sports, and art, and keep your academic record as strong as you can throughout high school. With so many applicants, colleges are looking farther and farther back into a candidate's academic and extracurricular history to determine his or her qualifications.

• For study tips and academic reference sites, try our findingDulcinea Education Guide.

• While it's smart to consider the types of programs or courses of study you'd like to pursue in college, don't get too caught up trying to create your résumé and transcript around what you think an admissions board wants to see.

• Some of the Picks in this guide are recommended in several sections. Some college-related sites are so extensive, they're like a Web unto themselves. Consider bookmarking the different links throughout each site for easy access. 

• Every college has a Web site. To find the site of a college you're interested in, try typing its name with ".edu" at the end, or searching for it in any search engine.

• College and university rankings can be useful for exposing certain positive or negative attributes of schools, but rankings are dependent on endowment funds, alumni giving, and other nonacademic factors. Don't use rankings as the most important way to judge a school, or you might miss out on some great institutions.

• Some college admissions offices are now enlisting students to write honest (and sometimes uncensored) blogs about student life. MIT, Cornell, and Johns Hopkins are just a few examples of universities using this practice. Check to see if the schools you're interested in offer similar primary resources. If not, check out the links mentioned above to get an honest account of college life.

• There are many good schools that lie under the radar. Author Loren Pope has written many books directed at students looking for a good match rather than a brand name. Check out Looking Beyond the Ivy League: Finding the College That's Right for You and Colleges that Change Lives: 40 That Will Change the Way You Think About Colleges, which includes sections for students with learning disabilities as well as for those who are home-schooled.

• If you can't make it in person to all of the colleges you are considering, check to see if the college has a virtual tour on its Web site. Many institutions now offer views of the campus, virtual classroom tours, and even live feeds of campus activity.

• Although affirmative action gets more media coverage, your gender may actually have a greater effect on your chances of being admitted.

• Some basic terms that you'll come across in this guide and in your research include:

• Safety School: a school that will likely accept you.

• Reach School: a school that will be difficult for you to get into.

• Early Action: a nonbinding application that puts you in the first round of applicants.

• Early Decision: a binding application that puts you in the first round of applicants. If you are accepted ED, you are required to attend the school that accepted you. Generally, you can apply to only one school Early Decision.

• We're not all writers, but small things like proper spelling and grammar make or break your essay. Have a teacher or parent look over your essay for basic syntax. Don't make a mistake on something you can easily control when so many other factors outside of your control will come into play throughout the process.

• To help you track all of the forms you'll need to send in with each application, try using an online spreadsheet such as Google Spreadsheets or Zoho Sheet. You can mark what schools you apply to, what forms you'll need for each, and can enter the dates when you send in each part of the application. This will ensure that you'll be on top of all of your forms and deadlines.

• Applying to more than one college? Lots of schools now accept a common application so that you don't have to fill out your basic information over and over. Note that some schools require supplementary material in addition to the common application, and that some schools do not accept the common application at all. See the Common Application Web site for info about which schools accept the application, and how you can fill it out online.

• The easiest way to apply is to apply online. You can go back to your application whenever you want—until the day you submit it—and can check spelling on a document before you send it in. Also, you'll find out sooner when it has been received.

• Part of a successful application is applying to the right combination of schools: some reaches, some maybes, and some safety schools. Before you start writing essays and getting recommendations, visit College Data, which helps you determine your chances of being admitted to a college.

• SAT originally stood for Scholastic Aptitude Test, but the name of the test has been officially changed to SAT and is thus no longer an abbreviation. Similarly, ACT used to be an acronym for American College Test but is now the official name of the test.

• Before you go and sign up for every test from now until the time you enter college, know that when colleges receive your test scores, they'll see the scores from every test you've taken. Most colleges won't mind if you take the test a second time, but a good score looks a lot less impressive if you had to take the test four or five times to get it.

• Find out which test you need to take from your school's college counselor. You may be qualified for the ACT, which is a slightly different type of test than the SAT. In addition, you may have to take the subject-specific SAT II for a number of topics, and your counselor will know when your school's official test dates are. If you don't have a college counselor, call the Admissions offices of the school you're applying to for more information.

• You can buy books full of SAT sample tests, which are a helpful way to practice on your own. These tests are formulaic—once you know what to expect, they are a lot easier. Practice as much as you can in a real-life context (which is why using books can be better than practicing online), so that you'll be calm and ready on the day of the official test. Some of the most popular test-prep books include The Princeton Review's SAT and ACT, Kaplan's SAT and ACT, Barron's SAT and ACT, and Gruber's SAT.

• One way to prepare for the SAT is to take the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT) administered by the College Board. To learn more about what's on the test and how to register, visit the College Board's PSAT page.