Is hiring a consultant a must?

[Anonymous]

Basically what posters are saying is that even if you hire a consultant, you as the parent still need to be involved.

So is it worthwhile for you to pay a large sum for someone to work with your family, even though you still need to do your own research and not rely on the consultant?

For many people, it's not worth it. I would say that if you have money to throw out of the window, and your kid is a contrary sort that prefers to hear advice from anyone but you... then it makes sense to hire someone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No of course not, but if you are already asking this question, you are probably going to do it anyway. Or balance the fact that you didn't hire a consultant for any substandard outcome.

OP- No, I would much rather not. I just worry that maybe I am doing ds a disservice because maybe they know "special" ways of phrasing things on the common app, know how to handle all the minute details. We filled most of it out but what if we did some of it wrong?

Use the the AI tools that show you former applications that were admitted. It democratizes the entire process.
For a few hundred dollars over the next 4 months.

Join ApplicationNation25.

Her zoom videos will show you how to fill out the common app and how to phrase certain things in the activities section and honor section. She’ll also edit essays if you need her to, for a large fee.

I found a good Essay editor on Wyzant.

For the $99/mo, Can I ask small questions like "Is this activity useful/well-phrased?"

Yes. I find it helpful and I’ve been through the process before.
Here’s a quick example (note I am not affiliated with it at all, but do find it to be relatively helpful and inexpensive for what it is. It’s also a great way to see the quality, depth and breath of other applicants to - sometimes - the same schools that your kid is applying to. There are some amazing kids out there btw.):

Someone just asked this question below with a picture of the activity entry in the common app:

“Student worked as a researcher in a lab this summer. It was not a “pay to play” program. Does including ”fully funded” in parenthesis look okay? Or is there a better way?

Any thoughts on description itself?
Thank you”

(Picture)

Response from senior member of AN team (not Sara, but another former admissions officer):
The parenthesis work and it's very clear. I'd change the verb "studied" (implies passive) to "analyzed" (little more action implied).

Maybe the fee was worth it to you for the reassurance, but in my opinion, that advice is not something that would move the needle for admission decisions.

[Anonymous]

No it's not a must.

however, if you can afford it, it can be very helpful. I'm talking about a College consultant who is $4-5K for ALL 4 years of HS. The perks are they help with keeping your kid on schedule, so you don't have to nag, nag nag. They also help create a better list of colleges than you can. I'm good at that, but our CC helped find our kid's top Safety and I most likely never would have found it. It was so good that my kid kept that safety in their final top 3 until mid April (and visited again in April). This is their job, they will help you find gems that are not always discussed. With great targets and safeties, you will be happier if your kids doesn't get into their Reaches.

Then they assist with developing essays. ours did NOT do the work for our kid, but helped them brainstorm and with editing. They make sure you dont' do a topic that is not good---they help your kid's true colors shine thru and make them unique.

IMO if you look at it, it's $1K per year of HS. If you are paying $60K+ for college per year, it's worthwhile.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I paid one $7000 and all he told me was Bucknell had an awesome pipeline to some street, Northeastern was the next Harvard, & SUNYs were awesome. Don’t know where the heck he was getting his information.

It's important to research the College consultant and find a good one. And you can do that for under $5K

[Anonymous]

No. Have your kid talk to upperclassmen friends. Read online. Read a book or two if you want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I paid one $7000 and all he told me was Bucknell had an awesome pipeline to some street, Northeastern was the next Harvard, & SUNYs were awesome. Don’t know where the heck he was getting his information.

If he also told you New England elite schools were out, all the kids were now applying where weather is warm and the students are TikTok hot, SLACs were dead, and UVA was equivalent to an Ivy, then it was definitely DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We hired and then fired a consultant once we figured out that we were getting better advice from the school (public). It was work to assist DC, to be sure. But I’m not sure how much of that really could have been outsourced. We know DC much better than any counselor, so our advice on schools to look at was more focused on DC’s personality and needs. We could suggest more specific anecdotes for the essays because we know our kid better. And when it comes to submissions, I don’t think most counselors are going to be available at 11pm when your kid is making a last minute change to an application and needs someone to check for typos before the midnight deadline.

Now that our student is a senior. Our counselor is available on evenings and weekends and response very quickly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No it's not a must.

however, if you can afford it, it can be very helpful. I'm talking about a College consultant who is $4-5K for ALL 4 years of HS. The perks are they help with keeping your kid on schedule, so you don't have to nag, nag nag. They also help create a better list of colleges than you can. I'm good at that, but our CC helped find our kid's top Safety and I most likely never would have found it. It was so good that my kid kept that safety in their final top 3 until mid April (and visited again in April). This is their job, they will help you find gems that are not always discussed. With great targets and safeties, you will be happier if your kids doesn't get into their Reaches.

Then they assist with developing essays. ours did NOT do the work for our kid, but helped them brainstorm and with editing. They make sure you dont' do a topic that is not good---they help your kid's true colors shine thru and make them unique.

IMO if you look at it, it's $1K per year of HS. If you are paying $60K+ for college per year, it's worthwhile.

Yikes. No wonder kids are balls of stress and anxiety!! All four years!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not at all.

The big, public, competitive schools are very useful because you have a strong cohort of students who know how to roll. You don't need to pay a consultant to tell you what Ryan from Multivariable is already telling you. And he knows things because his sister Sarah goes to Brown.

A consultant is not going to be better than that.

I disagree with this heavily. The top students often put together terrible college applications. The fact his sister goes to Brown means nothing. Students don't know why they got into certain colleges.

[Anonymous]

So, I hired a consultant for my kid from a very reputable firm. It can be very, very expensive. However, if you want to maximize your chances, then yes it is worth it.

Make sure you ask for disaggregated acceptance rate by school. In many cases they'll say "95% were admitted to one of their top 3 choices" but they won't tell you they select the top 3 for your kid.

In the end, they helped mold my children to exceptional and interesting applicants. Both of my kids got into T10 schools.

[Anonymous]

Data from Spark Admissions shows they have a 50% admit rate to Stanford and 48% admit rate to Harvard.

So, it looks like it is worth it if you want to take your kids chances at a T5 from minuscule to a coin-flip.

https://www.algemeiner.com/2024/07/16/want-to-talk-to-your-friends-about-jew-hatred-read-this-book/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We hired and then fired a consultant once we figured out that we were getting better advice from the school (public). It was work to assist DC, to be sure. But I’m not sure how much of that really could have been outsourced. We know DC much better than any counselor, so our advice on schools to look at was more focused on DC’s personality and needs. We could suggest more specific anecdotes for the essays because we know our kid better. And when it comes to submissions, I don’t think most counselors are going to be available at 11pm when your kid is making a last minute change to an application and needs someone to check for typos before the midnight deadline.

Now that our student is a senior. Our counselor is available on evenings and weekends and response very quickly.

+1

Also, a good counselor will have your kid on schedule where everything is ready 1 week before "due date". So there is no "last minute" issues. Ours went on xmas break around Dec 22 (depends upon the year). They were not available until Jan 2. But it's not an issue as majority were submitted by Nov 1 (or Nov 15--whatever the EA/ED deadlines were). The only ones left were 2-3 schools without any EA. My kid waited to finish the extra essays for those during Nov/Dec and had them edited by Dec 22. They waited because they didn't want to finalize the essays if they got in ED. But they had the essays 90% done by Dec 15 and tweeked them afterwards.

But yes a good counselor will respond to requests within 12 hours, but will also have you on a schedule so there are no major responses really needed in the final hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No it's not a must.

however, if you can afford it, it can be very helpful. I'm talking about a College consultant who is $4-5K for ALL 4 years of HS. The perks are they help with keeping your kid on schedule, so you don't have to nag, nag nag. They also help create a better list of colleges than you can. I'm good at that, but our CC helped find our kid's top Safety and I most likely never would have found it. It was so good that my kid kept that safety in their final top 3 until mid April (and visited again in April). This is their job, they will help you find gems that are not always discussed. With great targets and safeties, you will be happier if your kids doesn't get into their Reaches.

Then they assist with developing essays. ours did NOT do the work for our kid, but helped them brainstorm and with editing. They make sure you dont' do a topic that is not good---they help your kid's true colors shine thru and make them unique.

IMO if you look at it, it's $1K per year of HS. If you are paying $60K+ for college per year, it's worthwhile.

Yikes. No wonder kids are balls of stress and anxiety!! All four years!

We did not use it all 4 years, as did not need it. Started Jan of junior year, during covid, when my kid asked for SAT tutoring and it went from there. I was able to do the 9-11th help---it's more about what courses to take, making sure you have some ECs, etc. Not that difficult to do. But for parents not familiar with the US college system, some may not realize that yes, you do need 3 years of FL for many T100 colleges (or it's recommended and looks better than just 2) and that if you are striving for T25 schools, 4 years of FL looks even better.
So we didn't use it to stress out our kid---they were on track for 8-10 APs already.

I know that if a kid is in band from 5th grade onward, it looks good to keep it up thru HS, not to drop it after 10th grade. Colleges want to see dedication to your EC/activities, not just randomly picking something new each year. But some parents dont' know that.

The CC will also help you learn that yes volunteering during HS is a good thing, even better if it relates to something your kid is focused on otherwise---IE so that it appears your kid actually wanted to do the volunteering. Our kids already volunteered with us since they were in ES when we did it as a family, but not everyone knows that

[Anonymous]

Would there be any folks able to share which consultants were really worth the investment? Particularly if they were helpful in really narrowing down to reasonable choices and/or helping to optimize reach applications?

I believe I had seen some recommendations on earlier threads but now can't seem to find them.

Thanks for any info!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So, I hired a consultant for my kid from a very reputable firm. It can be very, very expensive. However, if you want to maximize your chances, then yes it is worth it.

Make sure you ask for disaggregated acceptance rate by school. In many cases they'll say "95% were admitted to one of their top 3 choices" but they won't tell you they select the top 3 for your kid.

In the end, they helped mold my children to exceptional and interesting applicants. Both of my kids got into T10 schools.

can you share the name?