by Joyce Slayton Mitchell, author of "The Chinese Guide to American Colleges"

Part I reminded you to check out the College Fairs and the many American college and university representatives who travel to China to meet students. If they don't visit your high school, check with the international school closest to where you live and ask them which colleges are visiting, when they are visiting, and if you can come to the presentation.

The big travel time is from September through late November, so it isn't too late to check. If you have missed this season, then they will come back next spring, usually beginning in March.

Besides calling the international schools, you can also check out the Web site of the colleges that interest you, and send an email to the admissions department and ask when the rep plans to visit in the Shenzhen area. They will be happy to hear from you and will notify you of their visit.

Check the American college guides, especially Mitchell's "Chinese Guide to American Colleges" because it was written especially for Chinese students and includes information on financial aid and how to get a visa as well as describing the application process and describing 150 different colleges. You will find many colleges in the guide that you have not heard about and should know about before you decide where you are going to apply.

Spending time on researching the colleges helps you in two ways: 1. In order to make a good decision you always have to know your choices. If there are five movies for you to see and you have heard only about two of them, you can't make a good decision on what you would like best unless you learn about the other three. Too many students choose before they know their choices and they miss out on many good options.

2. In order to get into a particular college, you will have to know that university well enough to express in your application why that university is the best match for you. The American colleges are looking for so much more than your test scores, once you have the English proficiency that they require, they will want to know how well you know their university. What you like about it. Why you would fit in well. What you will contribute to the kind of place they are. All of those factors mean that you must know what they are like and how they differ one from the other. It also means that you have to know how you differ from your classmates. Why should they take you over the person from your school who is also applying to the United States?

For these reasons, you are going to learn to research colleges from a great variety of sources. Living so far away from the United States, think of every way that you can learn about the great variety that you can choose from.

Besides the college reps visiting China and the college guides, the easiest and fastest first look can be on the college Web site. Colleges have details about their program, their student life, and their admissions requirements online. All you have to know is the name of a college and Google it.

To get you started, here is a list of different types of colleges in different locations for you to check out on their Web sites. Go ahead and Google Davidson College, Skidmore College, Olin College of Engineering, Denison University, Ohio State University, University of Arizona, Beloit College, Pomona College. It won't take you long to learn that there are so many different kinds of places for you to go and learn and it is so easy to check them out online.

Remember this: having someone tell you where to go to college or giving you a college list is not researching the college. You can not pay others to research for you because they don't know you as well as you know yourself. They don't know all of the choices in America, they only know the few that they have heard of. You don't have to pay for names of colleges!

Every time you hear of a student from your school or any school tell you the name of a college, check it out online to find out if it sounds right for you. The more colleges on your list to research, the better you will know what's there for you to consider, and where will be the best place for you to study and learn.

A major factor in the success of your college selection process is how well you learn how to trust your own research. When you read or hear something about a college, notice who said it. Was it the college? What's their bias? Was it a student? What's his bias? Was it a college guide? Who wrote the guide: an educator, a student, an entrepreneur? If so, consider what's in it for them. Why do they have a particular view of the college? You've been in science classes, right? Just like science, you have to collect all of the data before you know the answer. Your model for learning about the American colleges will be as a scientist- you are now in the stage of collecting data for the best answer for you.

The next College Series installment will be 'Researching the Colleges Part III,' on how to use the information you have collected to choose your college list.