'iCarly' Star Miranda Cosgrove: What's Next for the Actress

iCarly ends its seven-season run on Nickelodeon with an hourlong series finale Sunday night.

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The show stars Miranda Cosgrove as Carly Shay, who stars in and produces webcasts with her two best friends (Jennette McCurdy and Nathan Kress) while living with her twentysomething brother (Jerry Trainor).

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Cosgrove, 19, has grown up in front of the cameras; she got her big break opposite Jack Black in 2003's The School of Rock, where she played the precocious Summer Hathaway, and she's starred on iCarly since it debuted in 2007. She's also known for her role as Megan Parker on Nickelodeon's Drake & Josh and has guest-starred on CBS' The Good Wife.

Now that her series is coming to an end, what's next for the actress? For starters, she's attending college.

"I have an essay due. I'll be doing homework during Thanksgiving break," the University of Southern California freshman told USA Today.

After being tutored on set since sixth grade, this marks Cosgove's first time in a regular school in years. (She also moved out of her Los Angeles-based parents' house three weeks ago.) At USC, she's majoring in film with the goal to someday act in a project she's also written.

"I definitely want to act; that's why I want to major in film," she says. "The most important thing is to find a good story. It's hard when you're coming from a TV show. I'm hoping to find something that's right. It's hard when you're trying to do something different but not lose the people who know you. I wouldn't want to rush and do something that wasn't right. I'm just focusing on school."

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Meanwhile, she also will be back on the big screen -- at least her voice will -- in next year's Despicable Me 2, reprising her role of Margo for the animated sequel.

And while she's enjoyed her seven seasons on iCarly, she says it was the right time for the show to end.

"I grew up making the show," she said. "I spent my whole childhood there. We knew it would be sad no matter when we stopped doing it. We would have done it forever, but we wanted to go out and not do too many episodes. It ended at a good time."

The iCarly series finale airs at 8 p.m. Sunday on Nickelodeon.