Our Four-Year Program

The Summit College Counseling team works to assist freshman through seniors in identifying their strengths, aspirations, priorities and goals through a process of self-reflection. Throughout this comprehensive four-year process, the College Counseling office will work alongside students and their families to create a support network while ultimately preparing them for the college search and application process.

We start early so that our students are supported every step of the college search process.  

Freshman Year: Freshmen are counseled to take challenging courses, explore academic and extracurricular interests, develop good time management and study skills and plan meaningful summer activities, such as volunteer work, a specialty focused camp or a summer job. Freshmen take the preACT in the fall.

Sophomore Year: Sophomores should continue to schedule challenging courses, explore academic and extracurricular interests and seek opportunities to take leadership roles in school and in the community as they begin building their resumes in SCOIR. Sophomores take the PSAT in October, the preACT in the spring, and AP exams for any courses taken at the AP level.

Junior Year: Juniors begin a series of college-related standardized testing, including the PSAT in October, as well as start a self-reflective process with their counselor in preparation for college research. Students are encouraged to visit colleges during spring and summer vacations, attend on-campus and local college fairs, and meet with their primary college counselor to discuss their goals and aspirations. Students and the college counselor work together to develop a list of options for active research and consideration, while keeping an eye on the realities of their college admissions prospects.

Senior Year: Seniors work with the college counselors to develop final lists with an eye for fit and selectivity balance, and begin to focus on the final aspects of the application process. Over 150 college admissions officers visit The Summit annually to meet with groups of interested students and/or to conduct individual interviews. Students are encouraged to devote considerable energy to their application essays as they refine their self-presentation, and to make thoughtful decisions about the many exciting opportunities available to them in higher education. Through the middle of the senior year the college counselor and the students work in concert to create a college list that comprehensively connects to the students’ personal attributes, supports their intellectual endeavors, and will provide them with exciting options for undergraduate study.

The college process at The Summit is designed to be an extension of the overall education taking place in the classroom, on the athletic fields, in the art studio and in any venue on-campus where faculty have the opportunity to teach Summit students. Seniors leave with a sense of satisfaction for what they have accomplished while at The Summit, along with a healthy dose of enthusiasm for the possibilities in front of them in the years to come.