We're in the middle of that fraught period when high school students are finding out what colleges they've been accepted to and have to then decide which is the right one for me.

About 60% of high school students are going through this process right now.

William Brigham has more on this exciting and bewildering phase in American life and why some select schools may not necessarily be the

right fit. It's part of our series, Rethinking College. Anyone who is in the middle of this

or has been through it recently knows exactly what we are talking about. The process of applying

to college has likely never been more pressured, with college costs soaring,

competition rising, and many schools mired in controversy or conflict with the Trump administration.

Luckily, we have a recurrent guide to this anxious period. Jeff Selingo studies and writes about

higher education, and he has a new book, Dream School, Finding the

College that is Right for You. Jeff, so good to have you back on the program. You urge families

in this book to slow the process down, to start talking to kids even younger, like even

10th grade in high school, about what it is they really want out of higher

education. Isn't that extending this stressful period? And what do you want parents to be talking

to them about? Well, often, William, what I say in the book is that we often start the college

process midstream. What do I mean by that? We just start putting names on a list on a piece of

paper. And where do we get those names from?

Those are the names that we see on stickers on the back of car windows.

Those are names that we hear in our community.

In fact, I did a survey for the book of 3,000 plus parents, and I asked them, how important

is prestige to you as a family, as a parent?

And only 16% of the school.

And only 16% said it was important to them.

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