As the school year ends, Admissions Beat host Lee Coffin holds his final “office hours” with listeners for this podcast season. For graduating seniors, he advises them to “finish strong” and check their inboxes as pre-matriculation communications arrive from their chosen college. For parents preparing to say goodbye as seniors head to college in the fall, he offers practical and philosophical advice on letting go—and in taking comfort in the logistics of the transition to college. And for rising seniors, summertime is the season to sketch out the stories they want to tell in their applications and to keep exploring. Jacques Steinberg, former New York Times journalist and co-author of The College Conversation, joins Dean Coffin for the season finale.

What if math was a fundamental skill you could develop, rather than something you were simply good or bad at? Engineering programs are designed to blend theory with practice—analysis with practical problem solving. But engineering also spans organically across disciplines into the humanities and social sciences. This week on AB, host Lee Coffin dives into the undergraduate realm of engineering programs with Stu Schmill, Dean of Admissions and Student Financial Services at MIT. They discuss how to begin preparing for those experiences in high school and where a student’s untapped engineering potential might take them.

What advice do this year’s high school seniors and their parents have for those who will follow in future college application cycles? AB host Lee Coffin and Jacques Steinberg, co-author of “The College Conversation,” recently put that question to an audience gathered on the Dartmouth campus for admitted students’ programming. We also asked them what they learned, what they wished they had done differently, what boundaries they established for their respective roles as applicant and advisor, and how they managed the stress of it all. Tune in this week to hear what they told us, in their own words.