How will I know what college to choose?

Question

I want to study Education to become a teacher . I live on the East coast and want to stay here.. There are so many colleges to choose from but how will I know Im making the right choice? What colleges do you reccommend and how did you know your school was the right one for you?

Answer 1

You need to ask yourself what's most important for you in a school?
This can be anything from
-Cost
-Location
-Reputation of School
-Reputation of School's Program
-Social Life
etc.
When you have figured that out you should rank what you value most, and start from there.

When I was looking for a college, my main concern was the reputation of the school's program, because I wanted to study at one of the best schools for the major I wanted. I didn't care where it was, how much it cost, or if i was going to have a social life or not. It wouldn't serve me to apply to places like Harvard/NYU/Boston/Columbia when they didn't even offer my major, or even the area I wanted.

Usually you can find out what the strength of a school's program by browsing through US News & World Report who ranks universities based on their major. They mainly do that with Master's programs, but in general those schools are also bound to have strong programs at the Undergraduate level.

In addition, you may find it not worthwhile getting into debt if you can't afford a Private College, because teacher's paychecks won't necessarily make up for the expense. Most teachers end up going to public institutions because it won't matter whether you're at harvard vs your local state college. Take into consideration where you want to work and live in after college. That may be a start as to browsing schools.

Answer 2

One thing you might want to do is to go onto a website like that for the College Board. They have something called the "College Matchmaker". You put in all of the information about your qualifications and what features you prefer, and they will give you a list of schools which fit. It basically gives you a starting place. Then you can go onto the websites for those schools, and see how they feel to you. If at all possible, try to visit as many of the schools you are interested in as you can.