what do i do to find the best college?

Allow some time for this. Buy a book or borrow one from your library. Be honest with yourself. Don’t just ask your friends and do the same thing as they are doing.

There are several well-known College Rated type guides to read through. Don’t automatically exclude a school because it looks so expensive, because many of the priciest schools also offer the most student-aid. One of the first things to think about is HOW FAR AWAY? If you are on the East Coast, do you really want to fly home from California just to see friends and family? Another big question is your qualifications such as HS grades and test scores, etc.

You want to pick at least three or four schools to be interested in, so that you will be accepted at least at a couple of them.

Start a notebook or journal called College Search and jot down everything that you want to remember, or copy pages and insert them so that you can review the info with a counselor. Find out who are the good counselors at your school and make an appointment, even if that’s not the counselor that your school assigned you to work with. Follow through and don’t put this on the back burner while you let yourself get distracted. There are deadlines involved in applying to every college. OTH, it’s never too late.

Do NOT be afraid to start at your local community college, lots of successful people did that. If someone has a degree from UCLA, nobody asks them if they started out at a community college.