most private college counselors have different "packages" that vary in intensity...depending on what you want, you can get more or less. For some people, their student/families will need more hand holding from the start, including but not limited to figuring out their college list and how to navigate the whole application process. For others, they just want help with keeping their kid on top of things during the actual essay writing. It really depends on what you want out of the process.

I will say that some counselors don't take on additional kids for just senior year because they are too busy by that point so you need one of the more "intensive" packages if you want to work with them.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Waste of money. Never hired one.

Same.

How do you know it is a waste of money if you didn't hire one?

Because my kids got into Yale, Brown, Columbia and UPenn.

Anonymous wrote:Interviewed the counselor. Had DC meet (all remote) the counselor. This was required by the counselor who will not take students who aren't motivated to do the work to get to college. I agreed with this because I would not want to pay for someone DC didn't like. After that, meeting was between DC and counselor about once a week through Junior year until all acceptances came in and decision was made. This counselor is available though for no extra cost as long as DC needs college help such as discussing majors or classes or getting into graduate school.

Thanks. This is helpful

Interviewed the counselor. Had DC meet (all remote) the counselor. This was required by the counselor who will not take students who aren't motivated to do the work to get to college. I agreed with this because I would not want to pay for someone DC didn't like. After that, meeting was between DC and counselor about once a week through Junior year until all acceptances came in and decision was made. This counselor is available though for no extra cost as long as DC needs college help such as discussing majors or classes or getting into graduate school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Waste of money. Never hired one.

Same.

How do you know it is a waste of money if you didn't hire one?

For our in-school college counselor (small private school), we met once as a family at the beginning of junior year. Since then, DD has checked in with him as needed to report on college visits, her thoughts about ED, and the overall list. She'll meet with him before the end of the year to brainstorm essay topics. He said he'd be available throughout the summer to read drafts as needed.

What college counselor?

Anonymous wrote:Waste of money. Never hired one.

Same.

Waste of money. Never hired one.

Anonymous wrote:This is a thing? You interview a college counselor?

Absolutely - if this person is helping navigate the college application process and you will be paying somewhere between $200K and $400K over 4 years you want to make sure the person is a fit for your family and the specific needs of the student.

It depends on what you need.

We had an initial meeting with the kid for an hour, having talked to the counselor ourselves and asked them to look at

course choices for 11th & 12th grades
ECs
college application essays for a specific in-state

They had a session with our kid for an hour and we were done.

It may depend on the counselor, your kid and you. I did interview college counselors virtually. Once I had decided on a person, my child had the first meeting/intake virtually. I feel like either I was there for the first meeting or the counselor emailed after and copied me so I knew what were the next steps. My kids were already high school juniors so I felt it would be better for them to meet without me while we had general awareness of what was going.

Anonymous wrote:This is a thing? You interview a college counselor?

I am.

This is a thing? You interview a college counselor?

And what sort of things do you talk about each meeting? Is it just your kid, or do you go too? Is it in person, or online? We are interviewing a few and curious to hear how others handled it.