Happy Fall, Huskies! While the entire Flint Hill Upper School is hard at work balancing sports, extracurriculars, and academics, the Seniors are also tackling another challenge this Fall: Application Season.
While Fall might sound like auburn leaves, cool breezes, and pumpkin spice lattes to the vast majority of people, both in and out of school, that is hardly all that Seniors are thinking about this time of year. Busy at work completing various parts of their applications, Seniors are spending these first few months of school trying to knock out a critical section of the application process in general: early applications.
Broken into numerous categories such as Early Decision, Early Action, and Restrictive Early Action, this section of the application process is critical for students looking to hear back early from some of their top choices. Guided by the College Advising office here at Flint Hill, Seniors are working tirelessly to get in some of their applications by deadlines as early as September 22nd and October 1st.
Over the past few weeks, I took the time to speak with some Seniors going through this process. Senior Deya Ghaderi ‘25 shared, “I often find myself feeling stressed and overwhelmed these past few weeks. There are so many upcoming deadlines. It is a daunting time for all the Seniors. Despite this, the College Advising team is very supportive and open to questions concerning upcoming deadlines and aspects of the application process, so for that I am grateful.” My conversation with Ghaderi helped shed some light on the struggles of balancing these applications and everyday school work. She further commented, “The real challenge is finding time to balance school, applications, sports, extracurriculars, and a social life. These things are individually tackleable; just stacking them up makes it stressful.”
I then spent time talking to the director of the College Advising team here at Flint Hill, Ms. Susan Chiarolanzio, who helped share some ways Seniors can mitigate the stress of the application process: “Try to set aside time to not think about college applications, and also find truly good distractions that you enjoy. Applications should not dominate your life. Use a calendar, plan, and map out your schedule, and see what it looks like. If you put it on paper, it’s more manageable. And lastly, walk away from unhelpful conversations; they are beneficial to no one.” With this advice, Seniors should be able to rise to the occasion and face this time of year head-on.
With that said, it is important to give grace to everyone going through periods of stress, in this case, Seniors applying to college. As a community, it is key that we continue to uplift each other and provide the best support network possible, even in times that demand a lot.
Keep your heads up, Seniors! Try to enjoy the process, rest when needed, and push when possible. We got this!
