Don't Force It: How to Get into College without Losing Yourself in the Process

Rachel Leja: College Planning for Neurodiverse Students

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In today's episode, I chat with Rachel, an educational consultant at McMillan Education, who specializes in helping students with learning disabilities and neurodivergent needs find their ideal colleges. Rachel shares her unique journey from professional writing to education, and we dive into the importance of understanding each student's individual needs right from freshman year. We also discuss the benefits of gap years for building independence and essential skills. Parents, get ready for practical tips on supporting your child’s college journey while embracing their choices! Tune in for this insightful conversation!


Bio

Rachel brings her wealth of experience as a special educator of students with a wide range of learning, emotional and behavioral challenges to her school and college planning work at McMillan Education. Families love working with Rachel because they are immediately taken by her combination of genuine warmth and consummate professionalism. Rachel considers herself on a mission to help students find the learning and social environments that both address their needs and allow them to experience success. Nothing has brought Rachel more satisfaction than hearing the transformational stories from her students and families after they’ve found their best fit educational or therapeutic environment.

Follow Rachel on LinkedIn and click here to visit McMillanEducation.com

Access free resources and learn more about Sheila and her team at Signet Education at signeteducation.com or on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/sheilaakbar/.

Rachel Leja:

If they're asking for help, I think what we should all do is to really hear them out. Because more often than not, when I, in my experience, when parents have really kind of forced College as the only path, there are some hiccups, and it's not always as smooth, and we really don't want kids to fail to figure out how to thrive.

Sheila Akbar:

Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast. It is now the end of October, and we've got early college deadlines next week, and I know that me and my team have been really busy just getting our kids to the to the finish line here, and today I'm actually gonna hopefully interrupt the franticness and the the feel of this impending deadline just sort of looming over all of us with a conversation with somebody who works with students who are at the very beginning of this process. Her name is Rachel lega. She works for McMillan education, which is a really, I like to call them a close partner of ours. We know them very well. We've worked with them and their students for many, many years, and we really share a lot of the same values. And Rachel works on college planning, particularly for Neuro diverse students, really helping them think through what are their goals when it comes to their education, and she's helping the whole family think about All right, if this is our goal, whether that's a gap year, a vocational program, the workforce or a traditional college, could be any number of other things, or a combination of any of these things based on whatever that goal is, what resources, skills and environmental factors we need to make sure are in place so that the student can pursue those goals to the best of their ability, and a lot of the work that she does is really helping students understand what are those options out there, and then reflect very honestly about where they are in terms of their preparation and planning for whatever that situation may require. So it's really excited to invite Rachel to the podcast to talk about the work that she does, to let you all know that getting ready for college is not just writing college essays, that's part of it, but there's so much more to this, and at a higher level, right? It's not diving immediately into which college and which major and which program and all of those things, right? We can approach this from a slightly higher level and make a great plan. Set some really good goals, do some reflection to understand what those goals should be, and then start to chip away at a plan that would take us towards those goals. So take a listen to Rachel. I'll see you on the other side. Rachel, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm really excited for people to hear about what you do and how parents can kind of observe their kids in the college process and make some plans for their future. So let's start there. Tell us what you do.

Rachel Leja:

Thank you for having me. Sheila, my name is Rachel. I'm an educational consultant with Macmillan education, and I work with students and families to find schools and colleges that will be best fit, and I work with students who have learning disabilities or are neurodivergent in some way.

Sheila Akbar:

And I mean, I have so many questions for you today, but let's start by talking about how you came to focus on this. Like, what was your own educational journey?

Rachel Leja:

Yeah, so it has been a journey. I went to college for professional writing. I thought I was going to be able to write poetry and maybe a book someday, and I quickly realized that that was after graduation, not what I was meant to do, but I had been working in a after school program at a local Catholic school near my college, and I really, really liked working with kids, and so when I had the opportunity to join a gay and boarding school, to work as a teacher and to also get my Master's in special education, I took that opportunity and shifted gears a little bit from the writing background. I was able to utilize my writing background in my teaching work. I taught mainly English and writing and study skills. So that was really helpful for me to have that background, but certainly was not what I had planned to do. And after teaching for many years and in a boarding school environment, I moved to work at a day school in Connecticut, and that's where I really started doing a lot more college planning with students and college counseling. And so after my time there ended, McMillan seemed like a perfect next step that kind of allows me to continue to pull from everything from my original professional writing degree to my special ed background to my experience with college counseling.

Sheila Akbar:

It's so great when it all comes together like that. Yeah, we love that. So you talked about college planning. Planning and college counseling as two different things. Can you kind of define those for us and talk about the differences?

Rachel Leja:

Yeah. So it really depends on when we start the process with a student in the family. Sometimes I will begin the process as early on as freshman year with a family who might just need a little bit of a longer runway to kind of either get their student on board or to really understand themselves what they're getting into. So college planning can be a lot more based on kind of, what are our goals long term, and what do we need to do now while we are in high school in order to get there, and then kind of, the college counseling and the the actual getting into the meat of the applications and things happens, starts to happen a little bit more in junior year, and then, certainly in summer, leading up to your senior year. And right now, I'm in the thick of a lot of that applications work with with seniors.

Sheila Akbar:

Right. It's funny, because it used to be that the the busy season was really August, September, October, but now I find all year long is the busy season. I don't know if you're finding that as well. So you mentioned you work with a lot of kids who have learning differences or some kind of neuro diversity. How does that change the way you approach college planning or counseling with them?

Rachel Leja:

That's a great question. It really depends. I work with students that come from different educational background. So if I'm working with a student who has a public school education and they are on an IEP or a 504 A lot of times, the first thing that I'll do, even before I really meet a student or a family, is to review a lot of that documentation so I can start to understand that student's profile. The same can be said for students that are not in a public school setting. You know, I've always start with kind of document reviews so I can understand who the student is on paper. Obviously, follow that up with meeting them in person and talking with family and sometimes teachers and things like that. But I really think that the the number one thing for me to understand is, what are the students needs now, and how might that translate to the college setting? Many students that I work with are already in specialized settings now, so they might be in a private school that caters to students with a learning disability, and so that student might not be as aware of the support that they're going to need because it's so baked in to their everyday experience. So sometimes with those students, it's kind of taking a moment to unpack, okay, what are the things that you might not recognize, as you know, extra support that you're getting now, but that have been crucial to your success in high school. And when we identify those things that you know, becomes part of the greater conversation about the type of school that you want to go to, what are the things that you're interested in academically? You know, what size of a school do you want to be in, what area of the country? So, you know, I think first, learning what a student needs to be academically successful is very important, and then kind of collaborating with parents as well around kind of what they're seeing at home. Because it's not just always kind of what's happening in the classroom that determines the students college readiness or the type of environment that they might do best in. Sometimes it really helps to have an understanding of what's happening when they're not in a structured school environment as well.

Sheila Akbar:

Right. You know, similarly, I often talk to students about like, What didn't you like about this place, as much as what did you like? I think it's important to look at it from both of those angles. Now, one of the things I've been thinking about lately is, how do we negotiate, or how do we navigate between what a student needs and what a student wants? Of course, we want to find some sort of happy medium between that right, where we where they are getting their needs met, and all of their, you know, hopes and dreams for their college experience met as well. But in today's society, I think we're really swayed by brand and social perception, comparison and things like that, to the point that, you know, we have families who who really believe there are only 25 good colleges in the United States, right? Which obviously that is not the case. There are lots of great colleges, and everybody's definition of great is going to be different because students have different desires and interests and needs. So how do you navigate that conversation with families who may have you know their heart set on a college that is just not going to serve that student?

Rachel Leja:

That's a really good question, and it's completely different with every family and every student that I work with, and I never really know how I'm going to approach that until I've met the student, I've met the parents, and in a lot of cases, I've seen the kind of family dynamic, because that can give me a lot of information on kind of what's been going on behind the scenes, what conversations have maybe already happened, and what that student might be particularly sensitive to. Like I said, a lot of the students I work with are in structured or specialized settings where they've been receiving a lot of support. So they might be thinking, I don't need this anymore. I'm getting great grades, you know, I have strong test scores. I'm going to be okay in college, and I'm not going to need that. Like, I'm not going to say during our first meeting to a student of like, Oh no, you will. It's going to get really hard, and you're going to need that. It's about, you know, building that trust and building that relationship so that a student can ultimately hear from me when we're building that final list. Like, you know, we might need to add some more schools on here that are going to fall into that likelier target category, because you have a lot of schools that you're very excited about that are more selective, but we want to make sure you have schools you're excited about that are within kind of that target range. So when decisions come out, you have a lot to choose from. I think with parents, it can be more challenging, because there are expectations too for them as parents, in terms of how that relates to where their student goes to college. A lot of times, mom and dad want to talk about where they went to college, and that's great, but sometimes for students, that can really hinder their own process of discovering what's important to them. So I think, you know, I usually try to take the long game approach and just share with students information that they need to understand their candidacy at a particular school, but also kind of what the culture and the environment is, because oftentimes, if there's a school on a student's list that I feel doesn't fit, for whatever reason, I don't need to necessarily tell that kid, hey, we need to take this off the list. Generally speaking, they and sometimes, with the help of their parents and all of us together, will come to that realization. So I think kind of realizing that this is still very much a student driven process, and I want my kids to feel like they are in control. So really, we don't take anything off the table unless it's, you know, going to be detrimental to the student in some way. We're going to, you know, support them in applying to colleges that might be more aspirational. And I've had students in the past who surprised me, and they get into a college that I wasn't necessarily thinking that they might get into, and then we can kind of double back and say, All right, are there supports that are going to be available to you there, that you can take advantage of so you'll be just as successful there as you would be at a more supportive school. And if those things aren't there, we talk about, can we add them in using different outside resources. So I think, to answer your question, it's a delicate balancing act between parents and students, but I think ultimately, when he comes down to it, if I do my job and I help to inform parents and students about what's out there, what's available and what's reasonable for their student, generally speaking, we're all in agreement when the final list is put together.

Sheila Akbar:

Yeah, it's a process, right? We we have to do a it's a delicate dance, like you were saying, Yeah, but yeah, we get there, and it is really a wonderful feeling when you know you don't have to say, I don't think the school is a great fit for you, but because the student is so engaged in understanding what's at that school? What are the opportunities? What's the culture like? You know? What might my day to day look like? They're able to say, I don't think the school is the right one for me, because the thing that we're we're both not saying here is when it is a great match for the student, that's where the student has the most success in admissions, but also the most success in college. Absolutely. And there's not just one school that is going to be that that great perfect match. There are a number of them, and they can match in a lot of different ways and a lot of different vectors. Let's say So your answer just now made me think of something else we were talking about, which is how watching a student go through this process of understanding their needs, thinking about, you know, their hopes and interests in their college experience, and then actually going through the legwork of putting an application together can really highlight a lot of wonderful strengths in a student, but it also can really show a parent places where a student may need additional support or intervention before they go off to college, or while they're in college, talk to us a little bit about that.

Rachel Leja:

Yeah, that's a great point. So I work with a lot of students and families who are considering the college path, but also maybe considering like a gap year or a PG program, that thing that I often share with parents is the reason why these two things make sense to do together is because the college planning process is going to inform us so much about what's going to be needed to be successful, no matter what the next step is. So in terms of thinking about using some of the college process, the search, the application process as data gathering for parents, recognizing, you know, is your student having a hard time sticking to deadlines, or they're having a hard time making meetings with their educational counselor, if they're working with somebody you know outside of school or with their guidance counselor at school. And what is, what is that likely to indicate in a college setting? They often say to parents, if a student is really reluctant to reach out to me or to reach out to any other members of their support team. That's something we really need to work on before they head off to college, because in high school, people are looking out for you. They're making sure you're not falling through the cracks. And at many colleges, that's not going to be the case. So if I'm working with a student and I'm recognizing that their self advocacy skills are really. Lacking that can be something that we start talking about with students, but also parents and teachers about finding opportunities to improve those skills. A lot of times, one of the hardest things for students is to manage all of the different ongoing, kind of simultaneous processes of applying to college, and it really does kind of mimic what's going to be happening in college. You're going to be asked to be completing work for different classes on different days with different deadlines. There's a lot to keep track of, and there's a lot of goals. And for students who have struggled with executive functioning or study skills or a learning disability, that can feel very overwhelming. So we do our best to break the process down and make it as really as compartmentalized as possible. But if I'm noticing that a student is really struggling, you know, doing multiple things at once, that might inform the fact that this particular student might want to consider taking a reduced course load in their first year, you know, to sort of lessen the load of all those things at once. And again, for those students that I'm working with that may be considering doing something else instead of college after graduation, we can really pinpoint those areas where the student is falling short in terms of college readiness by using things like assessments and, like I said, parental anecdotes and my experience with the student to really inform what kind of next step might get them ready to either attend college that following year or to set them up for success elsewhere.

Sheila Akbar:

Yeah, that's a great segue to my next question, which is about helping kids plan gap years. And when we use the term gap year, it's not always a year, right? You can think about it. It could be three months, it could be six months, it could be nine months, or it could be more than a year, even. But in that kind of period of time between high school and the next step of their education, there's a lot of stuff that students and their families can be doing to build the readiness, to build the skills, to improve self advocacy, all those things that you were talking about. So how do you work with a student I don't know. Let's take both examples, a student who is open to the idea of a gap year, and the student who may not be open to it, but probably should think about it. How do you how do you talk to them about the opportunities?

Rachel Leja:

That's a good question. I'm going to start with the with the trickier one first, which is, I think the student that says, No, I'm ready. Let's go. And, generally speaking, behind the scenes, the parents are going, I'm not sure we're there yet. You know, again, it's a process of starting slow. I ask a lot of questions. I want to know about routines. I want to know about study habits. I want to know about homework completion. I want to know about communication with teachers, and even just understanding how a student communicates with their parents about what's going on at school that can be really helpful in kind of determining the angle that I might approach the conversation with the student if, in particular, right now, I'm thinking I've had a few students over the past few years who have really confided in me about the just feeling like they need a break from school. They need a little bit of a break from being in an academic environment. And so we'll really try to unpack that and understand, you know, is it the academic demands? Are you feeling like you want to do something that is just more physically engaging, or that might be more adventure based, in order to kind of get outside of your comfort zone and do something different, that type of student might really benefit from something like I said, that's more adventure based or a volunteer opportunity abroad, where they can continue to kind of develop themselves as a person and gain independence and confidence and certainly experiences that they can take with them. But they're not stuck in a classroom again immediately after graduation, but they're also not stuck sitting at home. They're still making forward progress. So for a student that's just feeling like they're not ready to make that decision to go to college yet they're not sure maybe what they want to study, I might recommend a program that it's more exploratory in that way, that will allow them to continue to build on their strengths, but get just far enough outside their comfort zone that they have to work at being uncomfortable and managing being uncomfortable and getting through that. When I'm talking with students who might recognize that they're struggling a little bit more academically, in terms of the workload, they might need some more specific skills, a lot of students right now, we're seeing, and I'm sure you can speak to this too in your work, but deficits in math coming out of COVID Lots of students who aren't ready for the pace, volume and complexity of the reading assignments that are coming at them. So if there are students that need more structured academic preparation, we might talk about a more traditional PG year at a boarding school where you're having the experience of living away from home, you know, if you're a student that hasn't done that before, there's something about that that feels similar to college, but maybe one step removed, and within a boarding school. And Don McMillan talked about this when he was on your podcast, but just there's so many structures in place that really help students to build health. Be habits that will really serve them well when they're in college. So, you know, I think it's really about trying to understand from the students perspective, what is it that they're maybe reticent about or concerned about, and trying to share with them that there are opportunities for them to shore up their skills, whether those be social skills or academic skills, in a way that isn't going to stop them moving forward, but in fact, is probably going to enrich their application when they do decide if they do decide to apply to college.

Sheila Akbar:

And I'm sure you're really familiar with this too, but there's research out there that shows just how successful students who have done gap years are in colleges, right? And gap years are far more common outside of the United States than they are within the United States, but they're certainly growing in popularity and audience. If you haven't looked at those statistics, I would say, look some of them up. You will be shocked. But it also makes sense that when a student is quote, unquote, living in the real world, priorities become a lot clearer. And either they can be really driven to say, Oh yeah, I want to do well in school, or they realize how certain executive functioning skills help them in the workplace, and they're just they have to develop them because of the environment that they're in that then they can translate them to the school environment. And students are really quite successful, and a very large majority of them do go back to college. I know a lot of parents are worried that if my kid doesn't go to college right after high school, they're never gonna go but that is certainly not, not always the case. Which takes me to the next thing I wonder if you could share with us is, how do those conversations go with parents? Because I know even if the kid is saying, I don't think I'm ready for college, I want a break, sometimes the parents are the ones saying, Nope, you will keep going. You will go straight on. So how do you handle that?

Rachel Leja:

Yeah, again, I think it's kind of easy into it and understanding why the parents feel that way. And a lot of times I find that parents are concerned that if their child doesn't go off, they're going to lose momentum, they're going to lose that steam. And of the students that I work with where we're doing that kind of parallel planning process, I remind parents that helping their students stay kind of present in the college process while also thinking about, you know, alternatives, is a good way to sort of keep their head in the college game or mindset longer. So if they've gone through the process of looking at colleges already and they've gathered recommendations and they've written some essays, they're going to be more likely to kind of be able to smoothly transition back into the application process after a gap year. So there's a benefit to doing it that way. And for the parents that are concerned that it's, you know, going to hold their student back in some way. I often cite the same kind of research you're talking about, but I also try to highlight for parents the the things that I just mentioned, like this. There are opportunities for students to gain internship experience, to take classes at local community colleges or colleges, depending on where the program is, or traditional schools. There's lots of opportunities for students to do things that are structured and that are going to be moving their son, daughter, child forward in terms of their progress, but it's also going to be probably developmentally more appropriate for them if their child is asking for that, I guess is that they know that they're going to struggle, and if they're asking for Help, I think what we should all do is to really hear them out. Because more often than not, when I, in my experience, when parents have really kind of forced College as the only path, there are some hiccups, and it's not always as smooth. And we really don't want kids to fail to figure out how to thrive, we'd like to avoid that if we could.

Sheila Akbar:

Right, I mean, that's the whole goal, isn't it is to help them launch. They got to figure this thing out on their own, right? And sometimes it's a really hard pill for a parent to swallow that they may not be on the same timeline as all the neighborhood kids, for example, but it may be what their what their child actually needs, and it's going to help them succeed even more in the future.

Rachel Leja:

And it can be a lot easier for a student to transition back to college or to the idea of college, if they have had a chance to just, kind of like we had said before, think about what they want to do, and so also, kind of sharing with the parents that sometimes it seems like we're kicking the can down the road, but we really might be saving ourselves some heartache and some struggle later on to really identify that if this is what needs to happen now, chances are they're going to be better set up for success later on.

Sheila Akbar:

Absolutely. So we're coming to the end of our time. Any final wisdom you want to share with us or advice that you want to give to parents at this time? You know, right before early deadlines are about to hit

Rachel Leja:

Yeah, I know. I think the thing to remember is something you mentioned earlier, is like there are so many colleges out there that are such great fits for different kids for different reasons. So, you know, as a parent, I think if you can be open to the schools that your son, daughter child are excited about, and try not to maybe cast any disparaging remarks from the beginning that might influence. In STEM one way or another. I think that's that's a really good thing to remember. And also, just during this time, if you're noticing that your your child is struggling, make note of of those struggles and talk with the people that are that are on their team, whether that's people at their school, or if you're working with an educational counselor, so that everyone can get on board with the goals, so that, hopefully, by graduation, they're set up to do whatever it is that they should be doing next.

Sheila Akbar:

That's great. Thank you, Rachel. So I'm sure there are people listening who are like, Oh my gosh, she gets it. I need her help with my child. If we have listeners who want to get in touch with you, where is the best place for them to to learn more about what you do?

Rachel Leja:

Yeah, you can visit McMillan education.com M C M I L L A N .com. You can find me there, and if you don't, if your son or daughter doesn't need, necessarily that academic support, I work with many other fantastic counselors who follow a lot of the same processes that I've described here that would probably be helpful to you as well.

Sheila Akbar:

Great, and I'll make sure that's all linked in the show notes. Well, Rachel, thank you so much for your time today. It was really lovely talking with you.

Rachel Leja:

Thank you, Sheila. It was great to be here.

Sheila Akbar:

All right, we'll see you again soon.

Rachel Leja:

Thanks.

Sheila Akbar:

Well, there you have it, folks. I hope you enjoyed that conversation. I know I did. I just love talking to people about how they work with teenagers, because I think we all bring something so different to it. And at the same time, are really insistent, are really careful about creating space for a student to take control of their lives, to imagine what taking control of their lives might look like. And so I get really excited when I get to talk to people about that, okay, if you were just hungering for a little bit more of like but okay, if the goal is college, and we're sure that that's the goal, what do we do? How do we get our ducks in a row? Well, next week, we will be talking about exactly that. How do you get yourself set up from the early years of high school to navigate the college process with ease, with less stress, with more clarity. And so that'll be what we talk about next week. And I'm really excited to share my approach with you there. So I hope to see you next time. And thanks, as always.