Spending time with a college counselor allows the counselor an opportunity to get to know the student's interests, goals, details of their ideal college, financial aid needs, etc. The college counselor can not only offer the student suggestions about steps to take to enhance their application as well as specific schools to consider, but can also recommend web sites that can be useful for the student. There are many web pages that offer information to students, but not all of them will be relevant to a student or contain accurate information. The college counselor can help by guiding students in where to look. Here is one article that has some great web sites that students and families would likely find helpful. In May, 2015, US News and World Report Education published an on-line article reviewing a variety of helpful web pages for students and their families.
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/slideshows/plug-into-technology-to-find-the-best-college-match/1
This website highlights web pages such as College Score Card, through the US Dept.of Education
https://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/education/higher-education/college-score-card
The site allows a student to plug in different variables like location of school, area of study, etc. I did a search for schools in California in a suburban setting that have a Civil Engineering focus. I was able to get a list of schools that match this criteria.
Another interesting web page highlighted in the article was for YouVisit http://www.youvisit.com/colleges
This web page has access to a virtual tour at many schools.
These web pages are just a sampling of what is available to students in their college admission search. There is so much information that can be potentially useful, that spending time determining the best searches for students based on their unique needs will be time well spent.