Parents: What web sites have proven most useful during college research?

Parents Forum
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<p>I have gotten a lot of use out of:</p>

<p><a href=“http://collegeconfidential.com”>http://collegeconfidential.com</a> This site rocks. Thank you for all the great insights!</p>

<p><a href=“http://parchment.com”>http://parchment.com</a> Best scatterplot analysis tool. Appeals to my wonky side.</p>

<p><a href=“http://assist.org”>http://assist.org</a> To see what AP and CC credits are applicable to UCs. And…</p>

<p><a href=“University of California Counselors”>University of California Counselors;

<p><a href=“http://naviance.com”>http://naviance.com</a> To see how students from our HS have fared getting into schools we’re looking at.</p>

<p><a href=“Google-based Ranking of Computer Science and Engineering Departments”>http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/rank.html&lt;/a&gt; For students looking at Comp Sci - google and USNW summary results.</p>

<p><a href=“http://forbes.stratagee.com./#signin”>http://forbes.stratagee.com./#signin</a> Forbes estimates college costs based on EFC method.</p>

<p><a href=“2200 Computer Science Professors in 50 top US Graduate Programs”>http://cs.brown.edu/people/alexpap/faculty_dataset.html&lt;/a&gt; Brown University analysis of comp sci professors and depts.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.kiplinger.com/tool/college/T014-S001-kiplinger-s-best-values-in-private-colleges/index.php?table=prv_univ&state_code[]=ALL&id[]=none&sortby=non_nb_aid_p&sortorder=DESC”>http://www.kiplinger.com/tool/college/T014-S001-kiplinger-s-best-values-in-private-colleges/index.php?table=prv_univ&state_code[]=ALL&id[]=none&sortby=non_nb_aid_p&sortorder=DESC&lt;/a&gt; Kiplinger College Value Tool</p>

<p>Still looking for a good scholarship site that <em>doesn’t</em> suggest scholarships not in the realm of possibility. </p>

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<p>For a sweeping profile of grades, rank, and test scores of almost every college’s admitted students, Google “common data set” + [name of school]. For example:</p>

<p>“common data set” Stanford</p>

<p>You’ll either get a direct link to a common data set, or a link to a page that links you to a common data set. Scroll to Section C. Often they are PDF documents. Occasionally an Excel spreadsheet.</p>

<p>Very useful for chancing yourself.</p>

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<p>College Navigator for CDS info and all sorts of other data on a particular school including the number of degrees awarded for each major:
<a href=“College Navigator - National Center for Education Statistics”>http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Aside from college confidential, the site we used most was <a href=“https://bigfuture.collegeboard.org/”>https://bigfuture.collegeboard.org/&lt;/a&gt;. It was a good, central place to get quick facts and figures on colleges and set up a “my college” list that we then whittled down. We entered my D’s stats to see where she fell in each school’s ranges. It’s also a good way to access the net price calculators: many are on the same system so once the data is entered once, as long as you’re signed in you don’t need to retype it for each school.</p>

<p>We also used a couple of the “what are my chances” sites like parchment, cappex, and collegedata… mostly just for the fun of it :)</p>

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<p>collegeboard has a lot of good info, including what colleges will give AP credit fo, what score is needed, and what classes it credits</p>

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<p>Has anyone found a scholarship site that actually presents a list that matches filter choices? Like what grade the students is in, whether financial need is considered, etc.</p>

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<p>@Ynotgo - that’s my question too. There are lots of scholarship sites and none have good filters that I’ve found. You just get spammed with ads to write an essay about why it’s important to be a good driver. And then you can get $500 if you are the lucky winner. Or info about a scholarship to some womens college - and I have three boys. To me it seems like scholarship web sites have just muddied the waters further rather than streamlining a path to actual merit based or uniqueness based scholarships. (Uniqueness based would be say descendants of Polish immigrants who play the ukelele. :-)</p>