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March 31st Webinar at 6:00 pm CDT
Junior Year Starts Now: What Sophomores Should Do Next
If your student is finishing their sophomore year and college already feels stressful, you’re not alone. Many families worry they’re behind or have missed something important. The good news is that this spring is actually the right time to pause, take stock, and plan intentionally for junior year.
In this webinar, our college admissions experts walk families through what truly matters during the transition from sophomore to junior year - and what doesn’t. You’ll learn how colleges expect students to move from exploration to focus, how to think about testing timelines without adding pressure, and how coursework, activities, and summer plans can begin to align naturally. We’ll clarify what colleges are really looking for at this stage and help you separate helpful guidance from noise.
Whether your student feels confident, uncertain, or somewhere in between, this session will help your family replace stress with clarity. You’ll leave with practical next steps and a clear framework for using junior year well - without panic, overload, or unnecessary comparison.
DOWNLOAD OUR GUIDE TO
College Planning for Juniors
Colleges consider junior year important for admissions because it's the last full year they see on a transcript and can evaluate academic preparedness and potential success. This guide for parents of rising juniors offers valuable insights to help you and your student make the most of this time. It covers all the essential areas to set your student up for success.
We have a unique approach at ESM Prep College MatchPoint. It all begins and ends with our ultimate goal: for our students to thrive in their selected college.
The college application process can feel overwhelming, no matter how strong the student. But at ESM Prep College MatchPoint, we believe it should be organized, personal, and even fun, and we provide a framework that reduces the stress throughout the journey.
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This year’s early admissions cycle delivered a wake-up call for many families. Applications surged again. Admit rates tightened. Strong students were deferred or denied at schools that once felt within reach. At the same time, admissions offices quietly expanded their use of AI-assisted tools to triage the flood of applications. Not to make final decisions, but to sort, flag, and manage extraordinary volume before human readers ever begin their work. When tens of thousands of files arrive at once, systems step in first. That reality matters.
If you are the parent of a sophomore with aspirations toward selective colleges, it is easy to feel reassured right now. Your child is active. They are on a team, in several clubs, volunteering, maybe even holding a leadership title. On paper, it looks strong. In many ways, it is. But this year’s admissions results at selective universities reinforced something important: activity lists are long everywhere. What is far less common, and far more compelling, is progression. Selective colleges are not counting commitments. They are evaluating development over time.
If you are the parent of a sophomore in Austin, this year’s UT Austin admissions results should feel personal. Not dramatic. Not alarming. Personal. Because what just happened to this year’s seniors is exactly what your family will face in two short years. Strong students were admitted. Strong students were denied their first-choice major. And in competitive colleges like McCombs, Engineering, and CNS, it became clear that grades and rank alone were not the deciding factors. Preparation was. Alignment was. And for families with current 10th graders, that realization makes this spring far more important than it looks.
This year, some of the most surprised students were not those who were denied by UT. They were the ones who were admitted. Top 5% seniors with strong transcripts, rigorous coursework, and impressive leadership earned admission to The University of Texas at Austin, yet many did not receive their first-choice major. For parents who assumed auto-admit meant security, the results felt confusing and even unsettling. What changed is not the caliber of students. It is where the competition now lives. The real pressure point has shifted inside the university, and understanding that shift is essential for every family watching these results unfold.
If you are the parent of a teenager, there is one number from this year’s admissions cycle that should stop you in your tracks: 65%. That is the share of applicants in the Class of 2030 who submitted at least one early application. Two out of three students are now competing months before regular decision even opens. Early is no longer a strategic side path. It is where much of the class is taking shape. And that reality changes when preparation truly begins.
For a few years, the message seemed clear: standardized testing was fading from the center of college admissions. Test optional policies expanded. Headlines declared a permanent shift. But the Class of 2030 early data tells a more nuanced story. Score submission is rising. Test-required policies are spreading. And in early rounds where admit rates sit in the single digits or low teens, strong scores are quietly strengthening competitive positioning. If you think testing no longer matters, you may be reading yesterday’s news. Let’s look at what the numbers actually say.