A Crash Course for College Candidates

Even the color of your fingernails matters, Elaine Auyoung’s private college counselor told her. Keep them unpolished for the Harvard interview so your hands won’t detract from your face. Wear a watch and carry a purse; they make you appear mature.

Detail, details. Elaine’s personal counselor doesn’t miss a step.

Coached and groomed, Elaine believes she’s better prepared, polished and positioned to get into the Ivy League. Perhaps she’s right--Harvard recently sent her an early acceptance slip.

“You have to know how to package yourself and tailor yourself to each school,” said the Irvine high school senior, who despite the nod from Harvard still is sending applications this month to Stanford, Yale, Princeton and Columbia. At the tender age of 17, Elaine is mastering the art of self-marketing. And she’s not alone.

An increasing number of parents are spending thousands of dollars to guarantee their college-minded children hours of individual time with private guidance counselors--a luxury most students lack in public high schools.

Statewide and in Los Angeles County, an average of 1,000 public school students line up to see each guidance counselor. Orange County stands among the state’s worst with a ratio of 1,700 students to each counselor.

Combine numbers like that with the superheated competition for admission to top colleges--most of which have a Jan. 1 application deadline--and the demand for private counselors becomes clear, experts said.

“Parents definitely need the help and students are facing intense pressures none of us had to deal with growing up,” said Pat McDonough, a UCLA associate professor who also studies the industry of independent counselors.

In a 1995 survey of students, McDonough found that nearly 3% of the nation’s freshmen had used a private counselor in high school. Most of those who had were attending prestigious colleges. Indeed, the vast majority of colleges already admit most applicants.

But there are no figures to show whether consulting a private counselor helps a student’s chances of getting into a top college. Moreover, critics point out, the potentially lucrative industry is unregulated, allowing virtually anyone, trained or not, to open for business. And college admissions officers complain that overzealous counselors go too far at times by encouraging students to load their applications with pretentious information.

“Folks who are not credentialed and have little experience end up hanging up shingles and saying they offer professional help,” said Robert Kinnally, dean of admissions at Stanford University. “Those are the ones I’m worried about.”

Fueling the fledgling industry is the competition for admission to top colleges, which has been growing fiercer by the year as the population of graduating high school seniors steadily increases. Stanford University, for example, admitted 18% of its applicants in 1993; by last year, that number had shrunk to 13%. Last year UC Berkeley turned away 13% of an elite group of freshman applicants--those with 4.0 grade-point averages and combined SAT scores of 1400 or above.

Only the Best Need Apply

Competition like that can rattle any student’s confidence.

Elaine Auyoung lays claim to a perfect SAT score of 1600, straight A’s and a stack of Advanced Placement courses she’s tackled. On top of that she has won 17 academic awards, serves as editor in chief at University High School and has played the piano since the first grade.

But is that enough, Elaine wondered? And how does she tactfully weave all her achievements into a punchy 500-word essay required on many admission applications?

“Everyone applying to these schools is so qualified,” she said, staring at the nest of applications on the dining table. “To get into the Ivys, I need to have an edge.”

A $2,000-plus investment brought her that edge, she believes: the expertise and insight of Barbara Barnett, a former Orange public school guidance counselor who opened her own business a decade ago.

With a staff of five, Barnett works as a scholastic den mother to Elaine and a couple hundred others. She sends monthly newsletters nudging students to register early for their college entrance exams and sign up for advanced academic courses. She wants students to send her their grades to keep them on task.

On the application, Barnett inspects draft after draft until the forms are tight and clean.

Meanwhile, one of Barnett’s associates helps students shape their personal statements. She scrawls red arrows and comments to organize introspective prose until it sings. A third staffer coaches teenagers on the delicate politics of a college interview.

“Kids earn their way into colleges by having outstanding grades, taking the right classes and building themselves as a unique product,” Barnett said. “What we do is to give them the guidance to make all that happen.”

The coddling has resulted in some sparkling application packets for Elaine. Where permitted, she sent everything possible, including a four-page resume, a copy of her school newspaper, a photo and an audiocassette of her playing a Rachmaninoff prelude on the piano.

Some colleges strictly forbid these extra touches. Stanford chucks them aside. And the UC system despises them.

Their reasons: admissions officers don’t have the time to sift through bulky packets. Besides, they are looking for skills, not frills, said Stanford’s Kinnally.

“Students who do funny things are misguided . . . and that drives me crazy,” Kinnally said.

“Unfortunately, our culture teaches us that the package is what counts,” he said. “But we’re really in the business of seeing what is the student’s essence.”

Harvard accepts tapes and other supplements, but some applicants have gone much further, attempting to win over admissions officers by sending them baked goods and other treats. One student even sent a pack of pencils with her name engraved on them, said Marlyn McGrath Lewis, the university’s admissions director.

“I don’t think we, or selective colleges, are fooled by packaging and presentations that lack substance,” she said.

Some contend that the trend toward private counseling is creating an even greater disparity between the haves and have-nots.

“We’d like to think that kids get into college based on motivation and intelligence,” said Pat Callan, executive director of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education in San Jose. “But unfortunately, the private counseling industry is just one more factor in this widening gap between the opportunities available for the affluent and the nonaffluent--and that has nothing to do with the talent of the kid.”

The Other Approach

Kenny Di Fiore, a senior at Woodbridge High School in Irvine, doesn’t begrudge his peers who get private help. He says his biggest frustration has been jockeying for time with his school guidance counselor. In early November, he was one question away from finishing his UC applications--how to label the college calculus course he’s taking--but it took more than a week to find out the answer, which he eventually got from another source.

“Usually, you have to wait up to a week to see a counselor,” Kenny said.

To save money, some public schools rely heavily on guidance technicians, or uncredentialed staff who mainly do course scheduling and make sure students graduate on time.

Each campus in the Huntington Beach Union High School District has one career counselor to help students with college planning. In addition, a handful of guidance technicians oversee students’ academic performance.

The same goes for Santa Maria High School, a 2,800-student campus just north of Santa Barbara with one college counselor and six technicians. Assistant Principal Jim Boyle said the school switched to more technicians in 1979 because of budget cuts; their pay is a third that of a credentialed counselor, he said.

“Our students are not getting shortchanged in the least,” Boyle said, adding that one college advisor is enough for the estimated 20% of the seniors who go on to four-year colleges.

John Amdon, a guidance counselor of 15 years at Foothill High School in Tustin who also works as a private counselor, disagrees.

“Nothing can replace a trained individual to work with individuals or a group of students,” he said.

As a public school counselor, he admitted, his time with 600 students is limited. Only 10% of his time is dedicated to college planning.

The shortage of time with public school counselors creates a rising demand for--and supply of--private counselors.

“Our membership has doubled in the last three years.” said Mark Sklarow, executive director of the Virginia-based Independent Educational Consultants Assn. He said he receives about 100 membership requests each month.

His group now has about 300 members. Sklarow said the number is low because he accepts only experienced, fully credentialed counselors. About a third are former counselors at private or public schools, and another third come from college admissions offices. There are 27 members from California.

While there are well-qualified counselors who don’t belong to his association, Sklarow and other experts caution that just about anyone can claim to be a college counselor.

To work in public schools, guidance counselors must earn a credential, usually by completing a master’s degree in educational counseling or student services. In some school districts, counselors are required to attend college admissions conferences and professional development seminars, said Milton Wilson, who oversees counseling programs at the state Department of Education.

But in the private sector, some so-called counselors don’t receive any formal training in the field.

Barnett, on the other hand, is a veteran high school college counselor who started helping students privately on the side while working with public schools. Through word of mouth, the demand for her expertise escalated, leading her to work independently full-time from her home, she said. She declines to say how much her private business brings in, but she works with about 200 students a year, charging $2,000 to $3,000 apiece depending on various factors.

Business Is Booming

Although she doesn’t advertise, Barnett receives more calls than she can handle annually. Even sixth-graders sign up with her--mainly to get on her waiting list for the four-year high school program that covers study skills, academic planning and college applications.

Mark Corkery has the advantage of having worked for the other side. Formerly an academic counselor for Boston University, Corkery now runs an Irvine consulting service that is staffed with credentialed advisors and is well-known for setting up college tours.

Connie Cooper in Tustin has 17 years of experience in intensive search for college money and scholarships.

“It’s an intimidating process,” said Dennis Carreon of Seal Beach, whose daughter, Sarah, is working with Cooper this year. “Identifying the schools was tough. The next step was to find merit money and where she may be eligible for grants and loans.”

Independent counselors say their job is about more than polishing applications. Often, they say, they help students find the right school.

Kelsey Long’s college wish-list is an unusual one for Southern California students. She is aiming for respected but perhaps less famous liberal arts programs at Colby College in Maine and Middlebury College in Vermont.

An adventurous honors student, Kelsey said she is eager to travel, but didn’t know where to look.

Corkery helped Kelsey plan a trip to visit 13 campuses. He combs through her essays. He encourages her to aim high. And he nags so she won’t procrastinate.

“He’s able to say things your mom can’t say and the little technical things your high school counselor doesn’t have time to say,” the Newport Harbor High School senior said.

And after the crush of college deadlines, most counselors advise students on which schools they might want to choose. Despite her early acceptance to Harvard, Elaine Auyoung still wants to weigh her options after hearing from all the plum schools where she’s applying.

“Maybe I could have gotten in without [Barnett’s] help,” she said. “But she helped me make the best impression possible.”

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Getting Started

The pursuit of a spot at a good college begins at the start of high school, many guidance counselors say. Students should enroll in challenging classes and take part in extracurricular programs, and gather college information the summer before their junior year. Here are some Web sites to help you get going.

https://www.campustours.com

* Take virtual campus tours through this site, which also connects you to home pages of public and private colleges and universities in the United States.

https://www.aaced.com

* The American College Entrance Directory provides college links and helpful tips for college-bound students.

https://www.fihe.org

* This independent higher education network links you to 630 private colleges and universities in the United States.

https://www.educationalconsulting.org

* The Independent Educational Consulting Assn. includes information on private counselors and a national contact list of certified members.

https://www.finaid.org

* A comprehensive site listing financial aid resources and tips.