By Nefertari Elshiekh and Julianna Zitron, staff writers

Townsend Harris High School hosted its annual college fair on April 23 from 6-8PM. This year over 100 colleges, including Yale University, Cornell University, and the Macaulay Honors College, sent representatives. Each year, the college fair allows students of all grades to ask questions and find out more information about each school so they can make an informed decision on where they want to go to college. Many juniors attended the college fair so they could decide what colleges to apply to next school year, but  freshmen and sophomores also attended in order to get a head start on thinking about college.

Living up to its purpose, the college fair exposed students to new college options. Junior Jessica Siguencia recalled, “Northeastern University’s representative stood out to me not only because of how thoroughly he answered the questions, but also [because of] his enthusiasm when answering the questions. As a result of the college fair, I am now considering Northeastern, Manhattan College, Swarthmore College, Johns Hopkins University, and Rutgers University.” She continued on to explain, “The college fair helped provide me with more information about specific majors I was interested in as well as scholarships.”

“The college fair exposed me to more colleges than the stereotypical ones we hear about like the Ivy leagues,” agreed junior Angelica Rahaman. “The representatives from Staten Island College Macaulay Honors were very influential. I never thought of applying to a school in Staten Island before, but he explained in great detail what his school was about and how it could benefit me and my goals for the future. I also am now considering Vanderbilt University since the representative was very helpful.”

Awestaa Zia, a sophomore, used the college fair as an introduction to the college scene. She explained, “As a sophomore, I know little to nothing about colleges and going to the college fair really opened up my eyes to how many schools are out there and that I can surely find a match for me.”

Awestaa, like many current ninth and tenth graders, plans to attend future college fairs as well. She continued on to state , “I plan on going on again next year to really ask more questions because by then I’ll know more about the college process and understand what questions to ask and perhaps more about what I want to major in.”

“The college fair helped open up my eyes to the many schools and opportunities out there and just gave me some perspective and information on some schools I would be interested in applying to such as some of the SUNY colleges,” she said. “I would recommend it to others and I’m definitely glad I went because it really opened my eyes to what colleges are out there.”