Have you ever seen one of those massive college guidebooks – the ones that list hundreds of colleges and universities throught the country? If so, you can probably understand why picking the right school can seem like an overwhelming choice. And you may have wondered, given all those choices, how you would ever find the school that was the best fit for you.

An enjoyable and successsful college experience depends on finding the right school – and focusing on the following three factors will help you figure out which school is right for you.

Location

The first criteria to consider in college selection is location – which region of the country do you want to live in for the next four years of your life? Climate is certainly part of this consideration – you’ll need to think about how you’d feel if you lived someplace without four distinct seasons. Are you interested in a school that lets you pursue your love of snow boarding, or are you happier spending time at the beach?

But you shouldn’t choose a school simply because you’ll be able to wear flip flops all year long. Think about how far you want to be from home and whether or not you’ll want to deal with flying back and forth for visits home. The cost of transportation to and from school will probably be a factor in this decision.

More than you might imagine, the location of a school also determines the pace of life, the cuisine and the local culture. These elements are a big part of college life.

Type of College or University

The next factor to be considered is the type of school you’re looking for. The college experience you’ll have at a large state university will be very different from the one you’d have at a small private college. And military school is another experience altogether!

Large universities have graduate and undergraduate programs and an enrollment of 10,000 students or more. If you would feel lost or overwhelmed on a campus of that size, you should probably consider a smaller university or a liberal arts college. This type of college has between several hundred to a few thousand students and is focused on undergraduate studies.

Other types of schools you may want to consider are colleges with special characteristics, such as schools with a religious affiliation, women’s colleges, and historically black colleges and universities. There are also a number of schools geared to a particular carreer path, such as business colleges, engineering or architectural schools, or colleges that focus on the performing arts.

Community colleges are another type of school you might consider – these schools generally offer two-year programs for local students commuting from home, and they can be an excellent starting point for students who then transfer to four-year colleges.

Competetive Level

The final consideration in picking the right school is its selectivity: how tough are admissions? Some schools accept 70% of their applicants, while others admit less than 20%. Which level of school you should aim for will depend on your high school grade point average, and your SAT/ACT scores. You should also think about whether you want to be at the top, middle or near the bottom of your college freshman class.

The most selective schools are hardest to get into, and will generally only admit students with high standardized test scores and mostly A’s on their transcripts.

Very selective schools accept students with very competitive test scores and a mixture of A’s and B’s in their high school classes.

Selective schools are not too difficult to get into but still require competitive test scores and mostly B’s and C’s in high school course work.

Less selective schools are the least competitive – they accept a large percentage of their applicants, and do not require particularly high grades or test scores.

While evaluating the selectivity of a college you should also pay attention to its retention rates – how many students stay on to graduate? A highly selective school that doesn’t do a good job of supporting and keeping its students may be a poorer choice than a less selective school.

Keeping these three selection factors in mind will help you narrow down your possible college choices to a manageable list. Schools that meet your needs and preferences in all three categories are the schools you’ll want to research further.

What has your experience with selecting a college been like so far? We’d love to hear from you!