Providing College Planning & Funding Services

If you’re like most parents, you’re probably overwhelmed with the uncertainty of how to properly plan, or maybe where to even begin.

Contact CollegeJim.com for assistance with the following services:

Your student will work with us using up to three of our award-winning, nationally recognized career assessment programs designed to confirm or create your student’s initial list of career paths.

Criteria will include

  • High school courses recommended
  • Level of higher education required
  • Salaries to be expected
  • Future outlook for their career choices

Your student will work with us using up to three of our award-winning, nationally recognized Career/Majors self-assessment programs designed to identify which Majors are required by the Career Paths your student has chosen.

Our philosophy: When asking your student about college, you should ask what they are going to do, not where they are going to go.

The proper sequence is

  • 1 Identify possible career paths
  • 2 Identify the majors that serve these career paths
  • 3 Identify the college that best serves these majors

Both exam providers have free preparation assistance available through their websites www.collegeboard.com and www.act.org. We strongly recommend hiring individual tutors (as opposed to group tutors) for time, resource efficiency, and effectiveness. CollegeJim.com suggests interviewing three tutors prior to choosing one. Call for recommendations.

We provide a Family Data Questionnaire for you to complete and return prior to our initial meeting. We will personally work with families to verify the accuracy of the financial data to be used to complete Federal, State, and College Financial Assistance applications.

We will use the completed Family Data Questionnaire to calculate both the Federal (Public Colleges) and Institutional (Private Profile Colleges) EFCs.

We will review and analyze your current college funding plan for maximum cost-effectiveness and tax-efficiency.

The third and most important step is to identify the colleges that best match your student’s needs.

Educational coaching of your student's position provides a live “coaching” session between the student and an educational counselor. This session is designed to help a student pick both academically and career appropriate colleges. This is called the Student Positioning Session. This is the third step of the Student Positioning Concept which will facilitate finding those colleges which fit the student both academically and professionally.

This session also includes a college search, based on custom search criteria which will include:

  • Higher education required
  • Salaries to be expected
  • Future outlook for their career choices
  • Internship and career placement programs
  • Working with your student, we will identify colleges which have nationally recognized Internships and highly successful Career Placement programs that specifically serve your student’s chosen majors and career paths.
  • Academic competitiveness
  • We will identify each college’s last year’s incoming freshmen class’s 75th percentile of GPA and SAT/ACT scores. (Preferential Award Packaging)
  • Financial suitability
  • We will identify each college’s last year’s incoming freshmen class’s percentage of eligibility met and the grant-to-loan ratio.
  • Geographic diversity
  • Working with your student, we will define colleges s/he wants to attend and assure your final college list of six to eight colleges has sufficient diversity to generate competitive award offers. This will facilitate your student’s selection and/or confirmation of the best colleges for a career-appropriate pool of 6-8 competitive colleges.

After verifying the Family Data Questionnaire and calculating EFCs, we will analyze your current financial assistance eligibility and recommend actions to maximize eligibility, when possible.

We provide monthly editorials e-mailed to the student. These useful editorials provide an overview of the college planning topic of the month. The editorial part of the program starts in June at the end of their Junior year.

We will provide the client with an introductory package outlining the service and key points of action. This Calendar and Newsletter system keeps clients continuously aware of the next step in the process.

We detail the Cost of Attendance, the average merit award, the percentage of need met, and the Grant-to-Loan ratio of your college choices.

This form is required by certain colleges for financial aid consideration. You must register to obtain this form or complete it online. This registration is completed together in our office. This application is completed electronically. The FAP is more complicated than the FAFSA. Additionally, the information needs to be consistent with that on the FAFSA. The additional cost of filing incurred by the College Board is the responsibility of the student family.

This form must be completed to qualify for financial aid from Federal and most State Programs. This form is completed in our office. First, as an estimate in mid-January, and second, as a final filing after subsequent tax returns have been completed.

The SAR will be received by email from the U.S. Department of Education reiterating the FAFSA information and officially confirming your family’s Expected Family Contribution (EFC). We will review and confirm accuracy or assist you to submit for correction.

Some schools have their own need-based forms that are just as important as the Financial Aid Profile (FAP) and the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The institutional financial aid forms are completed electronically together in our office.

We provide an awards analysis program. This program provides a breakdown of the award packages by offering two perspectives analyzing the award letters from the family’s viewpoint without long-term student loans or work study programs. These perspectives make it clear what the client’s true cost is for their first year in college. We help you evaluate award letters and facilitate the appeal process. We will request a copy of all award letters from the student's family. Upon receiving them, we evaluate award packages and let the family know if they have received a fair award offer from the college. When warranted, we will assist with writing an appeal letter that will be sent to the college by the student.

We will counsel the family on Education Loan options and provide guidance on their specific loan options. We will also provide the family with a college loan booklet which addresses important Student and Parent loan topics.