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By Claire Reinthaler

For the Clemmons Courier

We’re now into the midportion of November, that hazy period when high school seniors don’t really know what to do with themselves. Add together the fact that all of the early action and early decision deadlines have come and gone and that the regular decision deadlines aren’t for a couple more months, and you get a weird sort of in-between period, just waiting with bated breath for your early application decisions to come back while blissfully pushing away thoughts of the applications you still have to do.

My college application process has certainly prompted this sort of feeling. I’ve now applied to 10 of my 13 schools, with only Duke, Northwestern and Emory, all due in early January, left on the list. Just yesterday, I also finished my two big scholarship applications, the Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship for high-achieving, lower-income students and the Thomas Wolfe Creative Writing Scholarship for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

While this has certainly left me with a distinct feeling of accomplishment, it has also left me somewhat unsure of what to do with all of my newfound time. The past six-plus weeks of my life have been consumed by a sea of applications and essays that seemed never-ending, and now that the bulk of that work is over, it’s simply a waiting game.

Luckily for me and my peers, all of our hard work is slowly beginning to pay off.

On Sunday, I got my first decision back, being accepted with a scholarship, and many other seniors are starting to get their results back as well, many already with multiple decisions. Even though this is just the beginning, it’s been a really interesting process to go through and to watch my friends go through, simply because each person’s experience is so different. I’ve talked to so many people, some applying to fewer schools than I am, some applying to more and every variation in between, and each person has such a unique perspective on the whole experience.

It’s truly reflective of this period in our lives as seniors as a whole; we’re all coming into ourselves and beginning to get an idea of who we want to be as young adults. The process of college searching promotes the exploration and development of our sense of self; it’s truly fascinating to think about.

So, to all the juniors and underclassmen out there who are worried because they don’t even know what they want to do, let alone where they want to do it: try to put your worries to rest. I think you’ll find that through the trials and tribulations of the college search, you’ll end up exactly where you’re meant to be.