Many parents know that helping students navigate the process of finding, applying to, getting accepted to, and enrolling in college can come with a lot of anxiety. Another major stressor is teaching a teenager to drive a car. However, Boston College’s Dean of Undergraduate Admission and Financial Aid, Grant M. Gosselin, suggests that if you treat the college process like teaching a young person how to drive, you can help them find the right school while maintaining a positive relationship with them and creating wonderful memories. After working in higher education admissions for nearly thirty years, he shared his “lessons from the road” with students and families during Family Weekend as the W.P. Carey Speaker.
Gosselin recommended focusing on the road ahead of them instead of what is in their rearview mirror. “With an eye on the future, focus on how your student can continue to grow, develop a strong application, and take a challenging course load at Pomfret,” he said. With students behind the wheel of their college journey, parents should be a calming presence in the passenger seat. While on college road trips, Gosselin suggests being a copilot and exploring the area around the campus. “If you can build in time beyond just the standard college tour, I think it will be helpful, not only for them but also for your relationship and the memories you'll build along the way.”
The college search and application process is significantly different from when Gosselin and the parents in the audience applied to college. With the increase in the number of applications a student submits, the option to share standardized testing scores, the early decision process, and decreasing acceptance rates, students and parents are navigating a sea of misinformation. To dispel these myths, he played a game of fact or fiction, quizzing the audience about their knowledge of the pathway to higher education. He left families with ten tips for a roadmap to success — and a reminder to enjoy the ride. “Your children are going to go to college. They just don't know where that will be yet, and that journey should be part of the fun.”
W.P. Carey Lecture Series speaker. The program, endowed by William Polk Carey '48, brings a representative from a renowned college or university admissions office to the Hilltop to address students, parents, and faculty on the latest perspectives on the college search and application process. Gosselin honed his expertise in undergraduate admission at Boston College — where he served as senior assistant director of undergraduate admission and associate director of marketing and international admission — before working at Babson College and Wheaton College. As chief enrollment officer at both Babson and Wheaton, he set historic highs in applications and enrolled students, as well as in international student recruitment. He also implemented a new admission marketing strategy, including affordability and yield campaigns and a communications plan for high school counselors.
Gosselin is Pomfret’s sixteenth