Author: ccoleman

Junior Newsletter

VHS Guidance
Departmemt

Spring 2017

Georgia Futures
Explore. Plan. Succeed

Advice for High School JUNIORS
Stay Focused
Don’t
Procrastinate!
Prepare for standardized test before you take them.
Begin seriously looking at colleges and other post secondary options.

GAfutures is Georgia’s new FREE online resurce to help students and their families plan for and succeed in college. This website is a “one stop shop” to plan your future. Create your GAfutures account now!
Career Exploration
GAfutures has interest and career inventories which allow you to see what career choices best match your interest and skills. Once you answer the brief questionnaires a list of careers will be provided. An in depth look at these careers is also available. Salary, location, day to day tasks and post secondary courses needed is some of the information GAfutures provides.
College Exploration
Find the Georgia College or University that is right for you! GAfutures is full of valuable and easy to access information about all Georgia Colleges and Universities. Find out where the college is located, how many people are in the classes, what SAT or ACT score you need to get in and what majors the college has. You can even apply to college on this website. In fact most colleges encourage you to apply on GAfutures.
Financial Aid
Once you have determined what college or university you are interested in you can also use GAFutures to find out how to pay for post secondary education. GAfutures is a great place to learn about Financial Aid! HOPE Scholarship, Student Access Loans, Pell Grant, Work-Study and instructions on how to complete the FAFSA are just a few of the financial aid topics covered on GAfutures.
Move on When Ready
GAfutures is also the website used for high school students to apply for MOWR.
so what are you waiting for?
Go to GAFutures.org
today to create an account and begin exploring your future!

Inside this issue:

Georgia / Futures	1
STC Tour	1
College / Entrance / Exams	2
Move On When Ready	2

Save the Date
STC Tour March 2, 2017

On March 2, 2017 all Juniors at VHS will have the opportunity to tour Southeastern Technical College. STC is an excellent technical college that is leading the state and nation in many exciting endeavors. We want to ensure our students have an understanding of what STC can offer them in our own backyard. On this tour students will see first hand all the programs at STC including certificate programs, diploma programs, and degree programs. Students will meet the instructors of each program and be given a presentation or demonstration of what each program entails. They will also have the opportunity to meet current students enrolled in these programs to hear about their experiences first hand. The tour will end with STC providing lunch to our students and giving a presentation about financial aid. Many VHS students take advantage of Move on When Ready classes at STC. This will also be a presentation topic at this tour. We are excited to be able to offer this opportunity to our Juniors! Be sure to mark you calendar so you won’t miss it!

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College Entrance Exams

All colleges require a college entrance exam as part of the admissions process. The best time to begin taking college entrance exams is the Spring Semester of the Junior Year. There are three different college entrance exams. Students are encouraged to explore on GAfutures to determine which exams the colleges they plan on applying to require.
SAT
Students need to go to sat.collegeboard.org/register to create an account and register to take the test. The SAT is administered this spring on March 11th, May 6th, and this summer on June 10th.
ACT
The website to register for the ACT is www.actstudent.org. Students need to create an account and register for a day to take the test. The following dates are left in the 2016/2017 ACT administration: February 11th, April 8th, and June 10th.
When registering to take the SAT and/or ACT students should use the Vidalia High School code 113105 to ensure that your scores are sent to VHS to be included on your transcript.
ACCUPLACER
The Accuplacer is a new college entrance exam that is used for admission into junior or technical colleges. In order to take this exam an appointment should be made with the college.

Move on When Ready

Georgia students have the opportunity to Move on When Ready. MOWR is a program in which high school students may earn high school course credits while taking college courses. Many students at VHS have taken advantage of this opportunity and attended college while in high school. Some of the colleges our students have attended are Georgia Southern, Southeastern Technical College, East Georgia College, Brewton Parker College and even as far away as Kennesaw State University. The MOWR program provides financial assistance tuition, mandatory fees, and books without deducting from the amount of HOPE money you may receive upon graduation. Eligible students may participate part-time or full-time at multiple postsecondary institutions. Students must apply to the college or colleges of their choice and fill out the MOWR application on GAfutures.org each semester. College courses must be selected from the approved MOWR Course Directory which can be found on the GAfutures website.
Now that you know how MOWR works you can decide if this program is for you. Students and parents should take into consideration many factors before the decision to participate is made. Some of the questions you should ponder may be...Are you emotionally mature enough to handle the responsibility of being a part time or full time college student? Can you balance and manage your time at both institutions? Are you a strong enough student in the subject to pass and do well on a collegiate level? Are you willing to miss out on the normal life of a high school senior? Do you have transportation available to get to school?
Once it has been determined that MOWR is a program you want to participate in the next step is to determine what college or colleges you want to attend and what courses you would like to take. MOWR provides students the opportunity to take core academic courses as well as hands on technical courses such as Welding or Certified Nursing Assistant.
Registration for your Senior year is right around the corner! Begin now thinking about what courses you want to take and where you want to take them. If getting a free jump start on college is the way you want to go then the MOWR program is right for you!

Junior Newsletter