College Night, an annual event where over 100 colleges and universities representatives come to campus, occurred this year on October 7th. This is a great opportunity for students and families alike to speak with college representatives to help guide their college process. It is mandatory for juniors and seniors at Lake Forest Academy to attend and is open to people from the local community who are interested in learning more about college.
College Night has existed at LFA for over 30 years. The event is organized by Shannon Bradac, the college counseling office manager, who receives input from LFA’s college counselors to decide which colleges will attend, as there are only 120-130 spots available. Ben Wetherbee, the Associate Dean of College Counseling, explained, “We want schools that our students have been interested in, so whether they’ve applied, enrolled or just places that we believe are good fits for our students.”
As a college preparatory school, LFA hosts College Night in order to best assist students and families with their college process by getting face time with college representatives. The representatives who attend are the first people who will read students’ applications. College Night is especially important because external college fairs are not as accessible for boarding students. It also allows LFA to show off its campus and interact with the local community.
Many attendees are unsure of how to best utilize College Night’s ample offerings. Wetherbee suggested, “It’s important to keep an open mind — just because you haven’t heard of a school doesn’t mean you can’t learn something from [the representative]…as young high school students, you don’t know what you don’t know.”
In regard to conversing with a representative, Wetherbee encouraged students to be themselves and ask non-binary questions that they can’t find on the college website or ChatGPT. Questions like “What would you like to see improved at the school?” or “If you picked up a student newspaper, what would people be talking about?” are great conversation starters that reveal the personality of a school.
Although College Night is open to all high school students and their families, it is important that students take this opportunity to figure out what they want, not what their parents want. That is why Wetherbee believes students should “take initiative” and put themselves out of their comfort zone, even if that means speaking to representatives alone.
LFA student Christina Quiroz ‘26 shared, “College Night helped me to narrow down what I don’t want in a school and what I do.” For anyone who attends, College Night is a great opportunity to help students understand what they are looking for and better navigate the college application process.