Dirty Little Secrets of College Admissions Counseling-Great Accceptance Rates

100% of my students get into one of their top three colleges.

Impressed? You should be. But wait, there is more to this story. If you are working with students applying to non-selective colleges this is obviously no big deal. Everybody gets accepted everywhere. However, with college admissions companies that work with students applying to highly selective colleges, the story is a little different.

When working with students that are applying to highly selective colleges, students have to have not only a reach school but a match and safety college as well. Top choice college? The reach. Second choice college? The match. Third choice college? The safety.

So, as long as you get into your safety school, you have gotten into one of your top three choices. Clever, isn’t it.

If your student’s top three choices are always a highly selective college, then there is no way that 100% or even 90% of the students are getting admitted to these colleges unless you are only working with development students. Development students, if you are not familiar with the term, are students whose parents have given significant dollars to a college. And by significant I mean in the million’s. These students, not surprisingly, generally get admitted at a much higher rate than most students.

Do experienced independent education consultants have a higher rate of acceptance of their students into highly selective colleges?  Yes we often do. But the reason is because we help students identify which colleges are most appropriate for their needs. If the student is not going to be competitive for a highly selective college then we guide that student to a less selective college. And yes, we have a better idea of what these colleges are looking for in the students that they admit and can help the students with that application process.

But beware if the claim sounds too good to be true. It usually is. And that is why you won’t see me giving percentage of students admitted to selective colleges and BS/MD programs. It’s too easy to manipulate the data and I just don’t do that.