Is Getting Into College Actually the Hardest Part?

Just what we talked about before, which is the mindset shift of not only the parents, but the, the kid as they're going from high school to college and college to working world, right? Because, you know, we just touched upon a lot of things about like, it's very different getting them into college, right? And it's very different than getting out of college, and it requires parental shifts on both parts.

Yeah.

And it requires shifts on both the parent and the grad and, and the young adult, right?

For sure.

To make those mental shifts. So I'm curious, what are you seeing about, like, what do parents need to do? I mean, because they're obviously invested in their kids and they want to get them into college.

Right.

So what do they need— what mindset do they need to adopt to do that and then to make sure that they're having a successful college experience? Because that first year can be pretty rough. Yeah. I'd love to get your take on that.

Yeah, no, I think that's a really interesting question because part of our College of Mays curriculum is built around the idea of informed decision-making. Everything that we do and every step of our strategy— so we have what was called LEADS is our strategy that we build in within our curriculum. Column. So it's building your college list, exploring your options, applying to college, making a decision, and then developing a success plan. LEADS. So list, explore, apply, decide, succeed. And throughout every step, we have something called the 6 Keys of College Fit, and it's really looking at each college and each opportunity. So the same process if a student's military-bound or workforce-bound, it's still this informed decision-making process. You got to build your list, know what your options are, you got to explore your options, you got to apply or do the thing, right, to tell them I'm interested. You have to take, you know, all that information and make a decision, and then you build a plan for success. So no matter, you know, so families would be like, oh well, my kid's, you know, military, going to the Coast Guard, same process. You're still going through this informed decision-making So at the core of it, you know, a lot of times as counselors we use the word, what's your college fit? What's your fit? And we— that has a lot of emotionality to it. And usually what ends up happening is they layer on, where can I get in? What's the school name? And then, you know, is it pretty? Does it have some of the things? Does it have like the sorority life and sort of those like personal attributes? What they're not looking for, and they should be, is really analyzing it from all these different lenses. So our 6 keys of college fit sort of expands it to academic match. So am I— what I'm doing in high school, does it match with what the college is looking for in a student, right? So that could be test scores, GPA, all that stuff, um, you know, acceptance rates, things like that. Career match, which I know you're, you're big on, right? So looking at internships, alumni opportunities, um, you know, how are they going to help you get a job at the end of it? We also have financial match. Can I afford this college? Because not everyone can afford the $100,000 Vanderbilt. They just can't. Maybe that's a community college. Maybe that's a 2+2 program. You know, what is truly your, your budget? There was a parent that called me in a panic that— and I did not have the student— got into Cornell. With no aid. And they're like, we can't do this. And I'm like, well, if you would have done your net price calculator and you would have made an informed decision, you would have known that at, at the beginning, right? So financial match is a big one. Then we also have personal match, right? I was telling you about my daughter and her dining hall, and she's at this other campus right now at Montana State. And like, she didn't realize how much food really impacted her. And so like, that was something that she didn't realize it was so important, or the dorms, or just your, can I walk everywhere? What can I do? You know, my other daughter, she's looking at a nursing program. She's going to need a car, where my other daughter does, you know what I mean? So like the kind of like, what does my life look like on this campus? And then the other two that I don't think they do enough on is actual student outcomes. So look at graduation rates, look at persistence rates, look at retention rates, look at, there's one metric called loan default rate. How many students have gone through this college and then defaulted on their loans, which means they took on too much debt and they can't afford it, or they're not getting high enough paying jobs to now pay off that loan. So that's a big one. So student outcomes are big. And then the last one is the student support metrics, right? So like, um, think about if your kid has a 504, an IEP, how is that going to translate to college? What's that support look like? If they're not great at math, what does the math tutoring look like? What does the advising look like? Most advisors right now, college advisors, are like 1 to like 900. And so you're just not getting the time to sit and map out every single class and what do I need to do? Should I be in this program or this program? Like my daughter's school, she's a microbiology major. Microbiology is in two different departments. You can do it through the liberal arts or you could do it through like the agriculture and life science. So which one's better?

I don't know.

You have to talk to an advisor, but if you can't find out who your advisor is, that's a tough call, you know? So what needs to happen is I think so many families as they are making these decisions are only looking at one or two lenses. They're not looking at this whole picture and really assessing, is this school best for me and where I'm at and I'm going to be successful in? And so, you know, I love it when a student goes through the whole process and they said, you know what, my local university, it meets all of those 6 needs. This is where I want to go. And I said, that's an informed decision, right? Because you've looked at everything and made the best decision, so you're not just a statistic that, that drops out. And I think just too many families are just throwing out applications. And just because you got it admitted doesn't mean it's the best school for you, right? It might not have your major, it might not have the flexibility you need, or might not have some of those success support systems, right, that you need, especially if you're first generation or low income. So I do think that from the get-go, we need to have deeper and more strategic framed conversations about what college looks like and what that student needs. I'll take a breath. That was a lot of information.

It sounded good. And I think that— I think what I see is like, I do see people going to schools and then like, getting disillusioned by them really quick and being like, oh, this was a bad choice. Yeah, that's a scary place to be because, you know, it's hard enough being in the freshman year. And I hope you can't hear me down talking too much.

No.

But, but It's really a hard— for, you know, transition into that freshman year is hard enough, you know, and then they get there and they realize, oh man, I did not think about that. Yeah, like my daughter, when she was looking at schools, you know, she had good GPAs, you know, she got into places, and it was like she went there on college visits and she's like, these are not my people. Right? And then she found the college and she was like, these are my people. Right? She could interact with them. And it's hard even on those college tours to get a good feel of that because they're giving you the commercial.

Yeah. They're trained. I mean, they're trained. I mean, you've been on them. I took my youngest daughter to one the other a few weeks ago, and not a single person asked a question to the student. And so of course I'm going to ask questions like, tell me about your student experience. Tell me, she talked about switching majors. Why, you know, how did that process go for you? And everyone's just standing there being, you know, like they're not participating in this opportunity to like talk to the admissions and talk to these students. But yeah, it's a curated experience for these families, right? It's a peppy, you know, usually good-looking kid, right? And they're like, you know, got that energy about them and they're super passionate. And, you know, that's not the day-to-day typically, right? And so, and then, you know, one of my co-authors, Dr. LePan, he always wanted to do a study on your perception of the school depending on the weather. So like if you did a school visit and it was raining or it was snowy or it was gray and slushy, how did you feel about the school simply on the weather? Or if it's— I live in Southwest Florida, so all sunshine and palm trees, right? Like, right.

But they, they may not talk about like the heat index, right? It's really bad. But yeah, I mean, they put on a great commercial and, yeah, and I'm not saying that the schools aren't doing that thing that they're promising. But, but it's not for— not everyone has that experience. I know a lot of, you know, my daughter left school because she wanted to pursue working with dogs. She knows a lot of kids in there who are just doing it because their parents want them to, and they don't like it. They're there, they're burnt out. Maybe it was a bad match. Whatever it is, you don't want to be in that situation come your junior or senior year where your kid hates school. Yeah, right. And doesn't, and doesn't, you know, and it takes a while to find your people, even in a structured environment. It takes a while to find people. And it took my daughter until her junior year to find her people. But when she found her people, she felt seen and heard. But, you know, a lot of her friends, when she said, I'm going to leave college, they were like, well, our parents won't let us do that. Our parents, you know, and, and, and just like, we're not going in with the full 4 years in mind, right? Again, getting caught up in that commercial and that, um, and that like, oh, you know, what does the dorm Oh, if the dorm looks good, or if the food's good, then they're good to go, right?

They're good to go. Yeah, they're happy, you know. And what's, what's the return on investment, right? Think of 4 years of not being in the workforce. And I am, I'm a huge believer in you, you have to do some type of post-secondary something, right? After school, very rarely at 18 are you going to make a livable wage, you know, just right out of the gate. Like you need to do something. So whether that's a career technical program, getting a specialty certification, you know, having a job in mind. But, you know, so many people go into it without a plan, without really looking at the full lens of, you know, why am I making this decision? And if a student can come to you like your daughter and articulate, you know, this is what I'm really trying to achieve, this is why I want to do this, this is what happens, then that way we can have a real conversation, right? And I think sometimes so many kids like they don't know how to do that. And there's like, I don't know, I don't like school. I don't know. I don't know. I don't want, you know, like they don't have a rhyme or reason. And so we really have to get to that root of what are their interests? What are their abilities? What are their values? Like, and then what are they going to do to like support yourself? Because we don't want them moving back home. We were just talking about a lot of the families that you work with where the kids move back home and then they don't leave, you know? And it's like, we want them to be happy, healthy. But like just doing the same thing all the time without a plan is not going to get you anywhere, right? Like you got to keep moving.

So, yeah, you may have to, you know, I talk about it in my program where I'm about aligned and thriving, right? That's what we want for our kids.

Yes, for sure.

We want them to be aligned with what they're doing and thriving and enjoying it, right? And that's what I'm most proud of. That's my humble brag, right? My son is in marine science at Chapel Hill. Loving it, a rowing team, even has a job at a lab, like killing it, right? My daughter is at a Humane Society with her people, what she wants to do, right? She's neurodiverse. She needs that. But I think that it's just really hard for people to look at all the lenses. And I love your program because it really does that, because And the financial lens is a huge part of it, don't get me wrong. But if you can't find your people, you're going to be miserable in school.

Yeah, right.

For sure. And you have to have interests. And I think the best— and one of the things I talk about is messy action, is like trying to explore different things that you may not have been exposed to before. That's the great part about college is you get exposed to all these different ideas and ways of thinking and like, oh, you know, my son, he didn't meet with an advisor, took a multivariable calc class and it kicked his butt. And then he realized that he didn't need to take it. You know, like—

That's the worst. Yeah.

And that's the worst because he didn't meet with an advisor. So when the second semester came around, you know, my wife was advising him and she was like, I can't tell him what to do, but he really needs to take biology. Right. So she was like, let's look at all the courses that you need to take given where you want to go. Oh, look, biology, biology, biology. Right. So it's, you know, but you're doing the part in front of that.

Yeah. And hopefully, yeah, they can make it when they choose a college. They're more successful because they're understanding what they need to do once they get there. Right.

Right. And so, you know, and so like my son, why he's marine science microbiology, he's figured that out, which is great that he's aligned with that. But he still had those stumbling blocks of like the freshman year of like picking the wrong courses and stuff like that. And so I think to your point, yeah, you really have to understand, like, you know, and the plans may change, that's fine. But when you're getting into college, you have to have a plan for at least that first year. Yeah, of what you're going to do. And to your point, like, meeting with academic advisors is so, so important. But I also think the best thing we can do as parents is just to raise their self-esteem, right? And to encourage them to try different things. We kind of have this mindset when they're younger, right, of like, oh, explore all the sports and stuff like that, right? Try baseball, football, basketball, whatever. Right? But we don't do that when they get older. And I think that we need to, you know, yes, it's narrowing, but there's still an opportunity, you know, like he's taking a Russian literature class.

Yeah.

And he thought it was fun.

Yeah. Right?

And so he was just exploring that and, you know, and he could afford the credits. So it was like, that's Again, we want them to explore their horizons and being like, oh, I heard— talk to one of my friends and he's like, his son thought he was— wanted to be in accounting, took an accounting course, quickly dismissed that.

That's one of those courses. That was me too. I'm like, oh, I'll be a finance major. And I took accounting and I'm like, I hate this.

Yeah, I know. I know. Exactly, exactly, exactly. Yeah, I actually, I actually, I actually was a finance major. Not that I did anything with it, but, but it's just because I found a teacher that I liked. Yeah, and I, and I hated accounting, but I like finance. So it's just like, it's also about like looking at the teachers too, and, and that's, that should be part of the informed decision-making too, because like, you know, yeah, what's your access to them?

Because some of these schools, if you go to a large, say UNC, or you go to a Clemson, or you go to, um, you know, a big University of Georgia, you know, University of Central Florida, I mean, they have over like 85,000, 90,000 students. Like, so some of these classes, they are 300. And I know, you know, my daughter's up at UF, University of Florida, and she— it was Organic Chem. And she's like, oh great, you know, she had done dual enrollment. It was on a small community college. She knew all the professors. Like, she could go in and talk to them. And she's like, okay, I'm gonna go to office hours. I know what I need to do. And she's like, Mom, she's like, It was chaos. There were so many kids in this tiny little office that the lady was running it like, like a military. Like, you got one question. Go, go, go. And like, she's like, and I, it could because there's just so many kids trying to get help for this class because it's, it's one of those gateway courses, you know. And she's like, there were 300 kids in this class. And so when you have just a few office hours a week, she's like, I was not getting help. And so she found a program that other students, if you take the class, they kind of create like a study curriculum that you could buy to help you study, you know, for these, these classes. And she's like, that, that saved me, you know. So luckily, she could tap into other resources. So what she knew, and what she had been taught, didn't work in that situation. So she had to like, she's like, and it caused huge anxiety and she had to pivot and like, you know, and so we have to teach, like you were saying, the kids to navigate. You can't just, when you, when your kid's in Russian literature and you hit a wall, you can't just stop, you know, he's in multivariable calculus, you got to keep going, you know, and so how are you going to make that, that pivot? And what does that look like? And that's really hard because some adults We don't do that very well. Like, we're like, oh, we need to just go a different way. You know, one of my favorite sayings, and I've used this, like, in all my 25 years of doing counseling, is there's many paths to one summit, right? And I think about when you scale a mountain, and, you know, I know you're up in North Carolina, you maybe go hiking and stuff like that. So sometimes there's a nice, well-worn path that's nice and paved, or, you know, at least wide and It's beautiful vistas. Others like to go up the steep slope and they're like belaying and they're like on ropes and they're scaling the wall. And you know, whatever path it is, it doesn't matter, but you gotta get to the top. And once you're at the top, it's the same view, whether you went meandered or if you scaled the wall and went straight up, right? And so, you know, I tell kids, sometimes you get tired and you gotta go take the path. You know, you gotta get off for a little bit, rest your arms, and then you can go scale, you know, but you got to be OK with just taking different paths at different times, as long as you keep that, that goal setting that you're getting to the top, right, and looking out over that view.

But you have to listen to yourself and—

You do, yeah.

You have to, and what you're capable of. For sure. One of the things that I warned my son about is he got into University of Delaware., right? And he got into the honors program, right? And I said, that's great, but you're going to be in the honors program, you're going to be at the top of the heap, okay? He's at Carolina, he is not the top of the heap, right? And he's around people who have— who are smarter than him. Right, who are more disciplined than him. You know, one of the guys that he talked to, he's like, I have my schedule down to a half hour, right?

Yeah, yeah.

And so now some people are built for that, some people can do that, right? But to your point, you don't really know until you're on the path and then you have to like, oh, I have to recalibrate now. You know, it's like, wait, it's recalibrating direction, right? You have to be like, oh, this is not working out, or this is not what I thought it would be. And you have to have that. And it's very hard at that age to have that flexibility of mindset, of just like— because school is taught— school and jobs and everything that we've gone through is taught perfection. We have to get it perfect. Right? And we have to go down the right, this path, like the only, to your point, like, you know, only the tried and true path. But to your point, there's many different paths to get there.

Yeah, yeah.

Right. And it also depends on the kid, right? Because some things may not resonate. This tried and true path may not resonate, but if they go around or if they use a climbing wall or whatever it is.

Yeah.

They may find a different path and they may find new things that they're— so it's really hard at that age to have that flexibility of mindset. But it's also really hard as a parent to have that flexibility of mindset. Yeah, right. Of just like you're— because we all want to go to the dinner party and say, yeah, my kid's awesome, right? He's getting, you know, he's killing it. He's done 4.5 average, you know, like all of the things in college, right? And we don't want to be the parent who's like, yeah, he's really smart. But the truth of it is that if they don't have a plan going in, they're probably going to struggle even more.

Right.

Right. If they don't— something like your program, like we sat down, we didn't have a lot of know about you. I should have loved to. But like we sat down with my son and said, if you go to University of San Diego, it's going to cost you $90,000. Mm-hmm. Right? Do you really want to do that as opposed to $13,000 at Carolina?

Yeah.

Yeah. Now obviously vice versa. Yeah. And, and, and, you know, we're kind of biased because we're in Raleigh. Chapel Hill's not far. So yeah, we're biased. But, but he had to look at that and see like, oh, I could go to University of Delaware, University of Virginia, or I could go to Chapel Hill. Where's the most bang for my buck? And where will I find the best people in it and where I can learn the most too.

Right.

And so looking at all these opportunities, that's what he, you know, I think those schools would have been fine, but University of Delaware, if you're at the top of the heap, then it's not really, you don't have anywhere to learn, right? But then I see also people, and this was my college experiences, I went to UNCG for a year I didn't like that. I went to NC State for the next 4. I was on the 5-year plan. Didn't have a plan, right? But like, I got lost at NC State. It's too big, right? I should have gone to Guilford. That's what I should have done, right?

Much easier. And, and knowing thyself, and I think it's important to— and you mentioned it about the parents, and so part of when we have families look at the 6 keys of college fit. We have, we want students to rate each of the keys based on their interest and sort of what they're looking at. And then we have the parents do the exact same activity, right? And then the idea is, and we have this fun little, it's a little free card sort, and they go in and they just take the 6 keys and it shows them what's the most important to them. And then, you know, we always say you should always look at all keys, right? You should never like completely dismiss something, but there are times there's some non-negotiables and you need to work around, right? And so, you know, I love when the parents do it, and they have to realize where your lens as a parent and your biases come in, and how does that affect the student going through the process. And if we, you know, like, you know, you talked about your daughter's friends, if we're pushing on them, this is our expectations, but yet that's not congruent with who they are, we're not going to raise happy, healthy children, right? And so we need to have these conversations and understand how are we approaching it. So when my daughter was going through the process, I actually had one of my counseling friends help her because I had to step away and I just wanted to be mom. I didn't want to be the counselor. You know what I mean? I didn't want to be the advisor. I just wanted to be mom and support her and say, hey, these are some of the— our parameters. Here are the parameters. This is how you should go through the process, but not somebody else, let you be you and create your own sort of application and your own process. Because I wanted her to come and feel ownership of it instead of me just nagging, right? Like, do this, do this, do this. And you know, I'm sure you get a lot of parents that you work with that it's like, okay, maybe less nagging, you know, more planning and more like reframing, you know, you've We have to do it at all ages, right?

Yeah. And I love that. I think that having the parents do it because what I'm finding on my end when they're trying to launch, right? When you're trying to get the kid to launch, the parents have this expectation, right? Yeah. Of they're trying to do it. I've supported them all this time, you know, and they should have had enough life experience to figure out exactly what they want to do at this moment.

Right?

And they're not going through the process of, like, they have their own generational trauma, right? They have their own paths that they were taught.

Yeah.

And I am trying to tell them, like, you have to, like, when you're going through this high school, college launching phase, you kind of have to decrease the amount of advice that you're giving. And that's very hard to do, right? Because we've, for 18 years, we were told like, give them advice, you know, don't take snacks from strangers, you know, whatever, you know, don't, you know, don't do this, don't do that, right? You know, don't touch the stove when it's hot, right? So we've been advising them. So we still feel like that's our role, but it kind of morphs and changes. And it depends on the kid too. Like my son and daughter couldn't be more different. Different, right? So, so for my daughter, I may need to, like, you know, encourage her more. For my son, I don't need to do that. But, but, you know, in terms of advice-giving, they don't want to hear it from their parents. They will hear from their friends. They would rather hear from a college counselor.

Is it from us? Right, right.

Yeah, yeah. It starts to get to that point. And so what I do is I try to have tell the parents of like, you have to see and hear them, right?

And so as adults, I mean, as adults, that's the hard— kind of when my daughter came home for the first Christmas after, you know, being away for 6 months, right? And that was the conversation we had that I'm like, I have to step back and I have to treat you like an adult. I have to, you know, put away the advice like, are you sure you want to eat that? Are you sure you want to do this? You want to do that? Like, it's just It's part of your nature. And I'm like, if I continue this path, she's not going to have the autonomy or want to talk to me when a situation arises. And so when she does need advice, she's not going to turn to me because all I do is, you know, so I even had to, I have to check myself and be like, I have to view her differently. I can't view her as a 6-year-old. 16-year-old kid anymore that's not picking up her laundry, even though it annoys me that they come to my house and not have, you know, the laundry's not picked up. Like, I could see where she was only home for a little bit before she went out to this, um, research opportunity, and we could see where she went in the, in the, um, in the house because there's like glasses, like glasses and water bottles, like along the path. And I'm like, where are all of our cups? And they're just like I'm like, Evan Sanchez, like, where?

Right, right, right. It's really—

but then I'm like, yeah.

And you have to have these conversations like, you know, okay, our relationship's changing.

It's changing.

Right, right. It's changing. Like, we had to have those contribution conversation with my son. He's back home between semesters, and I was like, You have to do your laundry. You should not be asking me what's for breakfast or for lunch, right? Maybe dinners at the most, you know, but you know, and you know, you don't, you just, I don't need to tell you when the recycling is full. You should do that, right? You should do that. You should take care of the dogs more. I shouldn't have to ask you these things. And he was kind of like, he's kind of like, oh, okay. He got it. He was, you know, that's about as receptive as you're going to get it. Yeah, yeah. But it's just like the relationship has to change now. And, you know, and, you know, I can't give him the advice stuff. Like, it feels like pressure and judgment. And especially when they graduate from college, then it really, I think it magnifies at that point because the advice part like really gets in the way of establishing a connection with your kid. And it's so interesting to me that our societal timelines are, you know, you go to college, you get a job, you get married, you have children. Like these are all like at this age. And we talked about it before the call, it was just like, you know, your parents got married very young.

We got married young. Yeah.

Yeah. And so, and it's not the way life is viewed anymore. Anymore. But to have these societal marketers and, you know, like, especially after you've invested so much in college, and if you hadn't had a good college experience or haven't had the, you know, kind of that intentionality going in with your program, right?

Right.

Then they may come out and they may want to do something different. A lot of people don't do their college degrees, you know, anyway, but they have to think, but You know, what I'm trying to encourage parents to do is encourage, like, let's give them 4 years of messy action, right? And that may not be ideal depending on, you know, but, you know, let them, you know, guide themselves, you know, for a period of time. And not that you can't give advice, you can, right? But you have to say, here's my unsolicited advice. Here's what I think, you know, and, um, but allow this, you know, and that's what I'm trying to do with college and college grads and the parents is like guide them through this messy action part, right? And how to look at their kids differently. They're capable. And if you view them as lazy because they're sitting around playing video games, I say they're not lazy, they're just misaligned. Right? And so instead of the least generous interpretation of them playing video games, what would be the best interpretation of them doing video games? Right? Is it's more, it's give them, give them, I hate this expression, but it's Give them enough rope to hang themselves. Give them enough— I hate that expression because it's very morbid, but give— let them make mistakes, right? Let them make mistakes and follow their path. Now you can still guide them and you can still have intentionality, right? But they have to do a lot of reflecting to be like, what kind of life do I ultimately want to achieve, right? What am I, you know, like, what would my future self be proud of? All of those things have to come into play for them to figure figure out the next phase. And I feel like with your program, if they had that same early on, yeah, right on, then they're like, oh, this is the lens that I— this is, this is because you're still more prone to receive advice at 18 than you are at 22. Yeah, right. But if they saw a process early on, right, where they did these things and looked at the options in the way that you're talking about and made decisions like that, right? And they can apply that same framework over and over again.

Yeah, it's a life, it's a lifelong framework. I mean, really, I mean, whenever, if you think about, you know, you talked about your son going to graduate school, it's the same process. If you think about going back to school and getting a new certificate because you want to upskill within your job, I mean, there's so many opportunities where you just have to like sit down and really analyze what does that next step look like, and is it financially beneficial, what do I do, and You know, we're not really teaching a decision-making process at all. And I think that's such the critical missing piece for families. And you're absolutely right. If you can do it earlier on while they're in high school and they're a little more flexible and, you know, that they're going to listen to you and you can have that process, it's going to pay dividends later on because now they're, they're asking more questions as they go through the process, right, and have more ownership, I think, of that process too. Because at the end of the day, we want them to be, you know, self-sustaining adults, right, that they are doing the things that they need to do and can be happy and thriving. I know that's one of your words you use is thriving and doing well. And so funny story, I think I told you the story when we were chit-chatting last time. So I was standing in a line waiting for a lunch at like this chamber event, and this mom, we're just chit-chatting because waiting in line. And she goes— and whenever I tell people what I do, they're like, oh, I wish I would have had you like 4 years ago, right? And I'm like, okay. And so I'm like, well, what does your son do now? And he's like, oh, well, he's working at an ice cream shop. And I'm like, okay, interesting, fine. She's like, well, he moved up, you know, he has a degree in marketing advertising from UCF, and he followed some friends up to Virginia, and he's working, living with a bunch of buddies, and and he's working at an ice cream shop and he doesn't know what to do with his life. He's 22. And I'm like, okay. And I said, well, he's like, you know, he's applied, he can't get a job. And I said, well, I mean, does he like advertising? Like, is that really what he want to do, or does he want to do something different? Like, that's my first question. And she's like, yeah, I think so, just can't get a job. And I said, well, if I was working at this ice cream shop, maybe ask him to ask the owner "Can I run your social media and get, you know, start posting some stuff and start—" And then the mom owned a cleaning business down here. And I said, "Well, maybe he can run your social media." And all of a sudden now you have two clients that you can manage and look at their data and their statistics and you can get your mind back into the career that you were trying to build, right? So like the longer you go away from it, You sort of, you, you, you use it or you lose it. Right. And so I'm like, well then now he could start his own company and he doesn't have to say no one paid him to do the social media. And now he has, you know, he can show proof of concept. And now she's like, oh, that's a really good idea. And I'm just like, again, like you gotta be messy and you gotta figure stuff out and you gotta be okay with saying, hey, how do I keep You know, you don't have to put more money at a situation. You don't all have to go to graduate school. But how are you putting yourself out there instead of just being okay working at an ice cream shop making minimum wage at $15 an hour, right? Like, you can build those skills. And she's like, oh yeah, maybe, maybe we do need to talk to you. And then I met you and I'm like, no, you need to talk to Evan Sanchez. You need to talk to him. I do the college, the pre-college stuff.

But it's true. But it's the same sort of messy action, sort of like the— and the problem with the economy right now, people are just like, I can't get a job. And people are saying, like, LinkedIn, that's not working, and it's very hard to get a job, and da da da da da. And I get it. It's way harder than when we where we were going. I mean, we could just like walk out and somebody would hire us. It wasn't a problem. But now the economy is very changing and social media, AI, all that sort of stuff. But I'm like, the risk is just as great to be an entrepreneur as it is to be an employee now, right? And so it was a little surprising when you said the mom had a cleaning business. I was like, why wouldn't she put her— put him into entrepreneurship, right? Why would— yeah, you know, if she has a cleaning business, right, you know, and maybe he doesn't want to be a part of the cleaning business, but he could do the marketing. But, you know, to your point, he doesn't, you know, like, he doesn't have to charge them, right? He just gets the experience and he's like, you know, and, you know, and for marketing you can get Google Ads certified for free. Right. There's things you can do.

Yeah, Coursera and all the programs. Right.

There's all these things. There's all these programs that you can learn anything online where we didn't, you know, if we wanted to, if we wanted to go to dog training school, we'd have to find somebody back in our day. There's no like easy, like, let me just look it up. Right. So whatever interests they have, they can just look up now and they're not taking advantage of it. And I think the other thing that people aren't taking advantage of in the messy action after college thing is just talk to people, right? Like my wife, she thought she wanted to be a doctor, then she met some OTs and she's like, that's what I want to do, right? She's been doing it forever now. But it's like if you talk to the person and you get the behind the scenes, not the commercial, you're going to work in an agency, right? And just say, just find somebody who works at an agency and just say, "Hey, I just want to talk to you, take you out to lunch." And everybody loves to be helpful and loves to be, right, you know, loves for you to be curious about them and how they got there. Right. You know, that's one of the things that I try to instill in the parents is just try to be curious about your kid. Judgmental. And it's, it's very much that curiosity. And it's, it's really— I just think it's really important to like go out there and find people that are on the other side of what you're doing, right?

Yeah.

Because I don't know many people that I talk to that if you said, I'll take you out to lunch, or I'll take you out for coffee, because I'm really interested in what you do, who wouldn't be flattered by that? Even if you just met Like, why won't you do that?

Yeah. And I mean, that's the, you know, you think about what some of these people charge per hour and the unsolicited for a cup of coffee, it's like the cheapest mentorship that you're gonna get. Right. And, you know, I think a lot of us do want to pass it on. And that's what I tell students, you know, the worst they're gonna tell you is no. And if they tell you no, you're not anywhere, you know, worse off than you were when you started. So, You know, throw, throw a wide net, figure out what's out there, but put yourself out there. And we have to continue teaching our students to have that thought process and that advocacy, right? And that, again, going off your path, right? It's, it's, you got to know thyself. And so when in our book, so there's like 2 sections. So the first section is really about building your college and career readiness skills, like you as a student, as a person, as as a potential employee, what are those essential skills that you need to build all the way through 9 through 12 and beyond? And then we have the second part, which is the, the LEAD's college application process, right? The decision-making process. So in one of our chapters in the beginning, we have you factor, so building what's unique about you and your passions and interests and how do you do that. Academic, factor, like what classes do you take, how do you, you know, look at what's available and create your own path. Um, we have career factor, so we do a lot of like Collins Codes, the 16 career pathways, using O*NET, stuff like that. And then we have your money factor, right? Like, how are you going to pay for it? Um, in the career factor, the thing that we teach is there's two, there's two bubbles, and think of a Venn diagram, right? So the first half is knowing yourself. Know your interests, your abilities, and your values, right? Those are the 3 main things when you're looking at what type of career could I want to do, right? I loved being in education. I don't like the pay of being a teacher. So how can I stay within that realm and be able to, you know, still talk, still teach, but do it in a different way. And then on the other hand is the, the knowledge of the world of work. What's out there? What am I able to do, right? What really are the jobs available? And I think as parents, we don't know all these cool new jobs. And since COVID and globalization, like, there's so much out there. And so what we teach students is that intersection of who they are with what's available then that's, that's the key, right? That's where you are going to find your success because you're going to be congruent in your personal and your professional life, and it matches, right? And so, you know, it's just really important, like you talked about that messy middle, that's where they're, they're kind of figuring out both sides of it, right? They're funneling down to, OK, cross that off my list. Oh, not good. Like accounting, I crossed that off that first week of class, right? And, you know, I didn't want to sit behind a desk. I wanted a job I could talk all day long. Like, I knew I needed a job that I could just talk to people, and education, they were captive audience. They can't go anywhere. They have to be in my classroom. They have to listen to me, right? And so, um, so that's, that was one of my decision-making processes. But that, that intersection is so important, and I think again, every time we, we shift and change, no matter if you're 16, 22, 38, it's that same process that you have to do that we teach hopefully you as like a 9th and 10th grader, right? It's the same. It doesn't change all that much, right?

But, but you have to listen to that intuition. Yeah, exactly. You have to learn it, right? Because like you may say that you want to be in marketing agencies and you get into agency, and you're like, oh, this is not— this is not— this is not— these are not the droids I'm looking for, right? It's, it's like, it's a completely different thing. And, and you have to be okay with, like, that's not— people think, oh, that's a failure. I'm like, that's a learning. It's a learning opportunity.

Yeah, it's a learning opportunity.

You learned what you did not like. Yeah, right. You know, my dating, right?

I mean, we date people and we're like, okay, I don't like that type. I don't like that.

I like a little bit a little bit of that, a little bit of that. Now you're not going to get the perfect person, right? You're not going to get the perfect job that just lights you up on everything.

But you got to compromise a little bit, you know.

But, you know, my daughter, my daughter is at the Humane Society. She loves, you know, dealing with the dogs, not so much the humans, right? And she understands that she's going to have to interact with humans as part of this. Right? And she's going to have to clean the— clean up after the dogs and make sure that everything, you know, she's doing a lot of physical labor at this point, but it lights her up and she's loving it. And that's what I really want. And so you don't want to get your kid to the point where they get out of school and they have the same old stories. They have the feeling trapped. And stuff like that. So, you know, I love your process just because it can really like shape, you know, because they may have to go through the process multiple times in their lives.

Yeah, I think we all have.

And we all have, and that's okay. And that's what society needs to embrace, is that it's okay. My grandfather— I'll humble brag about my grandfather for a second— um, butcher's son. Right? Didn't want to take over the butcher, you know, the business, right? His dad was not a nice man, um, and he got into a school that he could. It was a school for girls, you know, somehow he got in there, and he started doing book publishing, and he started getting into that. And eventually, by the time he was 65, he was ahead of a book publishing company, a big one, right? And he had his successes, you know, he helped, he helped with Stephen King. He's passed on Martha Stewart, you know, like he, he did that. But at 65 they sold him, you got to get out of here, because it was the '80s, right? And he's like, you know what, I've always wanted to be a lawyer. That's been my lifelong dream is to be a lawyer. So he went to law school, no one would hire him. 3 times the passive there, right? No one hired him. He had to pay for his own office space and his own assistants for 2 years, and he practiced till he's 97. Oh, wow. And so, yeah, it's a humble brag, but it's just like, the point is that it's never too late to find the alignment. Yeah, right. And when people say that they're too old to do something or they're too old to change, and I give them that example, they're like, okay, well, maybe not, right? I don't know if I want to live to 97.

Bunch of stories. And yeah, he had a whole bunch of stories, but I mean, like, it's a whole second life, right? It's— and you hear that, yeah, where people finally go, this is what I want to do and who I am.

And right, and right. And you know, my son found marine science by going through a summer program at UNCW, right? And he was like in the lab and he's like, oh, that's what I want to do. And then came back senior year of high school going, and he's like, "I just want to be in the lab, man." He's like, "I want to work." And it's that exposure, right?

And so, you know, I guess the biggest thing that no matter what your age is, it's having that exposure, right, to the world of work, what's out there. And so taking opportunities, like you said, asking people to go to lunch, pick their brain, talk to them. You know, I just was talking with a rising senior, and he's talking about finance. I said, "Hey, I have some friends that are in the finance business. I'll connect that connect you and, you know, maybe go shadow, go ask some questions, just go be curious, you know, talk about how they went through the process and how they ended up where they were, because that's going to help you figure out which path, which school. And so you just have to stay open. And as parents, we have to encourage always trying to do something. And like you said, you got to listen, you can't nag, you know, you have to really, And, you know, obviously high school is a little bit different than, you know, somebody that's an adult and, you know, is out on their own. But it is, it's such an important skill. And I think, you know, the people that make it are the ones that continue to stay curious, right? They're, they're seeking those opportunities. Because, I mean, there are so many things in my life, like, oh, I mean, I started my book by just blogging, because I just wanted to help my own students. And then I started seeing that I'm putting this together, and then I started doing this, and then I reached out to the experts in the field and said, hey, you have the research and you have the, the theory-based and the assessments, how can we partner? Because I have the practitioner-based, right? And so like, it was a cold call. I just made a phone call and said, hey, this is what I'm doing, what are you guys doing? And we wrote a whole curriculum come together. And so all those steps, I mean, it was just one baby steps, right? It just, you know, but we— and I'll show you my first book. This tells you I literally made it. I, I, you know, did this at school, right? I, I hole punched it and the school machine, right, right, right. I mean, it was just, it was just a Word doc, you know. And now I have a whole web app and curriculum and it's sold all over the United States. And like, it literally just came from just some worksheets I want to put together for my own kiddos, you know.

So, right, right. But, but the hard part is we— that's, that's what I was about to say is let's just like take the, the one step, you know. When I started first posting on social, I had so much cringe and I was like, I can't post on LinkedIn, people are going to see me, what are people going to think? And then I got get over that. And then I was— somebody did, you know, said do 30 days of videos on LinkedIn. And I was like, oh, I hate myself on camera, you know, you know, I have no hair, you know, I don't like the way my mouth moves, right? All that sort of stuff. Like, and then I had 30 videos and I was like, well, now I have a YouTube channel, right? And now I'm interviewing people. And it's just like, it just, it just, it's just like you, you can't see the light until you take that first step, right? You can't see, like, if I didn't take the first step, and the first step is the hardest part because again, we're taught this perfection mentality of everything has to be perfect. But I guarantee you, anyone who learned how to swim was not Michael Phelps out of the gate, right? I went back to swimming, 8 years ago, and I couldn't do a lap. And then I just kept on— consistency beats everything. And so then I got into a master swim program and I was doing 4 to 5 miles a week, which was great until I realized that I was exhausted by waking up at 4:50 in the morning. But the point is, it's like you go through these evolutions as people and you have to embrace those evolutions and you have to see where they're going to lead and feel like, does this feel right for me? And, and that's kind of what your program does. It kind of gives them a framework to, to do that exploring.

Yeah, for sure. And I'll tell you a funny story. You just said swimming. Um, my daughter— so we were, we lived in Nicaragua. My husband and I were international educators for several years. So we lived in West Africa, we lived in Nicaragua, and one of the ladies that worked at my school, she was a former swimmer Olympian. So she had— and I've actually held a silver medal in my hand, which is really cool. Um, and she was the youngest swimmer. She went to Clemson, but I think at like 14 she won silver. And I mean, it was the really long one, is it 800 meters or whatever? Um, and then she won a relay. Um, so really cool. So we're in her pool overlooking Lake Managua and this beautiful— and she goes, hey, to my daughter, like, hey, I'll teach you how to swim. And she's Nope, like, I don't think you can do it. And she's like, I'm an Olympian swimmer. And she's like, my daughter's like, no, like adamant, like, I am not going to learn to swim from you. I'm like, you have an Olympic swimmer, like we're holding her medal in our hand. And, you know, so sometimes she ended up not, she did not want to learn to swim from her. I don't know why she wasn't ready. And, you know, she ended up learning to swim later on. But it also, there are people in our lives that sometimes say, hey, I can help you. I can be your Olympic swimmer and teach you you how to do this, it would be a lot easier and a much cooler story, and she would have been able to swim for a lot longer than if she just would have— she just wanted to, she wanted to learn it on her own. She just wanted to kind of hack at it. I'm like, swimming's not one that you just kind of hack at. Like, you need, like, to know how to not sink to the bottom, you know? And but I think a lot of times in, in life we do that, right? Like, these people come that say, hey, I could teach you I can help you, I can be your guide and do this, and you're like, oh no, I'll just do it on my own and just sink to the bottom.

I'll just drown on my own, thanks, thanks, thanks, thanks for throwing me the life preserver, but you know, I'm just gonna go over here, you know, and swim with the sharks, right?

You know, but to your point, I mean, there are times when families and like we have to step outside and be like, hey, this really is the best person, or you're going to be keep sinking to the bottom, like you're not going to figure out how to swim.

Right, right. But, but can I, can I just piggyback on— I mean, I love that story because it's so true, but also it reminds me of something else, is that, you know, so I don't know if I told you this before, but as a kid I lived in Colombia and Peru. Okay, okay, cool. Um, so, so, uh, I was 0 to 2, 3rd and 4th grades, and the 8th and 9th grade. So I had this international experience. And that's the other thing that we don't do as Americans. Right. And my father traveled all over the world, lived in Kenya for 10 years. Right. But we don't ever consider that a possibility. Of what people can do with their lives and, you know, and getting a different perspective on things. And sometimes that's the part of the messy action that you have to do. Do you know what I mean? Like, you can go live in Spain, right? At 22, that's fine. Yeah, right. It's probably more affordable than the US. For sure. For sure. Yeah.

But it's again, like, you know, getting into those uncomfortable I think, and being uncomfortable, like, you gotta work through being uncomfortable at times, right? And I think if you create this little bubble all the time, like, you're not going to grow. Growth doesn't happen when, you know, everything's just the same. Growth happens when you have to go through the messy middle, right? And then get through it, right?

And, and growing, yeah, nobody Nobody ever grew through a comfortable situation, right? For sure. Right. They grew through an uncomfortable situation. But what I love about what you do is, again, you're doing two things, right? Because I feel like when people feel seen and heard, they grow. If I had a bumper sticker or if I had a billboard, that's what I would put on it. When people feel— and then It's like less judgment, less comparison equals a happier life. Those are the two bumper stickers I would have.

I like them.

I'll put them on my car. Excellent. Excellent. But the point is, when people feel seen and heard, right? When you see your kid as not that 8-year-old anymore and as a 16-year-old and an 18-year-old, and they change. And you've seen them, like, you know, I've seen my daughter from like, you know, hiding behind a tree in kindergarten because she was afraid of being in her performance, right, in front of all these people, you know, to having her bat mitzvah at 13 and doing it in front of a whole bunch of, you know, you see those growths. And so when you acknowledge kids about how much they've grown, but you have to make them feel seen and heard at every age. But also as parents, we need to feel seen and heard. And I think that we, you know, because we're not going to grow. So I love what you do because you're taking the kid and the adult and making them feel the same thing. So they're both feeling heard right now. Yeah. Right. They're both feeling seen and heard in that moment by taking those assessments because they're like looking at like, okay, this is the way I'm perceiving the world. This is the way you're perceiving the world. And oh, wow. I didn't realize that, you know, I thought our Venn diagrams were over— completely overlapped.

And they're not. They're not.

Yeah. And they're not. And so I think that it's just such important work that you do that in terms of like getting that lens of of making everybody feel seen, heard, and also looking at the lens of what's actually available, right? Because AI is going to change a lot of jobs, right? Customer service may not be the best field to go into right now. No, just saying, right? You know, and it's just— yeah.

So yeah, no, I think, I think all of it is fair. And I think, you know, part of it is really for, I mean, any kind of parent, student thinking of listening and watching this, you know, sometimes we don't know what we don't know, right? And so I think so many times when we listen to these things and we engage with the people that do know, and I've spent my life, literally 25 years, like crafting this, thinking about this, analyzing this, working with students and seeing what works, what doesn't work, what, what questions and like understanding if you want to get here, these are the things that you got to do along the way. And a lot of times parents just see this endpoint. They don't see the step by step by the step, right? And so, you know, when you, when you hear this, like, think about like sometimes you need to have other people be the guide for a while. You need to hire the Olympian, you know, to come in and say, hey, this is how we do it right. So you don't keep drowning at the bottom of the pool, you know. So, um, because I think sometimes we get so stuck and regimented, and, you know, so many parents think, oh, I went to college, so I can help my kid through it. 25 years ago, I, I completed one application. I'm from Iowa. We had 3 state universities. My brother went to one, so I can't go there because I can't see my brother on campus. The other one was only 30 minutes from my house, which I'm— my mom is not stopping by. So that left the third university. I put in one application, I took the ACT one time, done.

Like, and it was paper, and it was paper, right?

Yeah, it was paper. And like, that was it. Like, there was no other question, right? And now there's just so much more at stake. Schools are more expensive, there's just more pressure there. You know, there's just more to it. And, you know, if I broke my arm, I'd go see somebody and ask, how do I fix my arm?

Like, I wouldn't just leave it dangling. Right, exactly. You're not going to be like, oh, I'll be fine.

I'll be fine. You know, like, so you do have to realize sometimes what we don't know or that we're not doing it right, right? Because that conflict between parents and your child should not be happening. Right? I mean, it really should be— it doesn't need to be kumbaya, but we definitely don't need to have conflict and yelling and people feeling insecure and their confidence going down. Like, that's not how this process should look like. Right? That's not a happy, healthy home. So, you know, that's my two cents.

You shouldn't be stepping on eggshells around each other. And I've seen so many parents of just like, they're so adamant that their kids have to go to school. Yeah, right. And they're so at, like, my daughter has a friend who's in an interracial relationship and the mom's not seeing it. And the guy couldn't be more lovely. He couldn't be better. And she's just not seeing it. And it's just I feel bad for Mom because think of all the traumas that she's had. Right. Right. That she can't— Yeah. That she can't get past. And we all have traumas. If we've been in this life for any sort of period of time, we're going to have some sort of trauma that's going to develop. For sure. But I think that's really important. But this has been wonderful. I've really enjoyed this conversation.

Yeah, it's a great conversation.

Very easy conversation.. And so I'd love to know, how can people get in touch with you?

Yeah, so easy. Just collegeunmaze.com is our business. And so yeah, we have curriculum, we have a whole new web app that's coming out. So, you know, whether it's working one-on-one with myself or my team or going through the web app and kind of having those tools and resources along the way, or the guidebooks, we have lots of tools. And I do every Tuesday at 7, I do a live workshop. Anybody can come and I do 30 minutes of recording and then I turn off the recording and 30 minutes you can ask any questions that you want. It's not recorded or anything like that. So, so you really get that one-on-one guidance too. So definitely check that out. I'm on YouTube as well. Instagram, not so, not so great. I try to struggle, but YouTube is typically, if you go there, I post all my videos and stuff like that there. So you can check me out. Yeah. And Amanda Turk is my name. So awesome. Well, thanks, Evan, and I can't wait to connect with you soon. Thank you.

Thank you.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Bye. Bye.