Students enrolled in AVID from all grades had the opportunity of going to a national college fair in Saint Louis, Missouri, at Saint Louis University. The national college fair included more than 250 colleges and universities from across the United States.

Leslie Aguilar, AVID site coordinator, organized the event to allow students and parents to see several colleges and universities across the country. “We were involved in this trip because there were over 250 national and international colleges and universities represented at the fair. I also wanted to give parents the opportunity to come to the national college fair with their students since it was on the weekend not a school day or night,” Aguilar said.

One of the attendees, Leslie Espinoza, junior, spoke about the trip to the National College Fair. “The trip to the national college fair was fun. I learned a lot of things from several colleges throughout the nation,” Espinoza said.

Espinoza also mentioned why college is important for her. “College is important to me because I want to expand my education. I don’t want to be at a basic level of learning. I am going to college not just for education, but also learn more things on life,” she added.

Webster University representative Joelle Blakley spoke about why the national college fair is important for students. “A national college fair is very important because it helps you get a better understanding from different schools and universities, outside of one little sector,” Blakley said.

Blakley also mentioned how it can be helpful to students and how it could be overwhelming for sme. “It’s helpful if you know what you’re doing, because a college fair is helpful to get connected to several universities and schools,” she said. She also adds on how it could be overwhelming for some students. “However if your not sure about what you want to study sometimes or don’t know where you want to live, if you want to live in state or out of state. Your going to come into the college fair with more than 250 hundred colleges overwhelmed. So it really helps to narrow it down first, but it is helpful if you know what your doing,” Blakley added.

As Blakley mentioned that national college fairs helps students understand colleges or universities far from home. Espinoza was experiencing her first national college fair and caught an eye for a school out of state and had an interest to this school. “I really liked one which is the St. Mary’s University”, she said. “I asked about the diversity of the college and it was at a very high percentage, which as really surprising for me because the other colleges I asked about their diversity, I found them pretty low.”

Not only did she asked about their diversity, she also asked about the majors they offered. “I also noticed that St.Mary’s University had a business major, and I’m looking forward into business as a career,” she said.

Espinoza chooses her top colleges based on three things: size, cost and diversity. “A small college would be beneficial because you could get one-on-one time with the professor. Cost is also important because I probably couldn’t afford college and by the help of financial aid, it’s probably not going to be that much depending on the scholarship, so a lower cost college would be better. And diversity is important because she would like to meet new people and know their culture,” Espinoza said.

Although there are several different factors that determine where students want to go for college, Aguilar talks about some things students could consider when selecting schools. “There are a lot of things that you have to think about when choosing a college. You have to look at your major, where the school is located, the price, the different activities that are available through those colleges or universities that support your activities or majors,” she said. “There’s just a lot of different factors to think about on where you want to go to college.”

Finding a college or university that best fits you will come down to the factors that you think are most important for you when choosing a college or university.