Rising juniors and seniors brace yourselves. If it has not already started, you are about to experience what I like to call Inboxmageddon. Inboxmageddon is the email phenomenon that occurs when high school students begin to receive an avalanche of emails from colleges and universities hoping to get their attention.

Most students take the electronic snow shovel approach to the mass of emails from colleges that litter their inbox. The delete button. They think logically: "These emails are just advertisements, right?" and "College is still a long way off-it is way to early for this." 

However, some of these "advertisements" are actually invitations targeting them specifically because of their test scores or other accomplishments. Even more interesting, some of these invitations contain financial incentives like waived application fees and scholarship offers.

One of my students is a rising senior who reads her email. She has already been accepted by a college and has an impressive scholarship package. What a nice way to start your senior year!

So the bad news for rising juniors  and seniors is that they should actually take a look at their emails. If they can't, they should forward them to their parents. Otherwise, they could be deleting dollars from their inbox. Happy reading!