Hiring a Private College Consultant? Be careful (COLLEGEVINE)

Hi
I’d like to start by saying that private consultants are typically great. It’s a great resource to help the student and family understand the process and help strengthen their application, since most HS counselors lack time and resources. Those who can hire one should. However, your mileage may vary depending on who you hire, and spending more doesn’t necessarily equate higher quality service.
I’m the student, not parent. I’m posting this here rather than on r/A2C because mostly parents are here, and it’s you guys that hire these services. I hope my insight will help you pick the best counseling firm for your child.
I’m subscribe to the premium USNews membership. With that, I receive emails from USNews that often included information on webinars hosted by Collegevine. I attended one before my junior year and was impressed by the depth of their knowledge in the college admissions process. It was my first exposure to these firms and led me to do extensive research on the company. They have stellar stats and comprehensive packages that led me to speak with my parents about it, and like me they were very impressed. Im not only an intl student living in the US but also an only child so the college admissions process to my parents was very foreign, despite my father having studied at UPenn for medical school years ago. We then hired all of their services together— the mentorship service, SAT tutoring, essay editing/application assistance, and the “decision support” team. We paid somewhere between $7-9k. Some “boutique” firms charge can charge even more, but it was still not cheap.

The mentorship and tutoring began together. The mentorship was actually great. I was paired with a current student from Duke that helped me a lot with my extracurriculars and creating “capstone projects” that later turned very useful for my application. The tutoring was awful, though. I had two different tutors that each taught me either the reading and grammar or math. They were both horrible. They were current students from T10 schools and claimed to have scored perfect scores on the SAT, but they couldn’t teach. CV prepares them with a set of questions that they’d share with me and we’d work on it together. However the process was extremely unintuitive, the questions were weak and the method of teaching as per the Collegevine policy was ineffective. I also had trouble repeatedly finding time throughout the week that would work with both of our schedules, so out of the 25 hours we purchased I only used 4. I moved on eventually to a local tutor that provided strong textbooks to refer to and my final score was a 31 ACT (from 1320 SAT). I could’ve done better had I gone with him from the beginning, but Collegevine truly wasted my time—an extremely undervalued but important in the application process spanning throughout high school.

Next up was the application help and essay editing services. I was paired with a student from Vanderbilt that I failed to really get along with. My mentor was very down to earth and his charisma made it much easier to work with him and look forward to making progress with the projects, but this person was quite the opposite. She was just difficult to talk to casually and it was hard to relate with her. Not only that, but my mentor knew me very well. Nothing my mentor learned from me (including my interests, important events in my life, etc.) were passed onto her and it was time consuming and felt awkward to have to repeat myself in almost a mechanical way. It was easier to work with her schedule compared to the SAT tutoring people and I felt like we had done good progress, but I had trouble staying timely with the essays. Often times I would write an entire essay days, or even hours, before the application deadline. Collegevine has a timeline to follow but it was seldom used with me. This was also where we used the company’s algorithm for college choices. Basically, I began this part by filling out a questionnaire on my preferences regarding colleges and I inputted my standardized testing scores and extracurriculars which were classified by tiers of “noteworthiness”. As such, the algorithm would take these factors into consideration and spit out several schools that would be of my liking. It also categorized them into safety schools, target schools and reaches. We narrowed the long list down and I ended up applying to 17 schools. My common app essay was revised a lot and we ended on the 3rd draft by Jan 1.

I felt good about the entire thing when ED/EA decisions started coming along. I got deferred from Cornell as my ED1 and Northeastern as my EA, but was accepted to UMiami and Penn State (rolling). I thought getting deferred from an Ivy was a good sign, and I felt my essays and ECs were strong as my friends that applied ED to Cornell had better scores and grades but were outright rejected. Between these decisions and my RD decisions, the person helping me sent me a goodbye email saying that the “decisions support team” would take over from there. I was left alone and had to write my Cornell deferral letter alone with no assistance from CV. Furthermore, when she didn’t feel like it she would forward my essays to a random person to edit them on her behalf. Mind you, these random people knew nothing of me yet were editing my essays with shallow feedback.

About a month after, I was emailed by CV. It was an automatized email that introduced me to the decision support team. They sent that email repeatedly, but I never replied because I hadn’t received any RD decisions yet. What good are they gonna do if there are no decisions to choose from? I guess their job is going to be pretty easy from here on out, as I was rejected from every single school RD school I applied to except for Indiana University-Kelley. The IU essay was one that I completely winged because the lady helping me with essay editing never got to it. She mentioned that I should apply to IU as an afterthought. I was rejected from Cornell after being deferred but accepted to NU. I was waitlisted at NYU and William & Mary. The rest of the schools rejected me, from schools labeled safeties by the “algorithm” like GWU or BU to Target schools like USC to reaches like Duke, Ivies, etc.

I tried reaching out to this team and made an appt. the guy didn’t confirm it and didn’t show up.

I should’ve noticed their sketchy practices earlier and dealt with them earlier to avoid what happened here. My application has been completely jeopardized by their influence and misleading claims of knowing what they’re talking about and asking for our trust. One would think that paying a price tag like this would guarantee you a worry free process, but no. My parents were also very off guard with the situation because I was being admitted and deferred (not rejected) from schools in the beginning, and I was being tutored elsewhere so they had their guards down the entire time. I am also privileged to say that to my family, the monetary expense was insignificant which led to our inaction. However, the significant expense was my jeopardized application and mediocre decision results.

To deal with my waitlists, we hired another counseling firm that is very expensive but very reputable and transparent. They’ll help me with my LOCIs. We could’ve stuck with CV as it’s not already paid for, but our skepticism on the quality of their advising took away our trust in the firm and we aren’t letting them touch my LOCI with a 10ft pole. Furthermore, the person we’ve spoken to from this new firm has looked over my common app essay and said it was trash. I thought at first it was an exaggeration but it made perfect sense as it’s why schools like BU and GWU denied me even though I have above average stats. This made me livid considering the amount of time and effort spent towards this specific essay all had gone into vain.

I hope this enlightens you.
Good luck!

Wow, I’m sorry. I’ve never even had a tutor before but a few of my friends hired inexpensive counselors to help with selecting colleges – I can’t imagine how angry you must feel. Not only did you get rejected from schools you wanted to go to (which hurts for anyone – I feel you!), you also put an immense amount of trust, money, and time in someone who let you down.
Obviously they can’t guarantee you’ll get in anywhere, but it seems like they didn’t even try. I can see how you would have been lulled into a false sense of complacency. Can you ask them for a refund? Was there a satisfaction guarantee or some kind of SAT tutoring guarantee (usually I think there is)?
I don’t know what to tell you, but that just sucks. I’m shocked, honestly.
But hey, Miami and Penn State are both good colleges! Some students only apply to reaches, so at least you covered your bases.

We’re going to try and seek a refund, at least a partial one. I’m afraid it might be too late but I’m going to look over the contract and get in touch with someone from CollegeVine to see what we can do about it. I know for a fact that I will by no means whatsoever tell them my full admission results. Each year they ask students for that so they can fine tune their algorithm of theirs, but I will not let my suffering end up benefitting them.

As of right now, my best bet is to get off the NYU or WM waitlist, but if that doesn’t work I think attending Kelley at IU is a great alternative with an amazing business curriculum. Northeastern is a great school overall but I’d have to spend a semester abroad, which I’m not sure I want to do (especially as my first semester in college). UMiami and Penn State are also great schools so I’m not worried, but I am very disappointed that I was led on and robbed. Thank you for your kind words!

Yeah, you have some fine options but it’s disappointing when they led you expect more. As hard as it is, I would consider telling them your admissions results because I think it helps your case – like I said, there’s no guarantees and I don’t know what you had to work with, but it doesn’t reflect well on them if you didn’t get into schools they said were targets and/or safeties for you. That means they were either steering you towards schools you couldn’t get into, or they were ruining your apps to schools you otherwise could have been accepted at. Not good either way.

Well, your description of the services you received are probably helpful to anyone considering using CV, but you should be mindful that you can only accept one offer, and as you say Kelley is a great school. The semester off campus at Northeastern is an indication that it was your stats that were the problem, not your essays. When schools offer spring admission, it is so that they don’t have to include your stats in their reports to the USNWR on entering freshman. Your ACT was low for the type of schools you were applying to. Unless you are in the top quartile of SAT/ACT for a particular school, it should be considered a reach, not a target, and that is if GPA is also inline with that.
I’m sorry you are disappointed in your results, but there are many applicants who were successful at those schools that did not have access to the support you did. And if your Common App essay was really “trash” , you should have been able to see that yourself. You were aware of deadlines; it is on you that you left essays for the last few days or hours. No one from CV recommended that you procrastinate, I would wager.

This is a disappointing season for a lot of people. Be glad you have multiple offers, release the ones you don’t want - someone else does want them. And stop looking for “the reason” you didn’t get the results you wanted - it really is kind of a crapshoot these days.

@Gudmom I would argue against the point that my stats were the reason I got spring admission for Northeastern. The fact of the matter is that Northeastern has some weird ploy to lower their acceptance rate and make their school look more competitive to go up the ranks. Not only are they exempt from providing stats on the students admitted to spring, but their acceptance doesn’t count towards the acceptance rate. Northeastern seems to be doing that to lower this rate and try to move up the rank, as I have multiple friends who were admitted the same way as me and had 34, 35 ACT.

I agree with you that it’s really a crapshoot these days. This was a brutal season and you can’t really expect much from schools you apply to until they accept you.

Don’t get me wrong. I am thankful for the opportunity to have this support net, but I’m disappointed in how they misled me but did so discretely so that I stayed with them for the remainder of my high school time. I definitely have made mistakes on my part, but spending almost $10,000 would make you think that at least they would work closely enough with you to catch onto any problems before they grew out of proportion. I have a minor learning disability that hinders my time management skills, so hiring CV or a similar company was imperative to the eyes of my parents as they would help me balance my time spent working on college applications and my time spent on school work. We can, so we did. Like I said in my original post, anyone that is able to hire such services should (just not from CV). Had we not hired anyone, we would’ve regretted not having done so at all. It’s definitely not a deal breaker. Several families don’t hire anything like that and their kids can end up at Harvard, but parents always want to give the best to their children and when they hire a service that performs to expectations, there’s no problem. One that doesn’t will be an expensive price for them to pay in regards to the results. CV was just disappointing for their unprofessionalism, their misleading into creating different expectations from reality, and for jeopardizing the integrity of my work. If we knew they wouldn’t perform to our expectations, we would’ve cut ties with them much longer ago. That would’ve spared me valuable TIME to find someone else that would help me the best they can with my apps. My mentor was the one that helped me come up with my topic for the common app essay, and he knew me very well. I was head over heels with the idea and thought my first draft was perfect. This happens to a lot of people and it’s hard to see your own mistakes which is why peer editing is a thing. Upon improvement after improvement, I was very happy and proud of this essay but in the end it turned out being too broad and lacked focus in a specific anecdote.

Like I mentioned somewhere before, I’m devoting my full energy towards my waitlisted schools. I have a meeting today that will hopefully help me decide which of the four schools I’ve been admitted to should I place a deposit for. That’ll release the other spots to other students. I hope to get into NYU; it wasn’t my first choice but it’s funny how much more attractive a school can look after the ones that you were in love with all rejected you.

Thank you for your insight. I look forward to using my fullest efforts to make the best out of the situation I’m in.

OP, That’s useful information for future students on CC. Thanks for posting. It’s important for people to know what they are likely to obtain from these expensive “services”

OP, I agree that it is not only acceptable, but a good idea, to have professional help if it is affordable. I’m sorry it didn’t get you results you are very happy with. But I’ve got a kid at U Miami who did get into some of the schools you mention, and was rejected from others he thought were target schools, so just know that you will be OK, and don’t waste more time regretting the time you “wasted”.

OP - Don’t put all your energy into your WL schools. Put all your energy into getting excited about one of the schools that has accepted you. Kelley has an amazing business program and will give you a tremendous education. Write your LOCIs if you must, and then move on. If you read through some of the posts over the past week, there are others not as fortunate to have any acceptance, let alone multiple.

IMO, the biggest take away from this post is the warning that even with a high paid consultant, the student still needs to do the work, put in the effort, and stay on top of things. There is no short cut through this process, just some hand holding.

FWIW, I think the biggest disservice you got was bad advice about your target/match/safety schools. As mentioned up thread, a 1320/31 SAT/ACT is simply not competitive for the top schools, especially as an international applicant.

OP, I think your summary will be very helpful to future applicants thinking about the company you used. As a parent, I can see how you could easily “fall through the cracks” by being handed off to so many people, and the fact that your main points of contact are college students (whose main job is to be a college student/do their own academic work) – not professional counselors – is a suboptimal business setup, to say the least.

Glad you have some great options, though.

@cluelesschild , thank you for a thoughtful, detailed post that will undoubtedly help people who search for the key terms in the future. Please don’t be additionally discouraged by a small number of unhelpful, scolding posters who offer nothing useful to you in return. Good luck to you!

Thank you for sharing your experiences. This is a great cautionary tale for others who are thinking about using the services of a college coach. We did not use one, but I know families who did. The best experiences came from people working with individual coaches who held their hands through the entire process. I can’t stress enough how important this is, especially for college selection. The point of a coach is to really get to know a student, and then use their personal knowledge and understanding of the process to help them craft a list. It should not be any kind of algorithm. Moreover, any algorithm that spits out BU as a safety is pure garbage. BU is not a safety for anyone. It is a target/match at best. Thankfully, you have some great acceptances in your pocket. But this kind of terrible advice is the reason that kids end up with no where to go.

Sorry you had such a bad experience with the college consultant.

For future students who are going to use a college consultant I offer the following advice: a) do your own homework regarding admissions and do most of the process yourself; b) when ready to use a consultant get recommendations from families who have used the consultant and interview them before hiring then (most will give you a free consultation); c) use a consultant that you can meet in person; d) do not pay a consultant a lump sum but instead pay them by the hour and only use them for specific items. For example, when planning out your classes for next year, deciding on which ECs to pursue and would be beneficial to your application, or reviewing essays and target colleges for your major, your HS stats, and best fit. If you do this right, you really only need 8-10 hours total of a consultants time over a 2 year period. Same goes with a ACT/SAT tutor.

I know things didn’t work out for you as you would have liked but you do have some good college choices and will do just fine.

Thanks for sharing your journey.

I am not trying to defend the company referenced here but IMO having Northeastern, Kelley and Penn State to choose from is a spectacular outcome given the stats mentioned here. They must have done something right with the advice and feedback that they gave you. If the essay coaches worked with you to filter out any unintended tone that was bleeding out from any of your essay drafts, I would say after reading your original post that they did you a huge service. I wish you luck with the waitlist schools but you are already have great choices. Appreciate them!

@Shiprock1976 I’m definitely glad to have options, and good ones. I’m not sure what you’re trying to imply by referencing an “unintended tone” from my writing, because I don’t see any unintended tone on my original post here. I’m rightfully angry, and their service was underperforming. Had they performed to what they had made it seem like, I would have been more successful during the RD round of schools. I didn’t even have my IU essay edited by them and yet I was admitted to Kelley. I think this is besides the point, though. I made this post to caution others before hiring a service like CollegeVine, not to complain about my acceptances. I’m glad that I was accepted to strong schools and undoubtedly there are students in worse positions. However, I had gained an expectation of what my results would look like as per the description and analysis of CollegeVine and its advisor working with me. This was wrong, so I feel misled. As simple as that. I appreciate your insight!

I think you gave helpful feedback on your experience with this company. I also agree with the post above that your tone is a bit entitled. Like, I PAID you, so I should get in. If I don’t get in, it is not MY fault. But if you look around here, there are a LOT of disappointed kids this month. Many of them also had help.

That is to say, even with the best consultant possible, no one is guaranteed good results in the RD rounds at these schools. That is why there is a huge cheating scandal right now - even very wealthy people could not get their kids in to these schools legitimately, despite being able to have ghost written essays if needed.