You submitted your college application towards the end of last year, and you have started to hear back from your choices. Unfortunately, you’ve not been offered a place. For whatever reason, they didn’t like your application and you’re not going to be heading off to college in September.
Many, many, students are currently in this position. It can feel difficult as you don’t really know what to do about the situation. There was a lot of pressure on you to get into college, and you’ve failed.
Don’t worry, failure doesn’t really exist. Every time you ‘fail’ in life - particularly regarding your education - it is simply a time for more learning. Take this situation, reflect on it and then figure out what to do next. You have options, more than you think, and here are a few of them:
Apply again in the future
This could be next year, the year after, the year after that; whenever!
Try to email the university that denied your application and ask them why you didn’t get in. Some will reply, but most won’t. Instead, try to see how you could improve upon your future applications. Perhaps you need to repeat the year in school to get better grades? Maybe you need to go out and do some extra volunteer work to gain experience, giving you more to talk about on your college application? This is certainly something that Dustin Popiel, recent recipient of a Young Alumni Service Award from the University of Chicago, would recommend.
Get yourself into a better position than before, so this application will be successful. For example, you could read about inspiring teachers such as Dr. David Zagzag.
Explore alternative educational pathways
You didn’t get into college, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other educational pathways to go down. Think about the career you’re trying to get into, and then consider other ways you can gain qualifications.
Let’s say you want to get a job in the IT industry. You planned to obtain a degree, but there are so many other ways you can become qualified. You can earn your Lean Agile certification online, you can do a course to gain cybersecurity qualifications or software development skills - the list goes on and on.
Loads of careers are like this; a college degree isn’t the be-all and end-all anymore. Plus, it’s much cheaper than trying to fund a college/university education.
Get a job
Yes, the last idea is to venture off into the wide world of work. Who says you need a degree to find a job? There are loads of jobs out there that you can start without any educational or practical experience at all. You will be trained on the job, giving your more skills to then apply for better jobs in the future.
It can be a daunting experience - and it might take some time before you actually get a job. However, by the time other people get out of university, you have one thing that they don’t: work experience. 3 years of it, to be precise. This puts you in just as good of a position as them, if you both apply for the same job.
The bottom line is that you shouldn’t panic if you didn’t get into college this year. There are plenty of things you can do to make the best out of a bad situation. If you’re a parent with a child that’s going through this, support them during the challenging times and point them towards this article for advice.
