and cough up the cost of such services in the hope that it takes the thinking out of the process of college planning and admissions? Or is it possible as a parent to really put in the time for the research and guide your kid on your own?
We are finding this question to be a big one in our household right now. Any inputs appreciated. First time posting here.
We were case #2. It did take a lot of time and effort. But it was a family project and we have no regret.
Even in case #1, you still have to drive the process and make decisions. A consultant is only for, well, consulting.
I know someone who hired a consultant because she wanted to keep her relationship with her son intact. They could afford it and she didn’t want to be the one to micromanage the process (which she knew she would). She was obviously still involved, but she knew her son would respond better to someone outside of the family.
Having said that, I think as a parent, you will want to be involved when it comes to the list of schools recommended by the counselor to make sure they fit into your family’s budget. You would also want to make sure that your student has enough confidence to speak up and tell the counselor if there are schools on the list that are a firm “no”.
You also want to do research on who you hire. There are a lot of folks out there claiming to be experts, when in fact, they aren’t.
It really depends on your budget, how much spare time you have, your expectations, and your family dynamics. Consultants can be costly or trivial, depending on your family budget. If your kid has special needs or special talents it may be worthwhile looking up experts, on the other hand if you are good at researching and have spare time it may be worthwhile to do your own legwork for a while first before you hire someone.
If you want a consultant to be a mediator between some strong personalities, that’s worthwhile too, but be honest upfront about it with everyone involved.
A lot of parents on this board have put in the time and effort and guided their kids through on their own. Would the kids have had better outcomes with professional counseling? It’s a hard case to crack.
Bad consulting is out there, however. Make sure before you buy that you are buying quality. Someone who guarantees Ivy League acceptances is probably scamming you, or they cherry pick clients and your kid could potentially face rejection from their college prep. If somebody is working out of their house and doesn’t have a track record of getting kids into college, you probably don’t want to hire them.
My understanding is that a lot of consultants work on the “packaging” of your kid, developing his or her “brand”–a really off-putting concept, to me. More to the point, though, I’ve heard that adcoms are getting more and more savvy about applications that have been worked over by consultants (and/or other adults) in this manner. A great consultant will know how to avoid that; a less great one, probably not.
Depends on what your child is aiming for. They only kids we know that had college coaches were either going for Musical Theatre BFA’s or aiming for Ivy leagues type schools. All those people also had the money for coaches.
A private coach was not in our budget so it was me doing a lot of research. Kid one and two both finished the process with several affordable and academically appropriate choices. I will say that my eldest might have reacted better to a private coach than me but we got through.
Now, if one had been wanting to go the BFA route, we would have certainly found a way to get a coach. It makes a tremendous difference and is just a very different process and difficult to research on your own.
The only person I know that used a private coach did so because her child is a procrastinator and she knew it would be better to have an outside person pushing him (or she would have lost her mind).
@VedaKas : I sent you a PM.
You will need to be involved in selecting the right person. Some of them are terrific - some quite the opposite.
A good one will be accredited, probably have worked in admissions, have visited numerous schools, and be a good listener. Someone who has read a zillion files will be better than anyone who hasn’t at determining how compelling an application is.
Most have contacts at many schools so if you have a sensitive issue that you’d like to ask about but prefer that the inquiry not come from you, they can be invaluable. (This isn’t the case for most people, but if there has been a disciplinary issue, for example, a good consultant can help you figure out how to address it.)
They often also follow “their” kids so can be pretty savvy about environments. And yes, your kid may be more candid with them about some things, especially around social life, than they’ll be with you.
It really depends on what you want from this person. I am happy to PM you a name of someone to consider if you choose to go this route.
We worked with someone for our oldest who works on an hourly basis (not full-package basis). My daughter had an initial consult that was about 3 hours long in January of her junior year and came away with a list of 25 schools to look into further. We visited 8 of those over spring break (and she ended up applying to 6 of those plus another 4). Anyway, she then worked with this person on essays. They met once every couple of weeks for 1-2 hours starting in the summer until the essays were done.
Now that I’m on kid #2 I think I can probably take care of that first part (coming up with a good list) myself, but I’d still like to hire out the essay editing help. It was really useful to have that external deadline of ‘you have a meeting with Mrs. X on Thursday - what did she want you to have done by then?’ rather than ‘have you edited that essay again? How about now? How about now?’.
For us, we both work full time and long hours. So when someone I trust recommended this college consultant, we gave it a try. We, the D included, met with him for an initial interview for two hours for free. We liked what he presented and “ “hired” him, meaning we contacted him as needed. The fee was hourly rate. D started using the service when she was going into 11 th grade (better to start in 9th or 10 th I think). We did not use him often but were happy with his advice. We like his service and the reasonable price. We have recommended him to other parents, too.
For us, it was worth it because we were short on time, D listened to him better than to us ( naturally) and he gave us some good ideas. It was good for us to have much less stress at an affordable price.
Re #8 - there is no accreditation process for educational consultants. However, there are two professional organizations (IECA and HECA) that require members to adhere to a set of ethical guidelines. If you consider hiring a consultant, you will want to be sure that person is a member of at least one or the other. @gardenstategal also makes a good point about using someone who has experience working in an admissions office. The experience gained from reading real files and sitting in admissions committee decisions is invaluable.
People can spend their money the way they like. To any of us who do not have the financial resources to even consider using a consultant, it is easy to think they are a huge waste of money.
One of D’s good friends at Stanford is in the band. Their family financial situation changed during the summer before her junior year - due to a significant unexpected inheritance. The parents wondered if they should hire a consultant to help with the college search process, but they instead chose to use the money to hire a maid service - freeing up their personal time to devote themselves to the college search. Clearly, it worked out well for them.
There are lots of examples of kids who do great without outside help, and plenty of kids for whom hiring someone to help was the best decision they ever made.
We used a consultant to help my daughter write her common app essay. Her essay was very personal, and while I was involved in the other parts of the college application process, I was hands-off on the essay. My daughter was over-extended timewise last summer (summer academic enrichment camp on scholly, job, HS senior summer work and cram for one last SAT attempt, QuestBridge app, extensive prep for fall varsity sport, official athletic visits) so the essay consultant was invaluable to her to focus on the final objective and assistance with pacing and time management. She worked on the supplemental essays on her own, which she found to be very challenging. Not selected as QB finalist, and made painful 11th hour decision not to pursue college athletics. It was an enormous gamble and leap of faith, which ultimately paid off for her, I am convinced due to the strength of her common app essay.
Depends on the one you hire. Sorry, but its true. Some people on this board have praised their consultants.
Our experience wasn’t so good. She came with a recommendation from a friend who used her and she cost a bunch of money. She suggested colleges that I thought were way below my son’s ability. We weren’t looking at tippy top schools but good ones none the less. She edited his essay and, based on the phrasing and word choices, you could really tell a student didn’t write it. We knew that was a major no-no. My son tossed her edits.
My son had a couple of his classmates (and he even let me do so also) read and comment on (NOT EDIT) his essays. He applied to 5 colleges and was accepted at 3 including his first choice.
I believe that a reasonable parent with a bit of research can do a good job HELPING guide a student with their college applications. The whole process is kind of a rite of passage for the student into becoming a responsible adult.
"Would the kids have had better outcomes with professional counseling? "
Outcomes aren’t the only – or even the primary – goal of all counseling relationships. Having reassurance and confidence during the process, becoming a better writer, knowing that you sent out YOUR best application, etc., can have value before you even hear back from your schools.
To be fair, some responders on this thread are professional college consultants. Which colors their answers. Not sure how to deal with that (as transparency on that then also could be perceived as marketing business). But for what it is worth, consider that.
You definitely can do it yourself if you have the time and interest. I did. College Confidential is a great resource. The one area I considered hiring someone for was essays for D2. And there is a lot more than the Common App essay; every college she applied to had one or more supplemental essays as well. We knew someone (her longtime Quiz Bowl coach) who is also a professional admissions consultant who she was comfortable with that we could have used. But she decided she was okay with me as her essay reviewer.
We conducted her essay reviews almost entirely by email. We agreed together on a schedule (about 2 weeks per essay). I’d send her an email with the prompt and a due date of a week away for a draft. She’d ship back a draft. A couple times she came to me to brainstorm ideas, or ask if a direction she was considering would work. Then I’d shoot the draft back with comments. I’d make her find typos, but I’d tell her how many I saw. We’d exchange emails as she revised. We didn’t stay quite on schedule, but we had left winter break open (and planned no travel that year) to finish apps, so that was time to finish the last couple. She had great admissions results. We never argued about the essays - email was a great way to communicate. We couldn’t see each other’s eye rolls. 
Actually editing a kid’s college essay sounds unethical, to me. I even have a moment when adults on CC say they’ve “helped” dozens (or more) with essays and I know they dont have admissions experience.
You can guide a kid to rethink the approach, structure, and phrasing without rewriting his or her college app essay.
Of course, pointing out a few missing commas, a run-on sentence, or some misspelled words is friendly help.
We hired a consultant for my eldest. It was not a “minimum of $5k” situation, and I think we paid under $2k. Was it worth it? Yes and no. I already knew a lot because I educated myself via CC, books, etc… The consultant was most useful in helping my daughter prepare for interviews and filling out the common app, so that was money well spent.
The consultant was also very knowledgeable about many colleges, and in fact, steered my daughter to the college she is now at, so that was also worth it. However, she was not at all useful for the essay, and spent a fair bit of time talking to my daughter about stuff we both already knew.
If you are already pretty knowledgeable about the process and can find someone who charges by the hour, rather than making you sign up for an expensive package, it might be useful. This assumes that you are prepared to be involved and can spend time doing what needs to be done without you both wanting to kill each other. If not, you might find it’s worth the money. I will not be hiring a consultant for my current junior.
I should add, I think it’s worth paying for help on the essay, but that doesn’t necessarily mean hiring a private consultant. So many kids write really poor ones. Disclaimer, I do essay advising professionally. Do I correct their work? If it’s major, I tell them what needs to be fixed and why. Mostly, I discuss with them how they want to portray themselves, and what it is they really want to say. Too many kids want to reveal dark secrets, or feel they need to write about something really trite. I help them focus on positive things they want a college to know about them. The essay is really important at many colleges, and I do feel it is worth getting help if a student can’t come up with a good essay.
It depends upon your needs & what you expect the consultant to do for his or her fee.
In our experience, being accredited as a consultant or belonging to any educational groups is not assurance of one’s abilities, worth or common sense.
Very few truly understand what makes for a compelling, influential essay. As one who does persuasive writing for a living, I am almost always shocked by the poor quality & lack of understanding of what makes a winning college application essay.
I tried to form a business with a very experienced (decades) college admissions officer about 10 or 12 years ago. His resume included two Ivies & a couple of very prestigious LACS. He was well known in the industry, but was absolutely worthless as an educational consultant for prospective students. In fact, to my surprise, some of the worst college advisors have worked in college admissions offices. Found some to be petty & small minded. Just as there are good & bad lawyers, there are good & bad educational consultants.
About 20 years ago we hired one of the nation’s top educational consultants when considering private high schools & boarding schools. Was an absolute & complete waste of time & money. And this person was a long time former head of a very prestigious school.
Most important is to determine what you need & expect from a consultant, and then to communicate that in an effective fashion.
Communication is important to assure that you work as a team as opposed to working against the others efforts.
Just like a persuasive legal brief, your application materials need to present a theme (packaging). And you need to implement a strategy based on your goals that reduces the stress & uncertainty of the process.
Finally, never let anyone else write your essays. You can accept guidance, constructive criticism, and minor edits, but your essays need to be your work product.