How To Try Out A College Before You Enroll

A college student heads to class.
This piece was coauthored with Bob Moesta, the founder of the ReWired Group and co-creator of the Jobs to Be Done theory. Bob is also the coauthor with me of the books "Job Moves" and “Choosing College.”
We are often told that it’s impossible to learn about what it’ll be like to be enrolled in college because it’s “an experienced good”— a product or service where its characteristics are difficult to observe in advance and can only be understood during consumption.
Many have told us the same is true, however, about taking a new job. That you can only learn what it’s like after you take it.
Yet the research in our recent book “Job Moves”—and the actual work we’ve done coaching hundreds of job switchers—shows that’s not necessarily true. We can “learn before switching” what a new job will be like—and more specifically how it lines up with our priorities, the things that give us energy and our assets.
Those findings have led me to believe that we can do the same about college—help people figure out how a given college or major will and won’t fit them before they enroll. But it requires a different approach than most prospective students take currently.
The key is in learning how to prototype your college experience. And to do that, you need to stop thinking about what you’ll be—a student at “insert-name” college or an “insert-name” major—and instead focus on what you’ll do day-to-day.