Bernards Township counselors outline 10-step junior-year college plan, demo Naviance at Ridge High parent night

Bernards Township School District counselors presented a 10-step junior-year college-planning program and a live demo of the Naviance college-search tool for Ridge High School parents during a recorded parent night on a rainy evening.

The session, led by Stephanie Smith, director of school counseling, explained counselors’ roles, the district’s postsecondary planning website and the main steps juniors should follow as they prepare for senior year and college applications. "When you have one of us, you have all of us," Smith said, describing the counseling team's coordinated approach and asking parents to keep questions general so answers benefit the whole group.

Counselors demonstrated Naviance features that students will use to build college lists and interpret admission data. Miss Wu walked parents through the career-interest profiler, scattergrams that plot Ridge students’ GPAs against SAT or ACT results, and college profiles that list acceptance rates and deadlines. She noted parents can create accounts and link multiple children, and that Naviance’s Ridge-specific data covers the past five years.

The team highlighted free test-prep access: "Methodize is our free SAT/ACT prep program — students can access practice tests, quizzes and lessons through Naviance," a counselor said. Staff also said Ridge offers both digital SAT and ACT administrations and that some external sites may still provide paper testing locations.

Counselors reviewed how colleges evaluate applications, placing the transcript at the center of review and noting admissions officers often recalculate GPAs using their own formulas. A staff member clarified how Ridge sends transcript information: "Our transcripts include final grades only," the counselor said, adding that the school issues a weighted cumulative GPA that colleges may choose to recalculate.

Audience members asked whether colleges are returning to requiring standardized tests. Counselors said policies vary: some schools have resumed requiring scores, others remain test-optional or test-blind, and many publish their policy cycles. "The safest current advice is to sit for a test now so students have scores available if a school requires them," a counselor said, adding that counselors will advise students individually during junior conferences.

Staff also urged families to use the summer and March–April junior conferences to organize materials, start draft essays and complete a parent "brag sheet" (part A of the senior packet) to help counselors write personalized recommendation letters. Counselors said senior packet part A is due in June and part B is due early in senior year; they stressed these items and username/password management as practical steps parents and students should complete.

The presentation included an engagement segment of "trainer trivia," during which staff said Ridge hosted 72 college representative visits this fall with about 433 student participants. Staff also cited the class of 2024’s application volume as an example: counselors reported 4,518 transcripts submitted from that class, an average of about 10.1 applications per student.

The team closed by reminding parents that the recorded presentation, slide deck and links will be posted to the counseling department website and that parents and students can request individual help. Counselors said they will follow up with one-on-one junior planning conferences in March and April and remain available for further questions.

What’s next: recorded materials and the slide deck will be posted on the Bernards Township School District counseling website; parents with scheduling or testing questions were instructed to contact the counseling office or the district’s testing coordinator for school-specific test dates.