Calendar of college information sessions?

The college counselor at your child’s high school should have information about that. I don’t know where your child goes to high school, but Berkeley High has a bunch of resources online, including a Google calendar listing all the dates and times of college admissions visits to the College and Career Center. BHS also hosts a college fair specifically for BHS juniors annually in spring. Here's the BHS College and Career Center Website: http://bhs.berkeleyschools.net/resources/college-career-center/

Hi,

In our experience (3 different high schools), it is the high school and especially its college counselor(s) that put on the information sessions.  This is true for both public and private high schools.  We have attended both.  Private high schools provide far more personal attention, more workshops for groups of students and more individual meetings with each student, as a general matter.  Our current public high school though does a good job -- although there is only one college counselor for the entire senior class.

Some very good information sessions I have been to in recent years:

Tilden Prep in Walnut Creek.  Very nice, small private high school.  Their evening college information session was great, involved Q&A too, and was open to all parents.  A seasoned college counselor presents information about the California college system, private colleges, etc., and there are always a couple college counselors in the room as well.  They put it on in October or November, and it's well worth the trip.

St. Mary's East Bay College Connection ("EBCC")  Fair.  This event happens every May and for some reason is hard to find out about, but it is very good.  It is a large college fair (public and private, regional and national) with college booths packed over two buildings.  For parents, there are optional seminars for admissions, financial aid, recruited athletes, etc.  Their Dean of Admissions gave a fantastic presentation on admissions and how it works!!  Q&A welcome too.  My kid and her friend did the fair with their list of schools to check out, and I went to a couple useful seminars. You can register ahead of time. You'll find it by googling the terms above.  Many public schools, including our school less than 5 miles away, do not even mention this wonderful fair.

Colleges That Change Lives ("CTCL").  This is a group of liberal arts colleges, some quite well known, around the country.  They have a fair in our area a couple times a year, locations change from SF to Santa Clara to East Bay.  This year I think the fair was in August and we missed it.  They usually have info for parents too.  They have a good website and even a book I believe. For a liberal arts or progressive-minded kid, there are some great schools here. Again, it is not well publicized and you have to google it.  

Those are the free sessions that stuck out in my mind, outside of the high school itself!  Look for events in the Bay Area, not Berkeley specifically.  We live in Oakland, but none of these events were in Berkeley/Oakland.

Best of luck, been there and not done yet

The college counselor at our high school told us about Western Association for College Admission Counseling (WACAC) which organizes big college fairs all over the state every year in the spring. We went to one in April at St. Mary's College in Moraga.  It was a huge event with tables set up in multiple gyms/meeting rooms. Every imaginable school in the western states had a rep there, as well as many east coast schools and as far away as Europe. All the UCs and CSUs were represented. There were also workshops about applying to college. There were a lot of people but it was fairly well organized. Our son was a sophomore when we went and it was a good introduction to getting him thinking about college. 

The WACAC college fairs are free but your kid has to register in advance on their website https://www.wacac.org/college-fairs/ -  There is not much there right now but check back in a few months to see if they have scheduled the fairs for Spring 2018 yet.