My approach to the college admissions process is based on my life and work experience.

Before embarking on my career as a college counselor and high school administrator, I had a variety of work experiences over several decades and through more than a few fiscal crises, experiences that shaped who I am today. I’ve been a gallery assistant on Madison Avenue, a classroom and resource room teacher in residential treatment programs in Brooklyn and Queens, a freelance editor, a piano instructor, a small business owner, and for eighteen years an attorney, where I learned essential lessons about the power of words and about advocating for my clients. I’m also a mother who went through the college admissions process with my own children.

When I became a college counselor twenty years ago, the message we were giving families about college admissions was that students should sit “in the driver’s seat,” with parents and guardians playing a supporting role. School counselors would begin discussing college with students in junior year, leaving plenty of time to get the job done!  As the years went by and college admission became more complicated, more competitive, and much more costly, it became clear that the role of parents and counselors would have to change. Parental involvement would increase and counselors would need to begin the discussion earlier and with a greater sense of urgency.

Perhaps we went too far! For years high school students have been telling me that the topic of college dominates most of the conversations they have with their families. The adults in their lives, students report, talk about college “all the time,” and that “every decision” made in high school,  from what classes to take to what clubs to join and athletics to pursue - even what to do during the summer - is viewed through the lens of boosting one’s chances of “getting into the right college.” I know my students' comments are truthful.  I was that parent, until some difficult but honest conversations with my daughter, a junior at the time, helped me see the light and put the brakes on.

Today, more than ever, students in every grade are experiencing unacceptable levels of uncertainty, stress, and anxiety. Unfortunately there are many reasons for this, college admission being only one. While we cannot solve all of the world’s problems, we can take some steps to protect our children and give them a more positive experience in life and in school.  Even while we acknowledge that the stakes surrounding college admission are very high, we must ask ourselves this question: How do we guarantee the brightest future for our children without compromising their mental health and well-being and putting undue strain on family relationships?

My goal is to help students and families lower their stress level and infuse some joy into the process. The journey toward college will be challenging but it need not be damaging, and it can, in fact, become a time that brings families closer. I believe the first step is to dispense with the message that high school is little more than a series of steps on the path to acceptance to the “right” college. This operating system robs children of what should be a time of exploration and growth, a time to imagine the many possibilities that await them. 

The next step is to think about the process as points on a timeline. Following a four-year timeline will distribute the work and the stress. In their freshman and sophomore years students have the important job of establishing themselves as high schoolers, of making new friends and becoming more independent,  of exploring academic, extracurricular, cultural, and athletic interests, and of beginning to forge their identities as young adults. They should be thinking about college in a broad sense at first, then more intentionally in the second half of sophomore year. Activity and intensity will ramp up the summer before junior year and continue in junior and senior years, and it is at that time that the role of parent and counselor - to guide, accompany, and support - increases. 

As the timeline becomes more layered and complex, parents can decide whether the support provided by their child’s school counselor is sufficient to meet the needs of the student and family. An independent counselor can work with students and families at any stage in the process, with the goal of making the process healthier for all.