You should probably know up front that I am one of those people who can not stand not knowing everything about anything that I decide to do. Much to the dismay of those around me, I have a tendency to be a wee bit tunnel visioned when I embark on a project, topic, mission, or crusade. Picture a tornado hitting my house, car, life in general. My husband and kids all cringe and roll their eyes whenever I decide I need to “do something.” Which, if I am being honest, has been most of their lives. Translated: give me a heads up if you are running out of clean clothes.

With that in mind, I dove into the college process fifteen years ago with son number one. I realized quickly that there was an enormous amount of information and much of it was conflicting. I set out to start sifting through it. There was so much to know, to understand, and to learn. So many time frames and so much information to store. Some that would apply to the current student I was working on, and so many others that I would have to save for different students to come.

Overwhelming was an understatement. To begin with, I could not believe that a fifteen, sixteen, seventeen-year-old kid was supposed to gather, decipher, analyze, and implement this information. It was staggering. I knew I had a basic understanding of the process and I was still lost. How were other parents dealing with this? The answer, I found, is that most were not. I remember thinking surely there is an instruction manual, framework, or connect the dots somewhere to explain this process. Nope, what I found was a lot of information on any particular subject but nothing comprehensive.