For anyone reading this thread later on, note that “recruitment consultants” for athletes are even more unnecessary than college consultants 
.
As a rule.
I am not aware of anyone in my grade who used a private college consultant, and we did pretty well this year.
I promise you they did… because we met 2 who did at our revisit!
Both of the above statements can be true. It’s unlikely that the student knows every other student, or even every member of the graduating class to the level that they’d learn this info
And 2 falls under “the plural of anecdote is not data” axiom.
I think we can all agree that some use a private counselor at every school. How widespread it is, and if the practice is more prevalent in some segments, is a different, and unanswered, question.
I’ll take the contrarian view and argue that it is well worth spending money on an outside CC. Several reasons:
The school’s CC main goal is to ensure that as many students as possible in the entire CLASS places well at top colleges. They are not aligned with getting YOUR student into as many top colleges as possible.
If you’re spending $70K+ per year on private/boarding school, its well worth the extra money to get an outside opinion.
I’d argue that for unhooked private/boarding school kids that its HARDER to get into top 20 colleges as compared to local public school. Reason is that your kid will be compared to others from the same high school. So its harder to stand out. Waiting until junior year to find unique and interesting things for ECs is too late.
At my son’s boarding school, the college counseling department didn’t start working with students until fairly late (spring of junior year). Before that the students/parents were on their own.
There are different levels of private CC. The most famous is a former Dartmouth admissions officer who started her own service. The price tag is well over $100K for 4 years of service. But there are others who charge much less. You can even get counselors for specific things like: SAT tutoring, Essay brainstorming, proofreading, college list selection, etc.
I don’t understand this idea. Shouldn’t students get involved with extracurricular activities for fun, friendship, and interest in the topics/events? Four years seems like a long time to pursue an extracurricular activity just because it is perceived to be unique and interesting to admissions offices.
Confession, my D24 was just elected president of a school club that I think is positively silly. I truly don’t understand why my brilliant daughter is interested in this activity that seems so fluffy to me. I can’t even keep a straight face when she talks about it with me and it takes a lot of effort not to roll my eyes. So what? She likes it and has been having fun in the club for the last couple of years. Good for her for doing what she wants and not what some college counselor (or her mother) advises. I admit that I would be frustrated if this club was her only activity (it is not), and I probably push her to consider expanding her activities to include some that are less goofy, but they should still be pursuits that she chose for herself not for her college resume. I feel quite differently about academic pursuits simply because colleges do have academic requirements and expectations. I have been a little pushy about some of their academic choices (like course selection). Still I want my kids to do what they want outside of the classroom.
My kids’ boarding schools also have not started the college advising process until mid junior year. However, I consider that a positive not a negative. Ninth and tenth grade students at independent high schools have just finished the secondary school application process. I think that age is too soon to begin thinking about the college application process. Starting that early turns schooling into a rat race.
I would rephrase #1. The schools are invested in happy families. That is, getting kids into schools that are best for them so that they have good experiences/outcomes and the families are happy. Pretty much every boarding school student at selective boarding schools will get into “good” colleges. So the assumption seems to be that the only good outcome is acceptance into a “top” college. But what’s a top college? Why is it definitely better for a particular student?
I agree, it is harder for a boarding school kid to get into a T20 school (except maybe the University of Chicago 
)than a public school kid from Appalachia.
Why do you think unique and interesting things a)are necessary or b) can best be found via paid consultants? Have you read the Applying Sideways MIT blog post? Anything can be interesting, depending on what you say about it!
Here’s what I want to emphasize to you: Your kid will be fine! Really! No matter where they end up at college. What they’ve learned in boarding school will be far more influential than which college they attend. They will be fine.
That just boggles the mind. And people wonder why how kid became a prestige whore?!? 
Yet she got what is essentially a mail-order Doctorate in Education from Nova Southeastern University just so–as she said in essence–that she could legitimize herself in the field.
Maybe if you can spend 100K on this, just go ahead and get your name on a building instead? Not to mention college choice probably has very little to do with outcome for these kids. 
And as I have said many, many times in this site, while academia moves forward at glacial speed, the annual changes in college admissions perspectives evolves at Usain Bolt speeds by comparison.
The fact that anyone would pay 100k (or any amount of money) to someone who last worked in an admissions office when my dad was applying to colleges is mind boggling
One reason parents don’t talk about their outside college counselors is because sometimes the counselors are doing far more than the schools are comfortable with.
a) Heavy editing and crafting of essays, sometimes way more than just “proofing”.
b) Helping kids/families create ECs, often with a social justice angle, that are barely sincere, but look good. They are using a version of MIT’s “applying sideways” concept, but it is not exactly organic.
Some families are OK with a college outcome that is a good fit from an application that reflects reality, others want as prestigious an outcome as possible.
I am far more prestige-driven than most on CC, let me admit.
But the thing is, there aren’t orders of magnitude difference in the levels of prestige obtained through using a private consultant. It’s not like the kid would have to go to a school 100 places below whatever ranking you use without the counselor. I will concede the school might be 10 places down, or 20, but that’s about it. (And there might be NO drop too). And those differences are hairsplitting.
Fantastic! Thanks for adding to this conversation…
Full disclosure, I am an independent college counselor. I have many students who attend private day schools or boarding schools. I have no doubt people can do this on their own. I have no doubt that boarding school college counselors are mostly fabulous at what they do! One difference between a school based counselor and a private one is the private one typically (well, I’ll just use my own practice, as there are so many variations) works with far less students and if they provide unlimited (in terms of time), comprehensive services (which I do), can devote far more time to an individual student on every single aspect of their college selection and admissions process, and in some cases in the years leading up to that. I don’t see how a school based counselor could put in the countless hours I devote to each student and their family, and multiple drafts of every little thing along the way that is involved.
Someone (I think more than one person) on this thread talks about the “results” of where the student is admitted if using a private counselor or not. That is not the reason to hire a private counselor. No counselor can guarantee an acceptance to a particular college (particularly colleges with very low acceptance rates). Independent college counselors don’t get kids into colleges, though help students do things in the best possible way that they may not have done quite the same if doing it on their own (though it is surely possible to do on one’s own!). The reason to hire a college consultant isn’t to get your kid into a certain college. So, weighing the admissions outcomes of using just the school counselor or a private counselor is not truly what it is about.
Someone also mentions their perception that a private college counselor is going to tell the student what activities to do to “look good for college.” I certainly help guide extracurricular activity planning during the high school years, but ALWAYS based on the student’s genuine interests and don’t believe doing things just to get into college. My own children (now professionals) went to highly selective colleges and had very full extracurricular endeavors that were lifelong genuine interests, that I am positive they would have chosen to do even if they never went to college. I never told them to do any of these. A good college counselor can suggest activities related to a student’s interest areas and ways to take it to a higher level, but always with the student choosing what they truly WANT to do, and not choosing anything for admissions reasons. Honestly, this is what colleges want anyway…students to pursue genuine interests. They are not into formulas of doing X, Y, and Z to look good for college. Go do what you love to do and find ways to excel at it, perhaps achieve something, lead something, contribute in a significant capacity, initiate something, make a positive impact, and so on. They don’t care the actual activity area itself, as much as what I just mentioned. A student can be mentored into how to go about doing that within their true interest areas. Some already do that, like my own children did and some of my clients already do, but some need brainstorming as they have no ideas the possibilities of ways to explore a particular interest they have. A college counselor can suggest many such ideas, but the student is always choosing what appeals to them, not being told to do X or Y.
The reason to hire a college counselor is not to get into a more prestigious college than you may have if you had not used a private consultant. It is the support every step of the way, the expertise, the experience, the highly individualized attention and amount of time devoted per family, and so on, that many find beneficial as they navigate the process and the time leading up to it. Some want that and some do not. Some feel they need it and some do not.
I don’t know anything about the consultant, but Nova Southeastern has one of the most well funded undergraduate Marine Biology programs in the US.
At my son’s boarding school, there was neither encouragement or discouragement of using private counselors. Similar issue for private tutors. But it was rarely discussed among parents.
I did find out later that many parents used private tutors for help with homework during the school year. I believe this was a gray area in the student handbook about outside help. These same parents were not afraid to shell out tens of thousands of dollars for private CC help during admissions season. I don’t have an accurate count, but my estimate is over 30% of the class had some help.
I think plenty of kids use private counselors over summer to help with essays and list of EC’s on common app. Puts the kids on a schedule so that by the time they start senior year their main essay and maybe other essays are finished.
Our students will have brainstormed essay topics with their CCs in the spring. In fact, all will have worked on two personal essays in the winter term as part of the English curriculum, many of which become their main essay. Everyone is expected to arrive in the fall with a completed essay.