131. From $80 Million in Scholarships to Debt-Free Graduates: The 7-Step College Ready Framework

In today’s episode, we get to spend time with Shellee Howard from California. Shellee is a mother of four, founder and creator of College Ready, author of two best-selling books, and the 2026 Global Educational Consultant of the Year. With over 18 years of experience and having visited more than 1,800 colleges and universities across 100 countries, Shellee knows what it means to prepare students to “adult” and how to effectively navigate the admissions process. All four of Shellee’s children graduated from post-secondary without debt from four different schools and paths. In this episode, Shellee shares the 7-step College Ready framework that she uses to help families and students prepare for higher education, career, and life. This conversation is a must-listen for parents wanting to prepare their children for life after homeschool, no matter what path they choose to pursue.

Books

How to Send Your Student to College Without Losing Your Mind or Your Money

The College Admissions PLAN Simplified

Website

College Ready 

Shellee’s Non-profit

Empower Education

Proactive Homeschool Dad (PHD) Course

PHD Course

This Golden Hour

Transcript

Shellee Howard 0:00

All four of my kids graduated debt free. In 18 years, I've gotten$80 million in scholarships for my families. There's more money than you ever could possibly need to tap into. The problem is people don't do what's necessary to get that done.

Timmy Eaton 0:24

Hey guys. This is Timmy Eaton, homeschool father of six, doctor of Education, creator of the Proactive Homeschool dad or PhD course, and host of this Golden Hour podcast that you're listening to right now. We've been homeschooling for almost two decades now, and we've had three of our children go from birth to university without the conventional school system and without a diploma. This Golden Hour Podcast focuses primarily on supporting homeschool dads with their important roles and responsibilities, specifically helping them to align and strengthen their relationships with their spouses and children. But we'll also discuss tons of homeschool topics and books and curricula. So pour an ice cold glass of carbonated water with a lime. Go for a long drive or do a chore, and listen to another inspiring episode of this Golden Hour podcast. You are listening to this Golden Hour podcast. In today's episode, we get to spend time with Shelly Howard from California. Shelly is a mother of four, founder and creator of College Ready, author of two bestselling books and the 2026 Global Educational Consultant of the Year. With over 18 years of experience in having visited more than 1800 colleges and universities across a hundred countries, Shelly knows what it means to prepare students to adult. And how to effectively navigate the admissions process. All four of Shelly's children graduated from post-secondary without debt from four different schools and paths. In this episode, Shelly shares the seven step college ready framework that she uses to help families and students prepare for higher education, career and life. This conversation is a must listen for parents wanting to prepare their children for life after homeschool, no matter what path they choose to pursue. All right. Welcome back to this Golden Hour podcast. Today we have with us Shelly Howard from Southern California. Thanks for being with us, Shelly. Glad to be

Shellee Howard 2:19

so glad to be here. Thank you, Timmy.

Timmy Eaton 2:21

And I'm a little jealous'cause she was saying how beautiful the day is there and so what about 70 degrees, right?

Shellee Howard 2:27

Sunny and 70, just like always

Timmy Eaton 2:29

get to the beach. That's awesome. And I'll just do a little intro and then we can jump into things. So Shelly is the author of How to Send Your Student To College Without Losing Your Mind And Your Money. She's the founder of College Ready and really focused on kind of strategic college planning and empowering us through the college admissions process. And you could check out her stuff. Definitely the book obviously, and we'll put that in the notes, but also college ready plan.com and you can find out much more. And add anything you want to and then we'll, we will jump into questions.

Shellee Howard 2:59

So I think it's important we'll be talking today about college admissions, but I want the listeners to realize that I am the 2026 Global Educational Consultant of the year, Actually I leave for the Philippines on the 30th to pick up my, award. And I share that because as you being a Canadian and I have a Italian exchange daughter in Italy. And my first went to Harvard, second, university of Alabama, third San Francisco State, and the fourth went to Czech Republic of Prague. The listeners can get something massive regardless of where you live or what kind of education you're pursuing. So I just wanted to speak that out because a lot of times maybe they may not realize that this can apply to just any student who has a desire to adult.

Timmy Eaton 3:57

And I like you establishing that authority'cause it, it helps our listener know the value that they're getting from this episode. So thank you very much. So tell us like how did college ready come to be? And maybe just give us more detail about what you do.

Shellee Howard 4:10

I'll give you the condensed version because that's a whole podcast in itself. So I'm a mother of four. I have two boys and two girls. And this college ready program got started 18 years ago when my firstborn was in eighth grade. And he came home from school and he is mom, I know exactly what I wanna do and exactly where I wanna go in eighth grade. And I looked at him and I said, I changed my major five times, right?

Timmy Eaton 4:34

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 4:35

And he is I know, and that's why I'm so excited. I know what I wanna do. And I said, what happened at school today? He said, oh, the high school counselor came and said, we need to pick out our classes for our freshman year and we could do whatever we want. And you always told me, serving our community is super important, so I wanna be a brain surgeon and I wanna go to an Ivy school. And I was like, all righty then. Okay. And awesome. He walks out and then he turns around, he goes, can you help me? And that's where it got real, because I'm like, that was not in my future plans or career at the time. I was an independent contractor, owned my own business, really didn't have anything to do with education. And I said, of course I'll help you. I'm your mom. And so just like any other part of parenthood, we get stumped and then we figure it out. So I went back to school and I became an independent college strategist, and then I started touring 25 colleges a semester, and I am now going to my hundredth country. In April. So I have seen well over 1800 colleges. All over the world.

Timmy Eaton 5:49

And the impetus of this was truly your son's experience there. Like you weren't thinking of going back to school or anything before that.

Shellee Howard 5:57

None of it.

Timmy Eaton 5:58

None of it. That is so cool of you as a mom. Like that. That is a very homeschool mom move right there

Shellee Howard 6:03

i've been told that many times. But here's the thing, Timmy, your listeners are gonna laugh at me. I used to threaten my kids if they didn't do well in school, don't make me homeschool you.

Timmy Eaton 6:12

Yeah. No, that's good. That's a good threat.

Shellee Howard 6:15

Yeah.'cause they knew I have patience to the end of time with other people's children, but with my own, they can push my buttons like no other. So anyway, back to the story that young man did exactly what I told him to do. All four years. He applied to 12 schools, got accepted to 11, had seven full ride offers at a full ride to USC and Harvard matched it.

Timmy Eaton 6:41

This is your son?

Shellee Howard 6:42

This is my son, yeah. My firstborn. And so when he left for Harvard, we made a bet. And the bet was if he graduated from Harvard debt free, stayed on the path and got good grades and got out in four years that I would write a book. So I go to his graduation, he got one B at Harvard, crossed the stage, handed me the diploma and says, mom, where's the book? And I'm like, oh, I thought we were kidding. He goes, obviously I was not kidding. And so that's how my bestselling first book happened is I stopped working for three months and I wrote the book, everything that you need to do to get into college without losing your mind or your money.

Timmy Eaton 7:26

Wow.

Shellee Howard 7:26

And then. I didn't still plan on really doing this full time, but everybody's like, well, can you do that for mine? Can you help my child? I would like some of that, yeah. So last year in 2025, we had 29 seniors get$10.3 million in scholarships. And so after helping my first get into Harvard, my second into University, Alabama, she's a nurse. My third into San Francisco State, he's now at Berkeley going to be a PA and my fourth going internationally to Prague doing international business. I am now global. And so it does not matter where you live. I can help your family navigate the process, wherever that is.

Timmy Eaton 8:09

And so how long had you been learning, like this was your son in eighth grade?

Shellee Howard 8:14

Yeah.

Timmy Eaton 8:14

And then you went to school for how long?

Shellee Howard 8:17

So while he was in high school? I went back to school for the first two, and at the time I was just helping him to navigate, do this, do this, do this. But I do have to say I'm a serial entrepreneur, so I built seven businesses. So what I did is I built him as if I would build a brand and that brand, we have to look at what's our return on investment of that opportunity. And so I set up business metrics. I used KPIs. I really looked at it as a business. And I was fortunate. He did everything I asked. He never pushed back on me anything I asked him to do. And I have three others, so I know that that does happen. It's the reality of every child's different of, but what was important about that learning is how much I fell in love. With helping teenagers and their families navigate this process. Wow. And I've always spoke teenager. I never wanted to grow up. I love them all dearly. Never met one I didn't like. And now I get to inspire them through my nonprofit called Empower education.world, and I get to meet with them to help them get clarity about who they are, what matters to them, their gifts, their talents, their advocacy, help them pick their career, their major, help them understand how AI is going to take over several jobs before they get there.

Timmy Eaton 9:41

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 9:41

So it's really about helping the family navigate how to get in, but also how to get the best return on their investment. Of that education.

Timmy Eaton 9:53

So I'm fascinated with what you must have been doing to become an expert on not just getting into schools, but like the scholarships. There's a lot of stuff surrounding college ready. So I guess my question is what were you learning in your schooling and was it, what you were learning that really propelled you into this business? Or was it your own efforts of attending schools? Because you learn the theory in a class and in a degree. And then the real life happens out there. And so what principles did you get to that you were like, no, this is gonna help you. This is effective. Because I'm sure there's a lot of people in the industry, and this is a second, third, fourth, fifth industry for you. What did you learn in school and, what did you glean from visiting all those schools and was that a requirement of your education or did you do that on your own?

Shellee Howard 10:48

That was on my own. So it's important to realize first that I started my first business when I was 12 years old. So I was raised by two entrepreneurs. Both my parents ran their own businesses. And so I have an entrepreneur's mindset and that really does set me apart. Yes. Good or bad, however you wanna look at it. But I think, very differently than somebody who goes and works for somebody else and gets a paycheck. And so I approach this as I would building a business. Yes. And so I had to really think outside of the box.

Timmy Eaton 11:21

So the schooling was definitely a means to an end for you.

Shellee Howard 11:24

So I, I got my four years undergrad and. As an entrepreneur. Nobody's ever talked to me about where I went, what that was all about. Nothing. But I grew up a lot. During those four years, I have absolutely no regret about going to college. I played softball, I was in a sorority. I did like the whole experience. And so I tell families, college is just not about books. It's about life skills. It's about failing forward. It's about

Timmy Eaton 11:53

relationships.

Shellee Howard 11:54

Yeah. Collaboration. And so really what prepared me is when I got out of college, four days later, I started with Proctor and Gamble as an operations manager. And so I worked for them for eight and a half years where they trained me as a Fortune 500. Company would train you. I had the best training in the entire world and what they taught me is what people are looking for and who people wanna do business with. So it's a mindset mentality of how are you gonna stand out as our brand, as our operations manager. And I take these same principles and I thought my son's gonna handle his GPA, but he needs a strategy when to take AP calc or when to take bio or, he needs a strategy for that. And then how is he gonna stand out? Well, He is gonna take a test. That test has got to match his GPA, right? So we have intellectual curiosity that matches no grade inflation or whatever. And I'm like, but after that, it's really up to us. He has no clue how to do community service with passion and purpose. How to lead others to create change, how to do extracurriculars that are meaningful, how to get letters of recommendation written, how to write essays that are going to absolutely stop them in their tracks. That's all what I'm good at. And so together. I didn't get the grades. Trust me, that young man, he had a four six GPA and so I, I stopped helping him after fifth grade. I'm like, I'm done. I'm out. And I knew that he had the desire to go get it. And remember, I have three others, so I'm not saying every child fits this mold. I'm just saying this was my first one.

Timmy Eaton 13:51

But like you're saying, when you combine their efforts with yours, now it's a powerful package.

Shellee Howard 13:56

Exactly. And so he didn't know how to stand out. That happened to be, I'm a branding salesperson. It was a very easy concept for me to say great, your gifts and talents are soccer leadership and community service. What are we gonna do with that? And then I built his brand around that, and that's how we were able to get the strategy to move forward. You asked the question about school versus reality. So what my certification taught me is that I needed to have the knowledge to help people. But it didn't tell me the how to help people. So it was very theory based and it was a certification. So people thought, oh, she knows what she's doing.

Timmy Eaton 14:44

And what's the title of your certification?

Shellee Howard 14:46

It's called an IEC, independent College Consultant.

Timmy Eaton 14:49

Okay.

Shellee Howard 14:51

Educational College Consultant. IECI got it through uc, San Diego. And again, I did it because I didn't wanna mess up and I didn't know how to do it any other way.

Timmy Eaton 15:03

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 15:03

And so I figured I'm just go back to school and learn some more and I'll be okay. And that wasn't the end all that really taught me what I needed to focus on. The GPA, the test score, the community service, the leadership, the extra, like it taught me, I need to talk about all of this, but it didn't tell you how. To do it right. And that is where college ready. Now I have 11 people, and so it's a team of us where every consultant has been certified by both the university and the college ready certification.

Timmy Eaton 15:38

So you've created your own certification and, and is that mostly based on your visiting of schools and creating your own framework?

Shellee Howard 15:46

It's all based on that. Am I two bestselling books? So as I was going out and talking to admissions people who were reading these applications and I'm going on college tours and I'm listening like a parent, unfortunately what happens is parents think by going on college tours that they're learning, know they're being sold. There's a huge difference the college tour is to sell you the parents on spending your money with this organization. And so I was like, that's fascinating because my research does not show that this school graduates 75% in four years. It actually takes six years to get a four year degree here. And all of a sudden I started seeing this really interesting. And then US News and World Report, it's really advertising. It's not real information. So again, there's a lot of bad information online. And people are doing all this research using Google and Chat and all of these tools. I just read a statistic today that more than 50% of what chat says is a lie. And I was like, wow, our kids have no idea that statistic is so high. I thought maybe it would've been five, 10%. But it is so bad. And Google, I've Googled how to get into college and it's like Googling, why does my thumb hurt? And you have cancer. It's like that scary, right?

Timmy Eaton 17:19

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 17:19

It is not a good plan. So I tell parents, there's nothing better than you being the wisdom in your family to help navigate this with your child. And if not, you then hire somebody the who?

Timmy Eaton 17:33

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 17:34

Because they're 17. They don't even know financial literacy, let alone what a return on investment. A$400,000 of an education's gonna get them.

Timmy Eaton 17:45

Now one thing in, in the home education circles and in, a lot of places that because you're, this is very targeted to, to post-secondary education. Correct.

Shellee Howard 17:56

So not necessarily. I also help people find careers. So say they wanna go directly into a trade school, or they wanna go into be an influencer, or they wanna be an entrepreneur, right? It doesn't matter what they want to do after high school, they still need to start to test the water. Now. You don't wanna do none of this and then get done with high school and be like. I still have no idea what I wanna do.

Timmy Eaton 18:28

Totally.

Shellee Howard 18:29

That's a terrible plan. So

Timmy Eaton 18:30

college ready isn't just about college?

Shellee Howard 18:33

No, originally it was called adult ready and everybody's like, I don't understand what you're trying to tell me. And so I had to make it more mainstream because college is the next step for many families, but not for all families. And

Timmy Eaton 18:48

so you're not biased towards, Hey all kids should go into post-secondary academic learning?

Shellee Howard 18:53

Not at all. No, I'm an entrepreneur and I have my degree. But here's the reality. If your child wants to be a doctor, a lawyer, a CPA, an engineer, I'm sorry, but that's their only path. There is no other option for them. I do believe that for some students it is the only path for other students who maybe wanna go to the Peace Corps, maybe wanna do a nonprofit, they don't necessarily have do one way. I have a nephew who told me early on, and Shelly, I do not wanna go to college. I don't even like high school. And I said, outstanding. What do you wanna do? And he says, I want to weld engines for race cars. That's what I wanna do that's exactly what he's doing. And guess what? He's the happiest. And he did go to a trade school, so he did have to get educated Yes. To learn how to do this. Yeah. Not catch a car on fire.

Timmy Eaton 19:48

Yep.

Shellee Howard 19:49

But the important thing is so many people want to put people into a bucket. Like you have to do it this way. I believe that every student should first figure out who they are, what matters to them, and then prove that exact thing. And whatever that is within reason. I've had a few students who tell me I want to be an influencer, and then I'm like, that's amazing. Where's your business plan? And they're like, what? What do you mean a business plan? That

Timmy Eaton 20:24

Yeah. That

Shellee Howard 20:25

I don't know how to make a business plan. And I'm like, that's what you can learn by furthering your education. They just think that people are gonna continue to like and follow them, and they're gonna get all this free money. And you, they work hard. Don't get me wrong. I'm not bashing influencers, but I'm just saying there is no plan. You plan to fail. Yeah. Because what else? You're gonna get out and you're gonna be like, I'm not prepared to do anything. So for me, I believe that every student in this world should do 200 service hours before they turn 18. Why? Because I think our world would be very different.

Timmy Eaton 20:59

And employers love that, frankly. When you talk about volunteer work or community service, stuff like that holds as just much of weight as work experience or anything else they do. And so I'm with you on that. For sure. And you help them locate those types of things and how to find those service opportunities maybe a good question. And you feel this however you want, and I know that people just need to go to your site and get in touch with you if they're like, oh, okay, this sounds like something that would be obviously so useful to my, myself and my children. Is there like a basic framework that you could say, okay, there's four parts of the framework do you have something like that you could share?

Shellee Howard 21:33

Yes. So actually there's seven parts of the framework. So it's a little bit more than four, the very first thing as the framework is the student needs to get clarity about who they are because on an application, a resume, a college application, they wanna know. That's step one. You can't move forward if you don't know who you are and what you've done.

Timmy Eaton 21:55

Is that like too abstract sometimes for students? Or when they work with you, they get what you're saying with who they are.'cause if somebody said that to me, I'd say, I'm a dad. I'm a husband, I'm a father. I'd be like, who am I? What does that mean?

Shellee Howard 22:06

Colleges and employers wanna know, why should I hire you, Timmy? That's it. That's the, why should I bring you to my college, Timmy? Why should I bring you into my world? That's all they wanna know. If you can't answer, if you were applying for a job at college Ready, Timmy, and you said I'm a dad and I'm a husband, and Yeah. I'd be like, all right's, lots of those good on you, Timmy. Just keep doing that, right? Yeah. But I need students to articulate their core values. My family is everything to me. That is telling me something about you. Uniquely. I am tenacious. I never stop until it's done, right? Yes. I encourage every listener to look at your teenager, one-to-one without a phone, without a distraction, and say, Timmy, who are you? And you will see the look of terror. They have no idea because they are looking at the best day of every single human being online. On all the social media platforms. So compared to their best day, I'm really nobody. And that is where the tragedy is in this particular generation, and I'm not a technology hater, actually, I'm on the AI train. Like I, I'm okay with it.

Timmy Eaton 23:31

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 23:31

But here's the thing. Before we had all that, we would go out on the street and play till the lights came on and we knew you were fast or slow. You could braid hair, you could play in the dirt. Like we knew we were something unique. An athlete a performer, whatever that is. Now students are so deep into I have to do this thing really intense and I have to do my grades at the highest level I can. And there's so much pressure. Everybody wants to know what I'm gonna do in the rest of my life. It is suffocating this generation.

Timmy Eaton 24:07

Yeah. Yeah.

Shellee Howard 24:08

And we can't continue to expect them to know who they are if they have not explored that. And this generation's also struggling with failure. It is, for some reason failure's a bad thing. And I don't quite understand it. I've always taught my kids to fail forward and learn from that. Because if they go out as adults and they haven't failed before, that first failure is gonna be pretty darn heavy.

Timmy Eaton 24:37

And how irrational is it to think that we're just a finished product without any experience or any exposure

Shellee Howard 24:44

But yet parents, if you ask them, they'll say, I just wanna protect them. This world is crazy. And I get it, I'm a parent of four. I didn't wanna put my kids in harm's way. But I also made'em order pizza on the telephone. It wasn't putting them in terrifying positions. It was just like, Hey, go ask the stranger for time. I'm right here.

Timmy Eaton 25:04

Yep.

Shellee Howard 25:05

They're not gonna take you. It's gonna be okay. These are the things that we've gotten away from because it's all in the palm of our hand. We don't have to do that anymore. So these students are really losing sight of who am I, what matters to me, and how will I prove it? I give an example. My first point said, mom, I wanna be a brain surgeon. I immediately said, how do you know that we don't have medicine in our family? He goes, mom, I've been serving our community as long as I can remember. And isn't that what a doctor does? And I thought, whoa, that's large for him to think like that. Yeah, it is. And then I'm like why do you wanna be a doctor? And he says, I can make people's lives better, mom, every single day. And I'm like, but do you know how much school you're gonna have to do? He goes, school's not that hard for me, mom. He goes, I'm curious how the body works. How the brain works. So here I'm trying to convince him that all of this is gonna be hard and heavy and not good. And he's like, but this is what I want. How many times have you sat with your children and just listened? We want to help them and fix them and provide for them and all of this stuff, but how many times have we just said, tell me about yourself? Without any reaction, without going, oh great. Your art is never going to pay for you. Like these things that we get scared about as adults. Without verbalizing them. Because I have learned that these students, they sometimes can't say what they're trying to tell. An adult. An example, I had a student wanted to be a botanist. I'm like, okay, why do you wanna be a botanist? And she says I believe that if we all planted more plants, we could save our environment. I said, so wait a minute. It's not that you wanna plant plants, it's you wanna save our environment. Yes I do. So you really wanna be an environmentalist? Not really. I kind of wanna do engineering to figure that out. So here the dad was freaking out that his daughter was gonna go to school to plant plants, and she had this huge vision of being an engineer. To save our environment. There was nothing that they were talking about that was sharing any of that. That's what I mean when it's not about college. It's about your child and what. They're good at and what they wanna do with it.

Timmy Eaton 27:39

Continue the framework if you will, tell us where do we get to? We got who they are, we're what matters to them.

Shellee Howard 27:45

We're step one. Step two is we need to give them opportunity to test the water. That means if they say, I want to be a psychologist. Okay, great. What about psychology interest you? Interesting. Would you like to take a class? Would you like to go to a psychology museum? Tell me I'm thinking. Forensics. I'm really fascinated with this whole, great. So is it the crime scene movie? Do you see how this can like ebb and flow? When you're in that they're sharing. The why, right? They wanna do it. And sometimes their why does not align with what they're telling you because their brain is not fully developed. They're really struggling to articulate. So for that student, I would say, great. If you wanna do crime, why don't you volunteer at the police station? Huh. Let's just put our toe in the water. Yeah. Do you like this environment? So it's, it is really allowing that student to try, I say, try on that outfit, whatever that is. And then if they're like I don't really know, it just sounds interesting. I, on the other hand would say, do you know the number one most employed major? It's psychology. Because there's no job called psychology.

Timmy Eaton 29:09

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 29:09

So do you wanna go get additional school? And they're like, no, I do not want more school. And now you're like, wow, we dodged that bullet. So do you see how just having these conversations, so one is the student needs to know them, number two is they need to try it on. Yeah. They need to test it out. Okay. Number three is they need to start to consider what is important to them. Do they need more intellectual education? Do they need more practical opportunity? And how much money do they wanna make in their future? Do you understand? Yeah. Because I love photography, that doesn't mean I need to be a photographer. I love snow skiing. That does not mean I need to go to the Olympics or make that my profession. So we need to unpack do you ever wanna move out of our home? Yes I do. As a matter of fact, very far from here. Or if they don't, you say okay I'm not gonna go grocery shopping and I'm not gonna cook for you anymore. Now would you wanna move out? And they're like, yes, I would. And that's what we want for them, right? Yeah. We want them to adult.

Timmy Eaton 30:22

Totally.

Shellee Howard 30:23

So now we're giving them permission to adult. And then you say, so do you want to be able to buy a new car once a year or once every 10 or 20 years? Huh? I want a new car every year. It's a choice. Oh, so stuff is important to you. To other kids, they may be, I don't care. Yeah. I'll take a bike. I, it doesn't matter to me.

Timmy Eaton 30:46

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 30:47

You're starting to help them understand financial literacy, and then you're like, do you know how much we pay for electricity? Not in like, turn off the lights. Do you know how much it costs? But helping them, are you aware? Yeah. They may not have an idea how much groceries cost or how much electricity or gas, because we've done such a great job to shield them and protect them from all of this, but really we're not doing them a service because they don't know what to do next.

Timmy Eaton 31:17

No. And then when they get out there they, yeah, exactly. They're just gonna be asking more. They wanna

Shellee Howard 31:20

come back home.

Timmy Eaton 31:23

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Shellee Howard 32:57

So that's number three. Number four is once they figure out who they are, what's important to them, and how much money they need to adult, and again, there's no judgment. If somebody wants to go and join the Peace Corps and give all their money away, it doesn't matter to me. I just need to help them get there. But here's the thing. If a child wants things, nice clothes, nice shoes, I've had children tell me they wanna buy a Lear jet and a yacht, and I'm like, then we need to consider those careers.

Timmy Eaton 33:30

That's right.

Shellee Howard 33:31

Now we're tapping into, we need to talk about, here's some different careers. I'll give you an example, Timmy. I was with my son, he was in middle school and we were in Boston visiting family and we're on a toll road. And I stop and I throw change in the toll road thing and he goes, that's it. That's the job I want, mom. I'm like, what are you talking about? And he goes, I wanna sit and play on my game boy and have people throw money at me. And I'm like, whoa. How far off is he?

Timmy Eaton 34:03

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 34:04

What he thought was so not what it was and so if we don't help them understand if they want money and they want to be a dentist, maybe we need to talk about the lifestyle of a dentist. Yeah. Maybe we need to interview a dentist. Maybe we need to be an intern for a dentist. Let's step into it. Let's own it. Let's go for it. So now we're getting a lot of clarity, and they're like, yeah, yes. No, yes. No, yes. No I know what I want now. No, it's easy. Do they need a college degree or do they not? But without all of that, that's dangerous. That's just doing things based on how other people feel about things. And what I'm saying is, if you were of my generation where our parents said, you must go to college, we don't care what you major in. And you're gonna take on the debt and we're all going whoa.

Timmy Eaton 35:06

That's the problem we find ourselves in now.

Shellee Howard 35:09

But that's not because of college. That's because we were not set up for success. So do you see, if you work this strategy, I'm talking about your child, regardless of what they're gonna do, is going to be set up for success. Now it's a choice. It's not college wasn't great for me, so I don't want you to. I went into debt. I don't want that for you. All four of my kids graduated debt free. In 18 years, I've gotten$80 million in scholarships for my families. There's more money than you ever could possibly need to tap into. The problem is people don't do what's necessary to get that done. So that goes into the next pillar.

Timmy Eaton 35:57

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 35:57

And that is if your career needs a college degree

Timmy Eaton 36:02

Yeah. Scholarships

Shellee Howard 36:03

now. Now you need scholarships.

Timmy Eaton 36:06

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 36:06

And you need at least three potential majors that will fit that career. Not every college has every major. So you may say, I want to go to New York University. And I asked why? I wanna live in the city of New York. It sounds really awesome,

Timmy Eaton 36:26

right?

Shellee Howard 36:26

I'm like, but why do you wanna go to NYU? I just told you. Oh, so you just wanna move out of your parents' house and live in New York? That's not telling me anything about why you wanted NY.

Timmy Eaton 36:38

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 36:38

Do you see the disconnect? Oh,

Timmy Eaton 36:40

yeah.

Shellee Howard 36:41

So now this is why we have to take them down this path because NYU doesn't have every major. So if they want to be major A and NYU doesn't offer it, now we have a really big problem because they've applied to NYU and they don't even have their major

Timmy Eaton 37:00

right now. Everything you're saying is what I talk about often begin with the end in mind and work your way back to the present, to the accomplishment of the end.

Shellee Howard 37:10

That's it. I call it reverse engineering.

Timmy Eaton 37:12

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 37:13

And like I said, I don't believe this is just for college. I believe this is truly

Timmy Eaton 37:18

for life. Any, anything. Yeah, that's right. Adult life and anything you're trying to achieve. Yeah.

Shellee Howard 37:22

And if it is for college, you do wanna be thinking college is a business. So if I went to you, Timmy, and I said, Timmy, I really wanna work for you. I heard you are the guy to work for. And you would say, can I see your resume or cv? And I say, Jimmy, I've been at the beach all summer and I've been busy hanging out with my friends, but I really wanna work for you. And you say, probably not a good fit, right? Now Child B says, Jimmy, I really wanna work for you. You say CV, please. And I say, I have four pages. I tried really hard to narrow it down, but I've done so many things. I could probably do your job. You can go on vacation. And you're like, yes, I will hire you and give you the most money I possibly can. That's all college is. It's that simple. And if they don't go to college, that's their first boss or their second or third boss. You can't go get a job, do nothing, and look for a promotion. It's just a business. Yeah. It's how life happens. So everybody's saying, I can't afford college. Really what it means is they don't wanna do anything. That's all they're telling me. And that's sad.

Timmy Eaton 38:36

And I imagine that so many are ignorant of, like you said, like the available money and how to do that, and then you might put together a scholarship application, but it might not be done effectively or in a way that appeals to whoever it is that vets those scholarships and determines who gets the money.

Shellee Howard 38:51

There's so many things. Even the fafsa, 92% of families complete it wrong. So they're wondering why I didn't get any money. I look at their FAFSA and I'm like, why did you put your house down? Because it said, do you own a home? Why did you put the value down here at the bottom line? It didn't say you had to add the value of your home to the bottom line. Of course you didn't get anything because you were bragging about how much you have, and the parents are like, oh yeah, I guess I should slow down and read it. But it's simple things like this. That is saving my family so much money. I have a financial team. I have an essay editing team. I have a college match team. We are all here. And then I have the nonprofit. We skipped over that where I have started a nonprofit myself and one of my students, and we have built two schools in Uganda, Africa, and we are educating over 900 little children now. I stepped back and I mentor teenagers to lead other teenagers to do the same thing. So I showed them the how now the other students are teaching the new students the how and for two years we've raised over$48,000 and it's all teenage run and it's an international nonprofit.

Timmy Eaton 40:15

Oh, that's awesome.

Shellee Howard 40:16

It's teaching them their passion, connection, collaboration is teaching them all the soft skills, not just for college, but for life. So the next step is, okay we have a pretty good idea about where we wanna go and what we wanna study. Now it's time to pick the best college list. And it comes down. Do you want the best academic fit, social fit, athletic fit, visual and performing. Arts fit. Financial fit. Let's get clear. Yes, I hear you. We want all of it, right? I'm on that bandwagon, but

Timmy Eaton 40:48

what's the top priority?

Shellee Howard 40:49

Think about when you were dating you met this wonderful person. Do they meet your top three? Okay, we'll keep dating.

Timmy Eaton 40:57

Yeah,

Shellee Howard 40:58

same thing.

Timmy Eaton 40:59

Carry on

Shellee Howard 40:59

for college. Same thing. What is a must have? What is a nice to have and what is okay? I can live with that. So then we come up with a college list, reach, comfort and safety. We wanna know how much money they'll get before they apply. If they are applying to a stingy school, I will tell them, do you wanna pay that amount? No, I don't. We can't afford it Then don't apply there. Huh? What a concept. Yeah. I don't have to tell my child, great, you got in and I can't afford it. If you start from the end and reverse engineer it, you know? exactly. Got clarity. Yeah. I can tell you the generous schools and the stingy schools way before you ever apply. Why? I've been doing it 18 years. I've seen it over and over, and it changes. But then I get to see how it adjusts and I can guide students to the right type of situation. So number six is really building that academic list properly, not by, I wanna live in Santa Barbara.

Timmy Eaton 42:06

Okay.

Shellee Howard 42:07

We need to get really clear about that. Finally, the essays, this is the final and most important summary. Think of it as you've wrapped this box, or you put all of this stuff in a box and now you need to wrap it and put a beautiful bow on it. And that's your essay. Because somebody will have a higher GPA and A lower GPA higher test score. Lower test score. Why should I pick you? It's a business. I need to hear your voice of why you would be a good candidate at my school, because the college is also thinking. If you've struggled to get Cs and you're applying to a school where every valedictorians applying to, they're worried that you're not gonna do well and that's not gonna help them or you. So do you see it? It's not that they don't like you, it's just it's not a good

Timmy Eaton 42:59

fit.

Shellee Howard 43:00

It's not a good fit. Yeah. And it goes back to the non-negotiables, right? Just like when you were dating, you wanna make sure that there is a good reason to make that match. And that's what we have to do. And the whole time we're weaving return on investment through it.

Timmy Eaton 43:17

So the thought that I've been having throughout this is and that framework is so helpful to understand like I imagine that, it's ideal for parents to be talking about this stuff from birth. Just so it's not like new when the kids are getting to that, but when do they really start to say. Hey, you should start thinking about this in a way that will lead them to a very matched kind of future for that individual.'Cause I imagine that if a parent is, consistently asking questions about like you said, those initial philosophical questions, who are you? And, test the water and what's important and what careers and lifestyles match what you're feeling now. Not that you can change it and adjust it in the future, but based on now, what are you feeling about this? When do you see as like a, or maybe the better question is when is it too late? And maybe the answer is never, but as far as when you have your kids at the nest, you know what's ideal.

Shellee Howard 44:09

So I'll give you different phases. The first thing is mindset. How many kids do you have, Timmy?

Timmy Eaton 44:15

Six.

Shellee Howard 44:16

Okay. Are they all identical?

Timmy Eaton 44:19

No.

Shellee Howard 44:20

Did they mature at different phases?

Timmy Eaton 44:22

And continue to.

Shellee Howard 44:24

So the first thing is, don't look at this as an

Timmy Eaton 44:28

one size fits all.

Shellee Howard 44:29

I'm telling you right now, all four of mine were so different and they matured differently and some of them could not absorb this until, later into the years where some of them were like, I got this.

Timmy Eaton 44:41

Your first child seems to have been on like, right on.

Shellee Howard 44:44

Totally. And he still is. He just came out that way. I, it's not because of what I did. He is just that kind of kid.

Timmy Eaton 44:49

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 44:50

So that's the first mindset I want families to be understanding. The second thing is they're watching your every move. If you spend all your time on your cell phone, guess what they're gonna do? If your cell phone is hidden inside of a book, it looks as though you're reading. Guess who wants to read? Just like mom and dad. Seeing how this rolls bath time. You're sitting there, you instead of being on your phone. Throw up a magazine, put the phone in the magazine, da. The kid sees that you're reading. That is mindset. Okay. Now, when they're in elementary school, teach them the love of reading. It does not matter what they read, captain Underpants or whatever you want'em to read. It just needs to be that. They need to understand intellectual curiosity. Yeah. And then the joy of learning. Have I talked anything about college yet? Yeah.

Timmy Eaton 45:47

No.

Shellee Howard 45:48

No, nothing. Now, here's where it gets real. In middle school, around seventh or eighth grade, it could be 12 or 13 years old, right around puberty, if you will. They're starting to ask questions. They're starting to say, wow that looks really fun being up on stage. Performing in front of people I think that'd be pretty cool. Can I take guitar lessons? You know what I mean? Like they're starting to point out like, uncle Jack is always stressed out. I don't wanna do his job. What does he do? Totally. And so they're articulating and questioning the world around them. This is the time they really need to be serving other people because they're not worried about embarrassing themself because they're in an awkward stage. If they don't help this person, nobody's gonna help them. So they can't be any worse off. And it's a very gentle way. And always have them do it with a friend or a family member. Don't push them into it because it will feel like another thing they have to do, and it's not gonna be well received. Just like homework chores. They're gonna be like, fine. We want them to be like, no, I really wanna go to the karate studio and I really wanna work with the kids on getting their green belt. And do, do you see the difference in energy? That's what they wanna be doing.

Timmy Eaton 47:12

And you were saying combine that with a, you said a family member or

Shellee Howard 47:15

it you have them do it with somebody else. In Other words, you don't wanna sign them up to go feed the homeless and say, I'll wait for you in the car.

Timmy Eaton 47:25

I see.

Shellee Howard 47:26

Do you see where the disconnect is? Why aren't you doing it? Are you scared of'em? Is that why? Yeah. So don't sign up to tutor, because everybody, tutors, I don't care who you are, there's always somebody who needs tutoring colleges or a boss is not gonna be like, whoa, you tutored, right? It's come on. It tells them nothing about them. If your child loves music, have'em teach younger children music.

Timmy Eaton 47:54

Yes.

Shellee Howard 47:54

Do you see where I'm going with this? Totally. Yeah. We're opening up their world. Still haven't talked about college yet.

Timmy Eaton 48:01

And your number is 200 hours

Shellee Howard 48:03

I think that is where the number takes them to joy. The first,

Timmy Eaton 48:08

that's cool.

Shellee Howard 48:09

20 is scared. I am doing something I'm uncomfortable doing. The next 20 is, wow, I'm good at this. I like this and I met this person over here who likes it and I wanna do it with them. And so can we do this? And now all of a sudden it changes from a idea to I want. And once it becomes their why, you get to step back and be. Awesome.

Timmy Eaton 48:39

I imagine that it's usually like a discovery for people. Are they pretty naive or ignorant to wow, I didn't realize you could just volunteer and serve is it ever hard to match people to an opportunity for service?

Shellee Howard 48:51

For parents? Yes. For me, no. Yeah. I've been doing this 18 years and

Timmy Eaton 48:57

so even if I'm here in southern Alberta, not that you know the locale, but you know enough about what's available. You'd be able to say, okay, here's my daughter, here's her interest. You'd give us some tips and you'd be able to direct us.

Shellee Howard 49:08

The big thing is we don't want them to sign up and show up. We want to create something that they are passionate about, that they are gonna help somebody change a situation. I'll give you an example. My daughter saw pictures of when I took my son to Kenya, Africa. I wanted to really know if he wanted to serve people, even if they couldn't pay him. And so I took him to the slums of authority and we absolutely took us to our knees and saw what need really looks like. And that was it. He knew for sure he wanted to be a doctor at that moment, but when we came home, my who's four years younger, said, that's a tragedy. And my son's I know it was so hard. And she's no, that little girl is wearing a dirty, old T-shirt and no shoes and no panties. That's a tragedy. That young person is never gonna have self-respect or she's not gonna know what it feels like to be in a pretty dress. A totally different person, right? Yeah. Yeah. And she's going on and on, and she's terrified for this little person. I said what are you gonna do about it? She goes I need to learn how to sew. I'm gonna make'em dresses great. There you have it. She ended up getting gently used pillow cases, turning them into pretty little dresses, sending them with doctors without borders and covered the globe.

Timmy Eaton 50:33

So cool.

Shellee Howard 50:34

Do you see what I'm saying? It doesn't matter where you live.

Timmy Eaton 50:37

Yeah. Necessity doesn't, none of ingenuity. Yeah.

Shellee Howard 50:39

I think differently. And so happens all the time. A parent's, like I told them to do Race for the Cure. I told them to, tutor. I told them to go to an old folks home. I told and the kid's I don't wanna do any of that. I

Timmy Eaton 50:53

don't wanna do that stuff. Yeah.

Shellee Howard 50:55

That means nothing to me. There's the problem. The parent might have connection to some of that, or they may just not know what else is out there. If you don't, If you don't start with the child's passion. You are not going anywhere.

Timmy Eaton 51:10

What about when people like, I have one daughter, for example, who just says, I just don't have interests like that. I like playing basketball and that's about it. And then you build on that as much as you can. I'm just saying I know that's not uncommon. I talk to families all the time. What do you do when people they're like, I'm too young. I haven't thought about that much. You have some kids that are like, I wanna be a firefighter at age six. And then it sticks with them, and then you have something, they're like, I have no clue what I'm passionate about. And I don't know if I actually totally believe that, but I think that is how they would express it. So what do you do with that?

Shellee Howard 51:39

I totally do believe it. I've dealt with teenagers long enough to tell you they don't know. They would tell you if they knew. Here's the problem. It's usually a child who's good at a lot of different things. And so they're like I'm good at this, so should I do that? And I'm good at English. Should I do that? Exactly. So if you're only good at math, you're 50% on your way. Yeah.

Timmy Eaton 52:02

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 52:03

But if you're good at all these things and people are telling you, oh my gosh, you're a great leader. Oh my gosh, you're so compassionate. Oh my gosh. Before you know it, they're like, I don't know. Here's how you help that child. The first thing you do is you ask them to write down all the things that they would do on a Saturday morning if they had no homework, no chores, nothing to do, all the money and all the free time they could ever want. Let'em sit in it. Let'em squirm in it. Don't help them. Okay. Yeah. Then mom do it. Dad do it. And then a sibling or best friend do it for that person.

Timmy Eaton 52:43

For them.

Shellee Howard 52:44

Yeah. You all get together. She reads her list. Okay. Wow. I learned some things about you. That's interesting. Mom reads her list. Is that true what your mom said? Yeah, that's, that is true. Dad read his, is that true what your dad said? Yeah, that's exactly true. Best friend. Wow. Yeah. That is me. So amazing. You are all of this and you agree that they're not lying. I think you're pretty amazing. Which of these directions are we gonna go? We work one to one with students so we can bring out the best in them and listen and guide them. We're encouraging while opening up opportunity for them to step into. Most people will say, what are you passionate about? And a teenager's gonna go, I don't know. And then I say, look at their newsfeed. I'll tell you everything they're passionate about, it's all over their social media. Or if they don't have social media, look in their closet, it'll show you they like this color, they like this type of thing, they like this bike, it's helping them see the world through the eyes of them. And they've never been taught how to do that. I know adults who don't know how to do that.

Timmy Eaton 54:06

This has been such a great conversation and so helpful and I know my audience is gonna love these resources, and so I just encourage people to go there and to look more into what you have college ready plan.com. You said two books. What are your two books?

Shellee Howard 54:18

So the first book is How to Send Your Student to College Without Losing Your Mind or Your Money. That is on Amazon right now for$4 and 99 cents for your listeners. And then the other one is called the College Admissions Plan Simplified. And that is the structure, the framework. I pour the cement, we put up the sticks, like it is truly a framework, step by step book. On Amazon,$4 and 99 cents for your listeners. So that's my gift. And then if you're like, you know what, Shelly, my kid just doesn't wanna listen to me no matter what I tell them, guess what? I had one of those. I understand what you're saying. Yeah. I had to pay one of my consultants to tell my kid exactly what I would've told her because she didn't think I knew anything. So I hear you parents. We have programs starting at$27. Going up from there. So I don't want people to not be curious about getting help thinking, oh, we just can't afford that. And truly, if you can't afford$27, I will gift you that. Like that is how strongly I feel. So if you go to college Ready plan.info, you can sign up for 30 minutes where we can talk about how close is your child to becoming adult ready. And if college is part of it, what does that look like?

Timmy Eaton 55:41

And that's a conversation with the parent or with the student.

Shellee Howard 55:44

It's the family. It's a family conversation because we need everybody to hear the same thing so everybody is on the same road. Because if one person's over here thinking you are going to college, the other one's going, I think it's a waste. And the kid's going, I don't know what y'all want me to do.

Timmy Eaton 56:02

Yeah.

Shellee Howard 56:03

It's a tragedy. But when I'm able to share. This is all of the things you need to know to adult. You're playing the same board game at that point.

Timmy Eaton 56:13

The last thing I wanted to ask you, and then I'll give you the final word. You have worked with so many students, you've been doing this for years. You've got extensive experience with your own children. And especially as somebody who's has an entrepreneurial spirit, is the traditional conventional system preparing kids in this way? How well are we doing to get kids ready? Obviously you exist because there was a gap. And especially as an entrepreneur. Are we helping our youth to really be prepared for that future that matches them?

Shellee Howard 56:39

So again, I have to go back to every child is different. And I will tell you with my four, we went from public to private, to homeschool, to public, to private. I didn't have it all figured out. Yeah. So I'm not gonna pretend like there is one way. What I will tell you is that without a parent in the, of those situations, the child is left defenseless. They are not ready for this adulting thing at all. And so there's pros and cons to homeschool, public school, boarding school, private school. There's pros and cons to all of them. But what does it matter? It matters that your family is doing it the way you want to raise your children. Does it matter the rest? No, it doesn't. Some parents like myself, could never homeschool. I knew it. There was nothing that told me otherwise because I didn't have the patience to do what my wonderful teachers. Had done for my children. And so I would've been a disservice to them. And so I have to be honest about that. I have no shame. And then there's other parents who are homeschooling and they're questioning, am I doing the right thing? Am I setting my child up for success? Again, I'm gonna say, how are you supplementing the homeschool? Are you collaborating? Are you doing things also in other environments? Playing sports, doing music? Like it's not just math, history, science, english, it's all of the stuff.

Timmy Eaton 58:26

Yeah. It's lifestyle

Shellee Howard 58:26

and most of it's lifestyle and it's intellectual curiosity. My first born who got into Harvard was the first student in 25 years at a public high school to go Ivy. So again, I ask you, is one better than another? Or is it that he had a really insane mom? That was like, Hey, I know I can't homeschool, so I'm gonna supplement what you all are providing to make sure that my kids are on par. Awesome. And I think it could go either way. I don't believe one is better than another. I believe both have areas of opportunity that we need to supplement.

Timmy Eaton 59:08

Thank you so much. I appreciate you taking time today and spending time. I'll give you the last word then we'll wrap up.

Shellee Howard 59:14

Most importantly, parents, if you did go to college in my generation, I wanna erase all of your memory. I really do. It is nothing like it was you now have to pick a major. It's not undeclared, undecided, figure it out later. You have to realize the cost has changed significantly. It used to be 3000 a semester and now it's out of control. And so you want to be planning, not putting your head in the sand, not putting your hands over your ears, leaning into it. Having an academic plan, a social plan, and a financial plan. Doesn't matter what path you take with a plan, they're gonna be successful.

Timmy Eaton 1:00:02

Excellent. Wow. So well said. Thank you so much you guys. This is Shelly Howard from California. Thank you for taking time.

Shellee Howard 1:00:10

It's been my pleasure. Thank you so much Timmy.

Timmy Eaton 1:00:14

Well, that wraps up another edition of this Golden Hour podcast. Thanks for hanging out for the entire episode. Make sure you check out our website@thisgoldenhour.org where you can find our podcast archives and you can register for the free web class I do to help homeschool dads every Thursday at 6:00 PM Mountain Standard Time, and you homeschool dads can also sign up for the Proactive Homeschool Dad or PhD course on the website. If you haven't done so already, please take a minute and give us a review. An Apple podcasts or Spotify. It helps a lot. And if you've done that already, thank you very much. Please consider sharing this show with friends and family members that you think would get something out of it. And thank you for your support. I'm your host, Tim Eaton. Until next time, remember to cherish this golden hour with your children and family.