Of all the questions high school students are asked, “Where are you going to college?” is easily the most common.

“It was probably freshman year,” senior Matt Jacobsen said of the first time someone asked him about college. “They didn’t know what year I was, so they were asking already.”

Senior Adam McClinton said he was first seriously asked about college during the summer between his junior and senior years and has since been asked "hundreds" of times. Another senior, Jalen Chang, agreed.

“As soon as junior year ended, when I went to California over the summer, every single relative started up a conversation about it,” Chang said. “It happens every day, and it won’t end until I decide.”

Though students such as Chang and McClinton typically begin applying to colleges in the fall of their senior year, the college search process usually starts long before that.

“(The college search process) actually starts in junior year,” Mrs. Sharon Bohannon, one of Trinity’s two college counselors, said. “You should begin to think about a career, think about a college major, think about what you’re going to go into, so that when you start to look at colleges you can look at them better because you have some idea what you’re going to go into.”

Before senior year starts, not only should a student have an idea of where he wants to go, he should have also researched the schools on his list, and, if possible, taken campus visits to them as well. This helps a student get a feel the college and affords him the opportunity to see whether or not he can envision himself at a school. Once this is done, the application process can begin.

“You’ll want to come in senior year in August ready to go,” Mr. Jeremy Jackson, Trinity college counselor, said. “You’ll come in and say these are the schools I’m looking for, and these are the schools I’m going to apply to. You’ll complete the online application process and collect the required information. If there are any letters of recommendation required, they’ll be submitted to me, and I’ll attach it to a transcript and mail that in, and then we have applied.”

“I’ve only applied to one (college), because I’m pretty sure I want to play soccer there,” Jacobsen said. “It was Bellarmine.”

When asked how many colleges he has applied to, Chang said nine: “UK, UL, IU, Xavier, Stanford, Princeton, Georgetown, Berkeley and one more that I’ll remember later.”

“So far I’ve applied to Indiana University, the University of Louisville, Western Kentucky University, Dayton University and Thomas More College,” said Jaime Leon, another senior going through the college search process.

Many frustrations accompany the application process, due in no small part to the required essays that are found on many applications.

“There are just some essays that are so hard to write,” Chang said. “Like with Centre, their essay was like ‘How do you think Centre fits your goals?’ and basically it really irked me. Same with Princeton. It irked me because it almost seemed like a way for them to build themselves up.”

“The essays get pretty repetitive. You feel like you’re doing the same thing over and over,” McClinton said. “Obviously every college expects something different. It just gets very repetitive.”

The frustrations don’t end after the essays are written and the applications are submitted, however.

“I think the most frustrating time for students is the waiting process,” Jackson said. “Let’s say we apply to five (schools) and we send those out before Christmas, and here it is the end of January now and a lot of people still don’t know, and everything is hinging on that.”

McClinton has been accepted to four of the eight schools he has applied to. Chang has been accepted to three of the nine schools he applied to.

“It’s pretty frustrating (waiting on admissions decisions) because you’re trying to make decisions and get the process over with but some colleges just take their sweet old time,” McClinton said.

Of course, a major concern for all students is the admission decision. While students interviewed for this story had all been accepted to at least one college, that is not always the case. Not being accepted can be very frustrating as well.

“Sometimes the schools you want to go to, you don’t have the scores, you don’t have the grade point average to get into that school, and it’s a school you’ve always thought you wanted to go to,” Bohannon said. “It’s very frustrating for seniors because sometimes they realize ‘I should have done better freshman and sophomore years, now I’m trying to pull it together junior and senior years, and it’s a little bit too late.’”

“There’s always some anxiety over whether or not you’re going to get accepted,” Leon said. “That’s a little bit of pressure.”

The college search process is not, however, all frustrations and headaches. There are very appealing aspects to it as well.

“You have much more control over planning your future than you did in high school. I think it’s really exciting. It’s scary, but I think it’s also really exciting to look at all of those possibilities and take more and more control of your life and what you’re going to do,” Bohannon said.

“I feel like I’m in control now, and the freedom seems so close,” Jacobsen said.

“I think the best part is just absolutely having a choice. For a young man, this is the first major choice where they’re in the driver’s seat. They’re deciding where they’re going to go, they’re deciding where they’re going to live and earn a degree,” Jackson said.

“I’ve already done one of the college visits, for example to Thomas More,” Leon said. “I just love the campus and the curriculum that they’re offering. I honestly just can’t wait to start.”
Leon, Jacobsen, Chang and McClinton all have a pretty good idea of where they want to attend college in the fall.

“It just feels right to me,” Leon said of Thomas More College.

“I’m 95 percent sure I’m going to Bellarmine, and I can’t wait,” Jacobsen said.

When asked where he would like to go, Chang said, “Georgetown” without hesitation.

“At this point, I want to go to the University of South Carolina,” McClinton said.

Going through all the hassle of the college search process seems daunting indeed. With so many options to consider, places to visits, applications to fill out, and essays to write, it is easy to wonder why a person would want to go through all of it. The light at the end for students hoping to go to college is the acceptance letter, which most seem to feel is the highlight of the entire experience.

“All the hard works pays off,” McClinton said of receiving his first acceptance letter. “It was pretty exciting.”

Perhaps Chang summed this up best when describing how he felt getting his first acceptance letter. He said simply, “Elated.”