Your B student wants to apply to competitive colleges, and you're worried they're not being realistic. Here's the truth: B students absolutely get into schools like Boston University, USC, and University of Michigan. Holistic admissions changed everything. With strategic course selection, deep extracurricular involvement, compelling essays, and strong test scores, a 3.4 GPA student can compete with 3.9 students. This guide shows you exactly how—from choosing rigor over easy A

Every spring, my inbox floods with the same panicked questions: "My junior just signed up for the May SAT—can we still prep?" "When should my sophomore start studying?" "We thought we'd wait until summer to begin. Is that too late?" I have noticed that, by and large, most families start SAT and ACT prep too late. By the time they realize it, they're scrambling to cram months of material into weeks, paying for expensive crash courses, or settling for scores.