Following the college fair at Amador that featured many colleges in the U.S., Amador recently hosted another fair that highlighted many new international colleges. The event was hosted during lunch in the quad, where students were able to ask questions at the booths of each college.

“It was a mini RACC (Regional Admissions Counselors of California) college fair, where counselors from outside of California are advertising their colleges and giving students exposure to them. I think a lot of students think about school in California and they don’t necessarily think outside of the box all the time, so we invited the out-of-state college counselors here,” said Lara Bays, Amador College and Career Counselor.

Colleges from as far as Switzerland had sent their counselors to the Amador quad to introduce and pitch their advantages and programs included within their universities. Amador counselors were excited to host these college fairs again as they were unable to organize these fairs like before during the years of the pandemic.

“We used to coordinate with them, and they would come every year. Now we are reintegrating them back after two years in the pandemic of not having it,” said Bays.

While there were international universities, there were a handful of nationwide universities from other states in the U.S. as well. Other state universities including Michigan State University came to Amador in an effort to introduce different opportunities offered by out-of-state colleges other than the in-state California colleges.

“Many out of state institutions offer great scholarships for California students and we’re not incredibly difficult to get into, so you can get in and out of college in four years. So it often can cost less money to go out of state and also you get the chance to experience living somewhere else being in a different part of the country and you can always come back to California,” said Naomi Schoenholz, Regional Manager for Michigan State University Recruitment.

In an effort to broadcast the event, Amador counselors had distributed information of the college fair and the variety of colleges attending via email-based newsletters. Each stall was dressed in a school banner, decorated with board presentations, and ready with college informational flyers.

“We put it in a spot that we thought would get a lot of foot traffic from students and we advertised it. I sent some emails ahead of time to students hoping that they would see those emails and open them. We also put flyers out on the offices and put some of the information in newsletters. So we tried to really advertise the event as best we could to get as many students as we could to attend,” said Bays.

Many students were interested in this international college fair as it shedded light on a new field of options for colleges to apply to during their senior year. Whether it is specific programs, majors, specific educational environments, or scholarships, each school had their own unique feature that stood out to the student attendees.

“I thought it was really informative. I learned a bunch of stuff about different colleges and now I’m more interested in different states that I could go to. I know that UCs are getting more competitive, so applying to out of state colleges gives me more options and it opens doors to more things I can do,” said Aanya Gupta (‘24).