Start Early at College Admissions Process

Start Early at College Admissions Process September 2 Procrastination is the enemy in highly selective college admissions. Folks sometimes ask us when is the best time to come to Ivy Coach for college admissions advice. Our answer is typically something like this: As early as possible because we can correct mistakes before they become just that mistakes. Mistakes in coursework, mistakes in testing, mistakes in extracurriculars and summer plans. But sometimes parents come to us too early. When we receive notes from rising kindergartners (nursery school students), we send them on their way to pack their lunch boxes (although if these parents are in Manhattan, we do recommend Stephanie Sigal for help with the kindergarten admissions process youd have to live in Manhattan to understand this phenomenonwe know it seems ridiculous). For parents of seventh and eighth graders, though, thats actually a really good time to come to us so that Ivy Coach can map out the students high school coursework, testing, extracurricular  angle, etc. Its all done during a one-hour evaluation in which students (and their parents) will get a lot of important feedback, feedback that can never be found on the pages of our college admissions blog. After all, its part of our secret sauce and our secret sauce is purposefully left off the pages of our blog. The fact is that folks come to us at all times of the college admissions process. We have people who come to us for the first time on New Years Eve, mere hours before the Regular Decision deadline as they seek our assistance in the college admissions process. Thats ridiculously late. Dont do that. Enjoy your New Years Eve. You should not be working on college applications at midnight. What if the servers go down and you cant submit your applications? What if you fall asleep? Oy vey. You may laugh but there are folks who contact us every year at this very time. The Independent Educational Consultants Association, an organization we have absolutely not a shred of respect for, even once contacted us alleging that a student contacted us around this time and they were disturbed by the fee we quoted. The Independent Educational Consultants Association seemed perplexed when we did not deny the possibility that we quoted  such a fee at that time. After all, who are they to tell us what we can and cannot charge on a day we wanted to enjoy, to ring in the New Year? This is the United States of America and we firmly believe that any attempt to restrain our trade is a violation of our Constitutional rights. We suspect the Independent Educational Consultants Association took the hint. This is a long way of sayingget started on the college admissions process early. Dont wait until midnight on New Years Eve. Thats absurd. And for you rising seniors, time is of the essence since Early Decision / Early Action deadlines are fast approaching.