Free Financial Aid Resources

Hi All,

Check it out - its that time of year when college applications are due.  And once that happens, college acceptance letters should start rolling in. 

With that in mind students - and their parents - might be well served by visiting the New York State Higher Education Services Corporation website from the New York State government.  Click here to visit the site.

What does the site have you ask? Great question!  Three major sections will help students.  The first major section helps students prepare for college.  There is a section on your 'High School Plan' which will help you determine what to do year-by-year to prepare for college.  There is also a college fair calendar and a section on applying to college step-by-step.

Next is the 'How to Pay' for college.  22 NYS student financial programs are covered, federal financial aid is covered.  Sections on filling out and completing the FAFSA and TAP applications are listed as well.  There are also calculators, estimators and more on this section of the site.

Finally, the last section is called 'Repay' - paying off student loans.  Finally, readers of this blog entry can use this site to find FAFSA completion events in our area - click here to go to the site. 

Enjoy the site - and I hope the applying to college process is quick, painless and successful for you.

Regards,
Stu

Hi All,

School and schooling is important - for kids - obviously.  Heck, without schools kids wouldn't be growing up with the skills they need to become productive, vital adults and human beings.  Imagine a world where there were no schools or colleges?  Yup - it would pretty much be chaos and not a good world to live in!

Anyway, I just found a website where users can find and share information about schools - the site is called Great!Schools.org and is easy to navigate and search.

Upon visiting the site, users can 'Find a School', 'Review Your School', and 'Discover'.  A bit further down on the page is a link to Great!Kids Milestones - which has lots of videos about the various milestones that kids should be reaching at various ages'. Note that users can select milestones by grade - which go up to 5th grade.


Users can enter a city name, zip code, address or school name when visiting the sites homepage.  Upon entering the information users come to a new page which explains what grades the school covers, whether or not the school is public or private, the location of the school, contact information and the number of students that are enrolled in the school.

Further down on the page are links for an Overview of the school, Reviews of the school, Quality of the school and Details of the school.

Users of Great!Schools.org can also sign in using Facebook or create an account with Great!Schools if they so choose.  Finally, users can get Great!Schools best articles, worksheet, and more delivered weekly to your inbox by clicking on this link!

In a future blog post, I am going to introduce another school-education related website: the New York State Report Cards section of the  New York State Department of Education website!  Its a very timely, information and well organized website run by the NYS Department of Education!

Enjoy Great!Schools.org and stay tuned for the next blog post about the NYS Report Cards!

Regards,

Stu

Back To School - Top 10's

Hi All,

Well, I hate to say it, but it is back-to-school time again. Yes, another summer has come and gone and we are in 'back-to-school' mode once again.  So...for long time readers, that means I'm going to generate another 'Top 10' list.  This time the list is all about 'things that relate to back-to-school'.  Here it goes!  Enjoy - and have a great school year!

Click on this link for an article from Time Magazine titled, 'Top 10 Back-to-School iPhone Applications'.  With titles of apps like CourseSmart, Stanza, Evernote and Graphing Calculator, students will have more time to study and get good grades.  Thanks technology!

From Mashable comes this article on 'Top 10 Back-to-School Brain Foods'. Note that readers might want to stock on pumpkin seeds, potatoes, chili peppers, oysters and steak - among other things. 

From Yahoo! comes an article titled, 'Top 10 School Supplies - Back to School Shopping Guide'.  Seriously, this is the most basic and useful list that I've found!  With items like lunch boxes, backpacks, flashdrives/jump drvies, locks, calculators, binders, staples and glue, this is the most down to earth, practical list I've seen for back to school supplies in a long time. 

From a legal website called 'Findlaw.com', comes this article called 'Top 10 Back-to-School Traffic Safety Tips'.  The very first entry on the list is 'Don't text while driving'....duh....'nuff said.   I'm also a fan of the fifth item in the entry, 'budget extra travel time'.  And for children the warning to 'use the crosswalk' is a very, very good starting point.

And finally, the reason why school exists is, well, learning.  So the website School Family.com should be interesting from that perspective.  But.. the article 'Better Grades - 10 Ways You Can Help' is worth reading for parents and is very helpful for students and parents alike. 

Some good ideas that appear in the article include creating routines, prepare for the morning the night before, help your child get organized, provide a quite place for homework, limit distractions, encourage intellectual curiosity, allow for free time, build a relationship with teachers, focus on effort rather than grades and learn how to step back...go figure. 

This next article is very helpful for students.  Entitled 'Get Good Grades in 10 Easy Steps' the article will help get any student on his or her way to getting good grades.  For example, a few of the very helpful hints include 'believing in yourself', 'being organized', 'managing your time well', 'being successful in the classroom (don't skip class and prepare for class)', 'take good notes', 'study smart' and of course, 'get help when you need it'.

So there you go - some links on the tools, safety and how to get good grades for this school year.

Good luck and have a great school year!

Regards,
Stu