Brown University, Columbia University, University of Chicago, and Yale sent representatives to Marietta High School, where they held a college information session on Monday, September 17. With the main goal of persuading students to apply to their respective college, the students sat in the auditorium and listened as the speakers went over their schools’ cultures and curriculums.   

“The entire presentation was really intriguing. I’m quite glad I came because this was my first time attending an event like this and I don’t regret it. The representatives were really nice and they covered a lot of information about the schools that I didn’t know,” junior Ana Barahona said.

Brown University’s Associate Director of Admission, Matthew Price, started the event by introducing the application process. Price reminded students and parents of the importance of their individuality when it comes to college applications.

“The admission process is your process. You’re going to be the ones managing deadlines, applying for schools, and researching all these schools. The parents’ job is to support their kids, making sure that their child is meeting the deadlines and making sure that they’re submitting the correct financial information for them because the aid piece is very important, ” Price said.

Presentations started when the Senior Assistant Director of Admissions for the University of Chicago for Liberal Arts and Sciences, Marjorie Betley, walked on stage to encourage students to involve themselves in more college informational sessions and join college tours.

“Visiting campuses is a really great way to feel out what you like and what you don’t like out of a school. It’s a great way to help narrow down your ideal list of schools,” Betley said.

Students sitting in the crowd laughed, whispered, and applauded as they listened to the presentation about the benefits and standards offered at UChicago.

“At UChicago, we start out broad, then we narrow. Our school does have core classes, but they are going to give students a strong foundation of the basic subject areas. 94% of the people that graduate graduated with a well-paid job,” Betley said.

After Betley’s presentation, Price then returned to the stage for a full discussion on Brown University’s main goals and priorities.

“I actually learned a lot about Brown that I didn’t know before. I really like the way their curriculum is set up. It’s focused more on concentrations where you make your own Common Core instead of the school forcing you to take classes that you don’t want. I also thought it was really interesting that they allow the students to choose the way they want to be graded in the class. If the students aren’t comfortable being graded with a letter grade, they offer a choice of using a pass or fail system instead,” Barahona said.

The last thirty minutes of the event included presentations from Yale and Columbia, who both hoped to convince young students to apply for their prestigious schools.

“The overall presentation was actually really nice. The presenters were constantly engaging with us, which I really liked because they were throwing jokes to relieve stress among the audience. The speakers really wanted to be more friendly with us and lighten the pressure since we’re talking about Ivy leagues here, and all of it may be quite scary for some people,” Barahona said.

After the presentations concluded, the representatives set up tables outside the auditorium to allow students to ask any further questions not covered in the presentations.

“I think it was really cool that I got a chance to ask my questions face-to-face to one of the representatives. Going to college sessions at school is much better since you get this totally different perspective versus just looking up all the information online. I highly recommend students to attend more of these college visits because it can help them look into their dream schools and help them decide if this is what they want to do or not,” Barahona said.