Ron Lieber
"Your Money" Columnist for The New York Times
Jeff Selingo
Journalist and author
Andrea Mondragón
The Joan Feitler ’49 Co-Director of College Counseling at Francis W. Parker School in Chicago
Mapping Your College Search: Finding the Right Fit at the Right Price
Watch the livestream at www.fwparker.org/livestream
FAN is excited to present two of the nation’s top experts on the college search process together on stage for a conversation that will cover all the bases, from admissions to financial aid.
With the same passion, smarts, and humor that infuses his personal finance column in The New York Times, Ron Lieber’s latest book, The Price You Pay for College: An Entirely New Road Map for the Biggest Financial Decision Your Family Will Ever Make, offers families a much-needed guide to help them navigate this difficult and often confusing journey that has only been compounded by a global pandemic and the resulting chaos in higher education. Lieber explains who pays what, and why, and how the financial aid system got so complicated. He also pulls the curtain back on merit aid, a complicated and often opaque form of tuition discounting that most colleges now use to compete with their peers.
In his 2020 best-selling book Who Gets In and Why, named among the 100 Notable Books of the year by The New York Times, award-winning journalist Jeff Selingo shares what he learned from months inside the college admission process. Most of us probably believe that this process is about merit, grades, and SAT scores, rewarding the best students, but Selingo presents a more complicated truth, showing that who gets in is more frequently about the college’s agenda than about the applicant. In a world where thousands of equally qualified students vie for a fixed number of spots at elite institutions, admissions officers often make split-second decisions based on a variety of factors—including whether a student will enroll if accepted.
Lieber and Selingo will be in conversation with Andrea Mondragón, the Joan Feitler ’49 Co-Director of College Counseling at Francis W. Parker School in Chicago since 2015. Mondragón began her admissions career at Notre Dame where she served as an admissions counselor and the Hispanic recruitment coordinator. She then went on to become an Associate Director of Admissions and the Director of Multicultural Outreach and Recruitment at the University of Chicago.
This event suitable for youth 12+. The recording will be available on our website and YouTube channel.
NOTE: No registration or proof of vaccination is required. Masks are recommended but not required.
Event Sponsors
- Barrington D220
- Beacon Academy
- Catherine Cook School
- Chicago Jewish Day School
- Compass Health Center
- Countryside Day School
- Evanston Scholars
- Evanston Township High School D202
- Family Service Center
- Francis W. Parker School
- Gorton Center
- Hyde Park Day School
- Kenilworth D38
- Lake Bluff D65
- Lake Forest Academy
- Lake Forest Community High School D115
- Lake Michigan Association of Independent Schools
- Latin School of Chicago
- Leo Catholic High School
- Loyola Academy
- Magnetar Capital
- Mindful Psychology Associates PC
- New Trier High School D203
- New Trier Parents’ Association
- North Shore Country Day
- Northwestern University School of Education and Social Policy
- Rebel Human
- Regina Dominican College Preparatory High School
- Roycemore School
- Sacred Heart Schools
- Science & Arts Academy
- Stevenson High School D125
- The Avery Coonley School
- The Frances Xavier Warde School
- Winnetka-Northfield Public Library District
- Wolcott College Prep
- Woodlands Academy of the Sacred Heart


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Note: Event start time is Central Time (CT).