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It’s not too early for Juniors to think about college

Junior year is an important time for college applications, as it's the last year to make big changes that can impact your admissions profile.


As a Junior, what should I be focusing on now for college applications?

Juniors can help improve their admissions chances by focusing on the right areas:

Optimizing your profile

Assess the strengths and weaknesses of your academics, extracurriculars, test scores, and more using our Admissions Assessment.

Narrowing down your school list

Our Chancing Engine uses years of admissions data and your profile information to assess your admissions chances for each school.

Creating an application plan

There are a lot of things students can be doing during this time, but not everything will make a difference. Create a plan to ensure that your work now will lead to great admissions outcomes when you apply to college.

junior working towards applications

Explore schools and discover your chances

Begin your college exploration with our chancing and school list tools.

Our Chancing Engine

Our Chancing Engine uses over 100,000 data points to create a list of reach, target, and safety schools that match your preferences. Using years of admissions data and your personalized profile information, we are able to give you an idea of your realistic admissions chances for schools you’re interested in.

Explore hundreds of schools

Finding the best-fit schools to apply to is an important first step in your admissions journey. We'll recommend schools based on your chances, goals, and preferences so that you can make an informed long-term decision.

What else can you do to prepare?

Elevate your extracurriculars

Junior year is the time when many students’ extracurricular profiles really come together and have the biggest impact on college applications. Taking on a leadership role is a great way to show dedication to your extracurriculars.

Strategize your summer plans

Admissions Officers take a close look at the summer before your Senior year. It’s your last chance to really beef up your extracurriculars and define experiences that can help bolster your college application.

Choose your Senior courses

The courses you take Senior year do matter on the transcript you submit to colleges. They show admissions committees your commitment to excellence and your trajectory. An admissions committee would almost always rather see a B in an advanced class than an A in a regular class.

Prepare for standardized tests

Junior year is prime time to take the SAT, ACT, and any other college entrance exams that may be required of them. If a student waits until their Senior year to take their standardized tests, they risk not having adequate time to prepare and only having a limited number of opportunities to take the exam before their college applications are due.

Make the most of junior year right now

Start working towards admissions success for free! Get access to all of our tools to make your journey a smooth and successful one.

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