Students and families hire independent college counselors for a variety of reasons:

-The primary reason is that many high school counselors have overwhelming caseloads and do not have the time or bandwidth to focus on each individual's post-secondary journey. When working with an independent college counselor, their goal should be to complement, not replace, your school's counselor. While we can guide you through the process, there are many specific documents that only your high school counselor will have access to. We encourage students to utilize all available resources.

-Another prevalent reason we often hear from parents is that college admissions has changed so dramatically since they applied, that they feel ill-equipped to guide their students. Here's some statistics to illustrate how the college search has changed between the generations:

Acceptance Rates:

Yale: (1980s) 20% vs (2015) 5%

Northwestern University: (1980s) 40% vs (2013) 14%

UC Berkeley: (1984) 48% vs (2014) 17%

Washington University in St. Louis: (1990) 62% vs (2018) 14%

Johns Hopkins: (1990) 53% vs (2018) 11%

Ease of Applying Leading to More Competition: In 1995 only 10% of high school students applied to 7+ colleges. Now in 2016, 33% of students apply to 7+ colleges. The Common Application alone has doubled from 414,000 students using it in 2008 to 813,000 students in 2013.

(Statistics courtesy of "Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be" by Frank Bruini & "Who Gets in and Why" by Jeffrey Selingo. You can find links to these books on our Recommended Reading page.)

-Raising a teenager can be a journey in and of itself. Hiring an independent counselor to help guide the college application process can relieve some of the stress families often experience during the final years of high school, and create more opportunity for positive family engagement. In other words, parents won't have to nag their student about deadlines, opportunities, and choices because independent college counselors serve as coaches and liaisons.

-Independent college counselors spend the majority of their time working with students, but when they aren't in face-to-face meetings or reviewing essays, they can be found in webinars, visiting schools, and interacting with college admission representatives in order to build their knowledge base and best advise their students about schools and opportunities.

-Independent college counselors who are members of professional organizations (such as the Independent Educational Consultant Association, Higher Education Consultant Association, and the National Association of College Admission Counseling) follow strict ethical guidelines to ensure best practices in working with students of all backgrounds.

-Independent college counselors provide professional, trusted, and expert guidance to ensure students feel confident that their applications and essays are the best representation of who they are. This means that students who work with independent counselors often feel more comfortable in sharing their essays and applications with parents, and are more receptive to feedback once the bulk of the work is completed.

When choosing independent college counselors, we're aware that there are many options. At Virtual College Counselors, we emphasize honesty, transparency, and authenticity because "fit" with a college counselor is just as important as "fit" with a college/university. We seek to help build meaningful relationships with our students to help mentor them through the college process and all of the opportunities for personal growth along that journey.

When you work with Virtual College Counselors, we promise:

1. Personalized guidance that fits the student's schedule and goals, from the comfort of their own home.

2. A simplified and guided college admissions process with straightforward, honest, and transparent conversations.

3. Expert, up-to-date, and insider information from a former college admissions counselor with a vast professional network.

4. Transformational Coaching that emphasizes the academic, professional, and personal growth of students.

5. Reduced stress, time saved, and one-on-one support with industry experts.

Some families will begin work with an independent counselor as early as middle school, while others might start as late as their final year of high school. There are a few benefits to starting earlier rather than later. Starting earlier allows the counselor and student to create solid long-term foundations that can be built up over several years to impress admissions officers. When using a comprehensive package, starting earlier also means you get more return on your investment over time.

It is most common for students to start working with an independent college counselor during spring of their sophomore year or fall of their junior year. The earlier a student can start, the less stressful the process becomes.

Before we can talk about finding a good fit, we usually have to start with the definition of a good fit. There are many definitions of "fit", but we have two main criteria:

1. The school provides an environment that supports a student's academic, professional, and personal goals.

2. The school provides an environment where students feel happy, supported, and have a meaningful educational experience.

Keeping that definition in mind, our common considerations for a good fit are: Field of Study, Academic Profile, Size, Location, Campus Culture, Finances, and a Student's Affinity (i.e. your gut).

Yes! We have extensive knowledge of external scholarships that focus on academic interests, location, background, institutional type, etc. We do not apply for the student, but we are more than happy to show them the path and help make their scholarship applications as strong as possible. We also help students understand institutional financial aid processes in regards to merit and need-based aid.

We have many notable specialties, including:

- Extensive recruitment experience within the U.S.A. for students at independent, charter, public, and home school programs.

- Several years of international recruitment experience, with expertise in admissions for international students. An added emphasis on East Asian countries: China, Japan, South Korea.

- Helping DACA and undocumented students navigate their college search, with a focus on safety, support, and affordability.

- Advocacy for First Generation, HALI (High Achieving, Low Income), and URM (Underrepresented Minority) students.

- Allyship and advocacy for LGBTQ+ students, foster youth, and other disenfranchised populations, including those making any significant personal transitions during the high school or college search process.

- Student-athletes interested in eSports programs.

- Students with 504s, IEPs, and/or diagnosed learning disabilities.

- Graduate School admissions in Psychology, Business, and Law.

- 83+ professional visits to colleges and universities.

When looking for an independent college counselor, it is incredibly important for them to keep current with the developing trends and changing policies in higher education. We subscribe to several leading information sources (Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed., etc.) and closely monitor information from industry organizations (NACAC, IECA, HECA, etc.). Before COVID, we collectively visited over 83 colleges and universities in a professional capacity. Conferences, webinars, and workshops remain a consistent form of professional development, particularly in a virtual world. Lastly, we leverage our large professional network to keep in touch with both high school counselors and college admissions officers, to understand the behind-the-scenes factors informing industry and institutional decisions.

At Virtual College Counselors we believe in a comprehensive and collaborative approach to working with students. Students are assigned a primary college counselor. Their primary college counselor will be their main contact for working through the college admissions process and scheduling any advising sessions. As colleagues, we leverage our specific professional capacities, knowledge bases, and personal experiences to support every student through the process. This means that all students have two counselors collaborating to help support a student on their journey to success.

One of the many benefits of working with a virtual/remote independent college counselor is the flexibility offered to families and students. We work around your schedule to make sure that we are meeting on a consistent basis to ensure the college search and application process runs smoothly for every student. Most communication occurs via text, phone, email, or video conferencing software (e.g. Zoom). During our first meeting, we work together to establish a timeline/schedule that works for both parties.

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One of our goals as a business is to do everything in our power to ensure students have as many resources available as possible. This philosophy drives our creation of informative and free content on the internet through blogs, videos, social media, and infographics.

To make our services affordable for families, we are more than happy to accommodate a payment schedule to help ease the financial burden of a one-time payment. Every family is unique and comes from a wide variety of financial backgrounds, so we make our best effort to personalize each payment plan for the family. Please reach out to us if you are interested in utilizing a payment plan.