When the beginning of the school year rolls around, many seniors start thinking about their plans once they graduate. There is no correct path after graduation. In 2017, 2.9 million students graduated from high school in the United States, and 1.9 million (67%) enrolled in college that fall. Many students also consider other plans, such as taking a gap year, joining the military, attending a two-year college, or finding a job.
Edward Rho, the Career Specialist at Roosevelt, shared some statistics on the graduating class of 2020’s post-high school plans. He said that almost 80% of seniors last year wanted to go to a four-year college according to the post-secondary goals survey they filled out at the end of the school year. 15-20% of the class of 2020 were thinking about going to a two year college, specifically utilizing the Seattle Promise, a program that allows you to take two years at one of three community colleges of choice across the city.
Rho helps to provide students with a variety of opportunities and activities for students to participate in over the summer after graduation. He sends weekly newsletters from the career center with plenty of opportunities such as becoming a coach at a summer camp, joining the Youth Maritime Program, and taking part in the UW summer nursing camp.
Throughout the year, he has been providing the class of 2021 with suggestions and activities so that students can add experiences to their resumes, earn money or volunteer hours, and find something to do after graduation. Rho can also help connect students who are considering joining the military, an appealing option seeing as the military pays for the full college tuition of its participants.
For the last graduating class, there was an increase in the number of students planning to take a gap year, due to COVID — about 2-3% of the graduating seniors. In addition, about 5% of students said that they wouldn’t be attending college because they needed to support their families after COVID caused job losses and financial difficulties.
For students in the Seattle area, there are several local colleges that are frequently suggested to seniors applying to schools, one of them being the University of Washington. With renowned business and medical programs, a beautiful campus, and an in-state tuition price, it’s an appealing option for any Washington state student.
The University of Washington’s Foster School of Business is known for being a hugely competitive program to get into, and many eager applicants anxiously waited to hear back when decisions were released this March.
The UW is a famously competitive school to get into with a relatively low acceptance rate of 51%. The UW, along with most other colleges and universities across the country, removed the test score requirement on their application.
While many students from Roosevelt apply and attend the UW, other students who plan to attend college are looking to go out of state. Senior Jade Sider considered schools all over the country. Her initial criteria for a college was a Division 1 school with a lot of school spirit, a good social atmosphere, and somewhere she knew she would always have something to do. With these interests in mind, she applied to Purdue, UT Austin, USC, Stanford, and University of Michigan, among others. “I also wanted a school that I knew was going to challenge me academically, and I also wanted something different and a new culture and the chance to explore myself more.” It was important to her to find a school with a good research front, a reputable medical program, and a study abroad program. In early April, she committed to the University of Texas at Austin and plans to major in biology.
Sider is approaching fluency in French and Spanish, and she wrote her essay about languages and how they have allowed her to connect with more people. “I also want to minor in a language because I enjoy learning them, and I think it’s helpful in all careers to know languages.” She mentioned that knowing languages allows people to have understanding, relatability, and access to a wider array of connections and resources.
Sider says she is excited for a chance to be really independent, strengthen her own beliefs, and practice managing money. “I think the big thing for me is learning to be 100% self-motivated without having a parent or guardian there to support and push me constantly; learning how to prioritize properly, stay organized, remember what’s important, and how to still keep my work ethic really good and stay focused.”
Sider hopes to pursue medical school after graduating from UT Austin. She says, “I’m someone who knows how to work hard for something and I think it’d be a career I would do well in. I like learning, it’ll be really hard but it’ll be worth it.”
Given the uncertain year, it’s frustrating to not know what the future holds. For graduates this year, it’s difficult to know what their college, gap year, or other plans will look like. As vaccines are being widely distributed across the US, hopefully graduates this year will have some normalcy next year.
