Hiring a college consultant

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are there any good ones that do hourly without a minimum? I’m pretty informed but have a few questions I’d like to run by someone who preferably worked in admissions before.

We used Richard Montauk. He was by the hour. RichardMontauk.com.

DP. When did you begin to engage him? Can you outline what he did? Also, if you don't mind sharing, how much did he charge per hour and how many hours did you need from start to finish?

To be honest, we should have started earlier in the process but we, unfortunately, trusted our private high school counselor who didn't know what she was doing. Having read many posts here , on College Confidential, and Reddit, I now know all the mistakes we made but that's water under the bridge. I think you will find if you call around for a counselor that most in the DMV area want to start early with you and have you pay a package rate. The lowest I've heard (from someone really good) was $6K and some ask $20K. In NYC it's $25K and up and they start coaching your kid to start thinking about what kind of school they want (and question the parents about what they can afford) sophomore year. It does reduce stress. I found Richard Montauk (I think he lives in Connecticut - not sure - we never met face to face and I turned it all over to DD once we engaged him) because he has written so many books in the field (go to amazon and see). He charged us $300 an hour, which I thought was reasonable. Most of Montauk's time spent with our DD was honing her essay. I never read the first version nor the last. but by the time DD was finished, she thought she had done a good job. He also coached her for interviews and guided her through some scholarship essays. I think we used up 10 hours so $3,000. However, his website says most relationships with his counselees last 18 months and wind up more like $4,000. Ours was a rushed job because we started searching for a counselor too late.

I think his value was not just in maximizing his element of the application (essays, resume, recommendations, interviews - on which he wrote the definitive book), nor in making sure all those aspects were fully integrated, but in approaching the whole effort strategically. In other words, I think (and I checked with DD before writing this and she agrees) to make a client's candidacy compelling - making the most of the client's credentials and helping to burnish them, craft a story, and tweak it to fit different programs. He also had a firm grasp of which programs would be the best fit for a client's interest and needs. In our DD's case it was Politics, Philosophy, and Law at Oxford. And she got in! (the interviews are brutal by the way).

If she decides to apply to law school, we will hire him again. he wrote "How Get Into Law School" a few years back. Good luck

[Anonymous]

You might try starting with the college book, "Rugg's Recommendations, "35th Edition. 140 College Majors are ranked. Since 1980. www.ruggsrecs.com

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are there any good ones that do hourly without a minimum? I’m pretty informed but have a few questions I’d like to run by someone who preferably worked in admissions before.

We used Richard Montauk. He was by the hour. RichardMontauk.com.

Thank you, Richard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are there any good ones that do hourly without a minimum? I’m pretty informed but have a few questions I’d like to run by someone who preferably worked in admissions before.

We used Richard Montauk. He was by the hour. RichardMontauk.com.

DP. When did you begin to engage him? Can you outline what he did? Also, if you don't mind sharing, how much did he charge per hour and how many hours did you need from start to finish?

To be honest, we should have started earlier in the process but we, unfortunately, trusted our private high school counselor who didn't know what she was doing. Having read many posts here , on College Confidential, and Reddit, I now know all the mistakes we made but that's water under the bridge. I think you will find if you call around for a counselor that most in the DMV area want to start early with you and have you pay a package rate. The lowest I've heard (from someone really good) was $6K and some ask $20K. In NYC it's $25K and up and they start coaching your kid to start thinking about what kind of school they want (and question the parents about what they can afford) sophomore year. It does reduce stress. I found Richard Montauk (I think he lives in Connecticut - not sure - we never met face to face and I turned it all over to DD once we engaged him) because he has written so many books in the field (go to amazon and see). He charged us $300 an hour, which I thought was reasonable. Most of Montauk's time spent with our DD was honing her essay. I never read the first version nor the last. but by the time DD was finished, she thought she had done a good job. He also coached her for interviews and guided her through some scholarship essays. I think we used up 10 hours so $3,000. However, his website says most relationships with his counselees last 18 months and wind up more like $4,000. Ours was a rushed job because we started searching for a counselor too late.

I think his value was not just in maximizing his element of the application (essays, resume, recommendations, interviews - on which he wrote the definitive book), nor in making sure all those aspects were fully integrated, but in approaching the whole effort strategically. In other words, I think (and I checked with DD before writing this and she agrees) to make a client's candidacy compelling - making the most of the client's credentials and helping to burnish them, craft a story, and tweak it to fit different programs. He also had a firm grasp of which programs would be the best fit for a client's interest and needs. In our DD's case it was Politics, Philosophy, and Law at Oxford. And she got in! (the interviews are brutal by the way).

If she decides to apply to law school, we will hire him again. he wrote "How Get Into Law School" a few years back. Good luck

Thank you, Mrs. Montauk.

[Anonymous]

Cmon DCUMers, seriously? You all think any part of private college counselor is worth it? Do your own damn research. It’s not that hard. I thought all the parents on here were smart and went to T20 universities.

[Anonymous]

Ask your friends with older kids, put the question out on your school list serv, and NextDoor. The people that do the advising will come to you.

Ours was $125 an hour, more time with the 1st kid than the 2nd. Totally worth it, as we didn't have to nag about applications or essays or anything.

If someone promises you entrance to a certain school, or field of schools (eg, top 10), run the other way, as they are full of sh*t

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s not worth it. Found it to be a waste of time and money.

+1 College Bound of Potomac. Waste of time and money. Find someone to help with the essays though

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s not worth it. Found it to be a waste of time and money.

+1 College Bound of Potomac. Waste of time and money. Find someone to help with the essays though[/quote


Look into the counselor's credentials and pay close attention to the writing on their website. Some of these "expert" consultants have a poorer grasp of grammar and writing style than your high schooler.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are so happy we did not hire a consultant. You can do it all yourself, you don’t need to pay someone 6k to get your kid in college. You do, however, need to be realistic about your kid’s qualifications.

6k? It's normally a lot more than that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cmon DCUMers, seriously? You all think any part of private college counselor is worth it? Do your own damn research. It’s not that hard. I thought all the parents on here were smart and went to T20 universities.

I do think they can have conversations with kids that get listened to about the school lists. I also think they can find some schools that will just never pop up. For elite schools I think they can help shape the application and do a better gap analysis than any parent could. I also think it is worth it to have the application and essays out of the parent kid dynamic. Is that worth it? It may depend on how much money you have. 10k to a biglaw partner is not 10k to two GS-14s. Is it absolutely needed -- no. Is it helpful --- yes.

And yes parents did go to T20 schools -- that is why they know that their own knowledge and advice is inferior to someone who does this all day and year in and year out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cmon DCUMers, seriously? You all think any part of private college counselor is worth it? Do your own damn research. It’s not that hard. I thought all the parents on here were smart and went to T20 universities.

I do think they can have conversations with kids that get listened to about the school lists. I also think they can find some schools that will just never pop up. For elite schools I think they can help shape the application and do a better gap analysis than any parent could. I also think it is worth it to have the application and essays out of the parent kid dynamic. Is that worth it? It may depend on how much money you have. 10k to a biglaw partner is not 10k to two GS-14s. Is it absolutely needed -- no. Is it helpful --- yes.

And yes parents did go to T20 schools -- that is why they know that their own knowledge and advice is inferior to someone who does this all day and year in and year out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s not worth it. Found it to be a waste of time and money.

+1 College Bound of Potomac. Waste of time and money. Find someone to help with the essays though

Don’t rely on accreditations, experience, or lists of “successes” on website. We spent $$ on highly credentialed consultant who was clueless and increased anxiety without producing results.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on your goal. If its to find merit aid to reduce costs, it could pay off because the consultant might direct your child to schools he/she would not otherwise consider that offer good merit aid. If its to reduce parent-child stressors by having someone else make sure child is completing essays, etc. in a timely manner, also beneficial. If its to get a leg up in admission to a competitive college, I see no benefit to hiring a college consultant whatsoever.

--signed parent of a hs senior

So if you aren’t seeking out specific scholarships that you may not be aware of, you are basically hiring another adult to nag for kid for you?

NP: It's far more than that, but yes it is so nice not to be the one person constantly nagging your procrastinator kid to get stuff done from Aug to Nov of their senior year. In reality, a CC is great. They help you put together a great list of Reach, target, safety/likelies that meet your kid's requirements (major, location, size, etc). They will put colleges on the list you never thought of, even if you are an involved parent (I had gotten two other kids successfully into good colleges, both got into 10/10 they applied for, but for my higher stats kid used a CC for many reasons). For us, the best parts was the help defining the list, help with essay brainstorming and managing the process so I did not have to constantly nag)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are so happy we did not hire a consultant. You can do it all yourself, you don’t need to pay someone 6k to get your kid in college. You do, however, need to be realistic about your kid’s qualifications.

I used to think that. Did it for my oldest 2 kids just fine.

For my last kid with higher stats (1500/3.99UW/10 APs) I hired a CC. My kid's final 3 choices (2 targets and 1 gem of a safety) included 2 schools I had never thought of or really heard of. My kid was largely applying to schools 2-3K away from where we live and wanted 5-8K size. So the CC was key to finding a great list. Sure, I might have found these schools with research, but maybe not. So for us, the best part of the CC was finding the right list of schools and that includes the gem of a safety school---so much of a gem my kid kept it in the final 3 list and we revisited in April of Senior year before deciding. I can assure you that school would probably not have been on my final list no matter how much research I had done.
Yet it was on the CC initial list with a star mentioning this would likely be my kid's top safety and the CC was right, it is an amazing gem of a school that my kid would have loved to attend, and we got merit as well.

Merit is another thing CC can really help with. We were not chasing merit, but if we had been they are well versed in what schools actually give excellent merit and how to get it (do interviews, etc.) They also help you know how to best show interest. The school my kid is actually attending highly ranks interviews---sure you can figure that out if you read CDS and College Confidential, etc. but it takes work. Our CC told us the day you visit this school (summer before senior year), if you at all think you are applying here, you need to schedule the interview/requiest it immediately---as they really want all serious applicants to do the interview. It's the little things like that that are key to getting accepted that the counselor already knows. Saved me and my kid hours of research. Worth the $4K we paid for it---and that is $4K for all 4 years of HS, so while we only used it for 1 year, we still got 35+ hours of work from our CC so well worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on your goal. If its to find merit aid to reduce costs, it could pay off because the consultant might direct your child to schools he/she would not otherwise consider that offer good merit aid. If its to reduce parent-child stressors by having someone else make sure child is completing essays, etc. in a timely manner, also beneficial. If its to get a leg up in admission to a competitive college, I see no benefit to hiring a college consultant whatsoever.

--signed parent of a hs senior

Bolded part above - priceless.

--signed another parent of a hs senior

+1000 Best part really (ok, not really---the generating the right balance of schools is but this is a close 2nd)