College counselors?

[Anonymous]

How did you find a college counselor/adviser? Any recommendations on a specific person or a process to find someone that is good for us?

My oldest is in 9th grade in public school in Maryland.

[Anonymous]

Start asking friends and family who have seniors or students who are in the first years of college. (My opinion, 9th grade is early. But, we talked to counselors when DC was a junior and some said it was "late". Depends on your goal.)

I found someone through an old boss. Then I just started asking friends, acquaintances, coworkers, etc. Did they use a counselor (not everyone did). If they did, did they like the counselor and if so could I have the contact info.

Then I called a few, explained why we were considering a counselor (DCPS, so not much counseling help and no state school) and asked how it worked, what it cost, what you got for that, etc.

The main thing you may want to know is the philosophy. Is the counselor there for the Ivy or die types? Good for the person who needs the best school for the cheapest price? Just want the best fit for your DC or your DC knows exactly what they want and you are hoping to broaden the pool, etc.

Now, I have friends calling me and asking who we used. I have passed on names of the counselor we used and some we talked to but didn't use depending on the family.

[Anonymous]

There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

I agree. But also feel that, unless you have piles of money, wait until start of 11th grade. You also don't really need one. It's mostly a scam industry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

I agree. But also feel that, unless you have piles of money, wait until start of 11th grade. You also don't really need one. It's mostly a scam industry.

I think it definitely can be a scam, especially for hapless parents who don't know what they're doing, or don't care and want to throw money at it.

We found a few hour long sessions with a counselor - one on one with us and then with our kid, were quite helpful, in terms of answering our questions and steering us in the right direction on a couple of issues. Beyond that there was a lot of noise about things that would interest a Harvard focused family, which we're not, so we drew it to a close.

[Anonymous]

I found ours through

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/search/filters.page

There was no need to create a new thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

I agree. But also feel that, unless you have piles of money, wait until start of 11th grade. You also don't really need one. It's mostly a scam industry.

+100

Current Senior. We never used one. He had one tutor for a few weeks of test prep summer after sophomore year and that's been it.

He had a teacher review his common app essay and another friend of ours that is an editor took a look.

We have a Princeton review college guide and, frankly, we certainly didn't need help drafting a 'safety/target/reach' list. SCOIR at our HS and controlling for past 2 years has been very helpful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

I agree. But also feel that, unless you have piles of money, wait until start of 11th grade. You also don't really need one. It's mostly a scam industry.

+100

Current Senior. We never used one. He had one tutor for a few weeks of test prep summer after sophomore year and that's been it.

He had a teacher review his common app essay and another friend of ours that is an editor took a look.

We have a Princeton review college guide and, frankly, we certainly didn't need help drafting a 'safety/target/reach' list. SCOIR at our HS and controlling for past 2 years has been very helpful.

^ we also didn't want to make a 'fake kid' for college admissions. lol. My kids both are devoted to a sport and have a few other outside interests. We made them join a club of their choosing freshmen year, get a job at least one summer and they have A LOT (a lot) OF community service requirements each year for their school. I didn't need to 'package' them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of preexisting threads on this topic.

I agree. But also feel that, unless you have piles of money, wait until start of 11th grade. You also don't really need one. It's mostly a scam industry.

+100

Current Senior. We never used one. He had one tutor for a few weeks of test prep summer after sophomore year and that's been it.

He had a teacher review his common app essay and another friend of ours that is an editor took a look.

We have a Princeton review college guide and, frankly, we certainly didn't need help drafting a 'safety/target/reach' list. SCOIR at our HS and controlling for past 2 years has been very helpful.

^ we also didn't want to make a 'fake kid' for college admissions. lol. My kids both are devoted to a sport and have a few other outside interests. We made them join a club of their choosing freshmen year, get a job at least one summer and they have A LOT (a lot) OF community service requirements each year for their school. I didn't need to 'package' them.

Did they apply to Ivy League colleges? I think that those really are the ones that require the most "packaging"