College Mini Project

Introduction

This packet contains all of the assignments you need for our mini-college research project.
College Majors

You want to do what?????

Throughout your high school career, you have explored options for your professional future. Some of you know exactly what you want to do; others of you have no idea. Many of you fall in between the two ends of the spectrum—you know basically what you are interested in, but you may not know exactly what majors or jobs relate to that interest. Because ALL schools do NOT offer ALL majors, now is the time to start figuring out the college jargon for your interests as well as where you can go to study for that field. On your own, you will be researching college websites for information on majors offered.

You must identify THREE possible majors for this assignment. Each one needs to go along with your top three career choices.
For EACH of the THREE majors, you will answer the following questions:
1. What is the official name of the major?
2. Write a description of what someone declaring this major could expect to learn.
3. What career path could you take if you majored in this? (Include a list of possible jobs that require this major)
4. Considering the jobs you just listed, address how much schooling you would need. (i.e. an associate’s degree, bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, Ph.D, certificate, license, etc)
5. List a minimum of three schools that you would consider attending that offer this specific major.

You must record ALL sources for your information. (website name, URL, date accessed)

Suggested research sites:

University and college official websites
Peterson’s www.petersons.com
College Board www.collegeboard.com
Chandler Public Library
- Online resources are available if you have a library card. Go to www.chandlerlibrary.org and browse the Internet Resources, Online Databases, Careers and/or Education and Training.
- AZCIS is a good online database available through the library
- Reference books such as Peterson’s Guide

You are welcome to use other sources, but ALL sources MUST be documented.

See back for set up. This document is posted on my website, so if you would like to download the chart and type directly into it, feel free!

Official name of major:	MAJOR 1	Major 2	Major 3	Source
Description of what someone declaring this major could expect to learn.
Career paths you could take if you majored in this? (Include a list of possible jobs that require this major and how much schooling you would need for each (i.e., an associate’s degree, bachelor’s degree, master’s degree, Ph.D, certificate, license, etc) )	Career/Job Amt of schooling
List a minimum of three schools that you would consider attending that offer this specific major	1. 2. 3.			1. 2. 3.

College Research

School Choices	Choice #1 School Name: List all sources you used to obtain this information	Choice #2 School Name: List all sources you used to obtain this information
Address of School Phone/FAX of admissions office
Cost of travel (by car, train, bus, air) to the school. If it is local, use .50 cents/mile
School Website Address
Type of School (Public/Private/4 year/2 year/Vocational/Technical
Total number of undergraduates
Percentage of applicants that were admitted
Percent of students who return for sophomore year
First Application Deadline
Application Fee required? If yes, how much is it?
Admission requirements (GPA/SAT/SAT Subject Tests/ACT/Class Rank/Essay Required/Letters of Rec) LIST ALL NEEDED
Cost of Yearly Tuition	In-State: Out of State:	In-State: Out of State:
Cost of Room & Board (University -Living on Campus; Community College – Living outside of home)
Financial Aid Deadline
Percentage of freshman students who had FULL FINANCIAL NEED MET
Most Popular Degree at this college
List your intended field of study (major). Is this field offered at this institution? If so, in which college or dept. does it exist?
How many credits in EACH of the following subjects are required for admittance for this school?	English: Math: Science: History/Social Science: Foreign Language:	English: Math: Science: History/Social Science: Foreign Language:

Write one paragraph per school reflecting on the appropriateness of this institution to your individual needs. Are you qualified to attend this school? Discuss advantages and disadvantages over the other two institutions you researched.

Reflection for school #1:

Reflection for school #2:

Spreadsheet Activity

You have researched the costs of attending various universities and community colleges. You have also researched living expenses, comparing the costs of living at home vs. living in an apartment or living in a dorm. Now it is time to place those findings in spreadsheets. ** Additionally, you will need to figure in a 5% per year increase due to inflation, tuition increases, etc. Use the following directions to help you create a spreadsheet that will assist you in making those comparisons.

NOTE: If you have never used Excel, follow the below steps exactly as written and you will be able to create your first Excel spreadsheet (you can then add Excel to your list of skills).

Complete two spreadsheets:

Using your Expenses worksheet, you will create ONE spreadsheet for EACH school based on your most likely living situation (ie “University of Arizona-living in dorm” or “Mesa Community College – living at home”). After you create your first spreadsheet, you will have to change the heading at the top, and the rows that relate to housing, utilities, food, etc. You will have six (6) total columns for each spreadsheet: One for the header and row labels, one spacing column, and one for each of the four (4) years of school (For community colleges, you will have two years of expenses for a total of 4 columns) and calculate the total for each year, including inflation. If you know for certain that you are first attending a community college and living at home, then transferring to a four year university, you may create a hybrid spreadsheet reflecting comm. College costs for years 1 and 2, then university costs for years 3 and 4.

Do the following to begin preparing your spreadsheet:

Point to Start, point to All Programs, and open the Excel program, point to File and New.

Heading

Place the appropriate information in the following cells, by clicking on the cell itself:

A1: Your full name, a dash (-), and then the period you are in

A2: College name and Residence Option (dorm, home, or apartment)

A3: City and State location for school

A4: Date (in day/month/year order only - e.g. 17 August 2005)

Skip to cell A6

Titles

Type the labels of all the different types of expenses you might incur. Do this from cell A6 down through whatever cell you need. For example, the below list runs through cell A20 (see sample spreadsheet).

Include the following (and more if you need to, but not less):

Tuition

Rent (apt) or Room and Board (dorm)

Groceries/Toiletries

Books

Phone/Cellphone

Cable/Satellite

Internet

Electric

Healthcare

Cost of Travel (plane/bus/subway costs –car transportation costs are $.50// mile. This number

was included on your school research sheet and incorporates gas and routine maintenance

costs)

Car Payments

Car insurance

Entertainment (be realistic - err on the side of caution)

Eating out

Gym membership

Haircuts

Clothing

Miscellaneous/Incidentals (unexpected expenses, birthday gifts, emergency flights home, etc. – estimate at $100 per month)

Skip one cell (leave a blank cell between the last item and the next cell) and title this one “Totals”. Once done, move the pointer back up to A1. Holding down the SHIFT key, press the KEYBOARD’S DOWN ARROW until you get to the “Totals” row. Release the SHIFT button, click on FORMAT, then COLUMN, and then AUTOFIT. This will ensure that, no matter how long the name of each entry, all will fit within the column.

Years

Click on cell C5, and type 2008. Go to cells D5, E5 and F5, and type, respectively, 2009, 2010 and 2011. Highlight each cell and both underline and bold each column title, and then center each column title by clicking on the CENTER TEXT icon at the top of the page (shortcut: Hold down the CTRL key and the U key at the same time for underlining, and the CTRL and B key for bolding – CTRL and I key for italics).

Amounts for first year

For the first year column, enter the anticipated amount, in whole dollar amounts, for each category. Press Enter after each dollar amount, and the cursor will automatically move down to the next row.

Totaling the first column

Highlight cell C6 and, while holding down the SHIFT key, press the KEYBOARD’S DOWN ARROW until you are at the same row as the “Totals” label (row 23 on the sample spreadsheet). Release the SHIFT key, and click on the SUM icon at the top of the screen (it looks like a Greek “E” or a sideways “M”). If you did this correctly, you should automatically have a total amount in the “Totals” row under the first column.

Inflation increase and final spreadsheet formatting

Apply the 5% increase to all categories for each subsequent year.

Highlight cell D6 and type the following (every formula in Excel must start with an

“=” sign): =C6*1.05 and then press the ENTER or RETURN key. You will notice that cell D6 now shows an amount equal to the contents of cell C6 with a 5% increase. The “*” (asterisk) is Excel’s code for multiplication. The 1.05 is telling Excel to multiply the contents of cell C6 by a factor of 1.05, equivalent to an increase of 5%.

Highlight cell D6 again. Move the cursor to the bottom right of cell D6 until it

becomes a black plus sign. Click and hold down the mouse button, and drag the black plus sign until cells E6 and F6 are highlighted. Release the mouse, and you will see respective 5% increases for each column. You have just copied the formula in D6 to the other two columns.

Highlight once again cell D6. Move the cursor to the bottom right of cell D6 until it

becomes a black plus sign. Click and hold down the mouse button, and drag the black plus sign until cells E6 and F6 are highlighted. Release the mouse button, and then move the pointer until you see the black plus sign at the bottom right corner of cell F6. Click and drag so all the cells under columns D6, E6 and F6 are highlighted, all the way down to your last row of titles (but NOT the “Totals”row). Release the

mouse, and you will automatically have the “plus 5% increase” formula applied to

every single cell.

Click on the second year column of the “Totals” row (D23 on sample spreadsheet),

and apply the same formula as in # 1 above: For our example, you would click on cell D23, and then type: =C23*1.05 and then press enter. The total in column D will

increase by 5%. With D23 highlighted, move the pointer until you see the black plus

sign, and then drag to cell F23 and release so that all 3 cells are highlighted. The

inflation increase formula will now be in each of the “Totals” columns, and you can

see the yearly 5% increase automatically applied.

Highlight all the cells in the “Totals” row (from A22 through F22) and press the B

icon to bold these entries (or hold down the CTRL and B keys at the same time).

Click on cell C6, and highlight all the cells with dollar figures in them (C6 through

F23 on sample spreadsheet). Point to FORMAT at the top of the page, and point to

STYLE in the drop down box. When the STYLE dialog box opens, select CURRENCY by the STYLE NAME area, then press the MODIFY button, and change the DECIMAL PLACES option to “0.” Every cell should now have a whole number in it, with a dollar sign to the left of it.

SAVE each spreadsheet under a unique name (e.g. ASU Rent or ASU Dorm), and select PRINT PREVIEW under FILE. Click on the SETUP button at the top to change printing options; then click on SHEET, and make sure “gridlines” is the ONLY BOX CHECKED. Do not check the option to include column and row headings on your spreadsheet. They are included on the sample spreadsheet for instructional purposes only.

Move the cursor to cell A1, and highlight all cells through to the last year of your spreadsheet, and down to one row below your last source entry. Release the mouse button and your selected print area is now highlighted. Click on FILE and PRINT AREA, then select the SET PRINT AREA option. This is all that will be printed from the spreadsheet. If you make a mistake, you can click on FILE and PRINT AREA, then select the CLEAR PRINT AREA option.

You can now “copy” the entire sheet and “paste” it into a new workbook. Change the school name and living situation, then revise the numbers in the FIRST column only. The rest of the spreadsheet will revise itself if you did the formulas correctly.

Print the spreadsheets. You are now an Excel beginner!

Instructions for Projected Income Document

You have already figured out how much it is going to cost you to live while you go to school. Now it is time to figure out how you are going to pay for it all. Above all, you must be realistic in your estimates. Prepare this as a table of itemized income estimates, along with an explanatory paragraph or two. NOTE: THIS MUST BE DONE AS A TABLE. Your document must represent four years of income (even if you are only going to a two-year school). Your document will need to be a minimum of one substantial explanatory paragraph (at least six sentences), along with a detailed income listing, and a summarization/reflection statement at the end.

You will want to include such things as:

- Parental assistance [DO NOT INCLUDE IF YOU KNOW YOUR PARENTS CANNOT ASSIST YOU FINANCIALLY – REMEMBER THAT YOU WILL BE DISCUSSING WITH THEM YOUR FUTURE PLANS]

- Savings

- Employment income

- College savings funds/stocks/bonds

- Scholarships, loans, grants

- Estimated high school graduation gifts (estimate low!)

Be realistic about how much you really think you will qualify for in terms of grants and scholarships. If your GPA will not get you any, then DO NOT list any. If you truly believe you will receive scholarships, check with your counselor, this week, to "guesstimate" at the amount.

NOTE: Graduation gifts and savings will almost certainly be depleted the first year; if you have $2000 in savings or estimated graduation gifts, and you plan on that $2000 being first year income, do not include it for the subsequent years. Savings and gifts do not carry over!!

Remember: When you are estimating parental assistance, you need to calculate ALL of the expenses they will cover. If you are living at home, then they will cover your electric, groceries, cable, etc; be sure to add all of those types of expenses into your estimate for their contribution.

Do not use my dollar amounts or my words. You can use my ideas, but NONE of your sentences or dollar amounts should be exactly the same as mine.

EXTREMELY IMPORTANT: YOUR PROJECTED INCOME MUST AT LEAST MATCH YOUR YEARLY SPREADSHEET EXPENSES.

The following is a sample Projected Income Document:

Munczek 1

Steve Munczek

English 12

Munczek - 4

12 Sep. 2011

Projected Income Document

While attending Arizona State University, I have estimated my costs to be approximately $23,200 for the first year. I will live in a dorm for the first two years, and then rent an apartment with a roommate for the subsequent two years. I plan on working twenty to thirty hours per week to enhance my income. I will also take into consideration a yearly 5% inflation increase. Some of the following income is not guaranteed, including employment income, but these are close estimates. I am hoping I will obtain more income than that which is listed below. The income I have determined I will need to support my four years of college expenses will come from the following sources:

	2012	2013	2014	2015
Scholarships/Grants	$1000	$1000	$1000	$1000
Employment	$8000	$9150	$10200	$11300
Parental assistance	$5000	$5000	$5000	$5000
Savings	$1000	$2000	$2000	$1000
Graduation gifts	$1500
Student loans	$7000	$7350	$7718	$8100
Total	$23,500	$24,500	$25,918	$26,400

Source

LIST ALL NEEDED

Inflation increase and final spreadsheet formatting