We encourage students to explore, to further develop their interests, define their talents, and deepen their values. The University School of Nashville college counselors seek to empower students to direct their own college searches. We give students the tools to reach their own decisions about college– by providing information, advice, reflection, and resources throughout the process to both students and their parents/guardians. Our mission is not about placing students in particular colleges – it’s about students learning how they make decisions and cultivate their own value system.
Through a structured program based on individual needs, we focus on helping students maintain a balanced perspective on the selection process. We want them to realize that rarely is there one and only one right school, but rather several schools at which they can find what they are seeking. Underlying all that USN provides is the strong belief that the student should take responsibility for the search and the application process. Emblematic of the high school at large, we value process over results. Our approach is firmly grounded in our office’s five values:
Self-Awareness: Students should learn about themselves throughout the college search process and develop their own value system and decision-making process.
Empathy: Students should demonstrate a capacity for understanding others—their peers, admissions counselors, students who do not attend USN—during this process and also acknowledge the many privileges they have at USN when applying to college.
Agency: Students need to learn when and how to ask for help in addition to advocating for themselves before they leave Edgehill.
Resilience: Every student will experience disappointment in some way during this process, and our goal is for students to learn how to process disappointment in a healthy way.
Joy: This process can, and should, be fun! No, really. It happens. Applying to college should be the culmination of a student’s academic journey, and we should be celebrating their growth.
We encourage you to explore our college roadmap for a more detailed look at the scaffolding of our programs.