Questions to Ask a Private College Counselor

The questions

Open any question to see why it works.

1. 1

   How many students are you working with in this application year?

   Caseload is the single number that predicts availability in October and November, when everything happens at once. Ask for the count of current seniors specifically, since a counselor with forty seniors and a large underclass roster is busiest exactly when you need them.

2. 2

   What is included in the fee, and what gets billed separately?

   Packages vary enormously in what counts as extra: additional essays, scholarship applications, transfer work, extra meetings, phone calls with parents. Ask for the exclusions list rather than the inclusions list, because the exclusions are where the second invoice comes from.

3. 3

   When would we start, and when exactly does your work end?

   Some counselors finish at submission, others stay through waitlists, financial aid appeals, and the May decision. The end date matters more than the start date, since spring is when families most want someone to call.

4. 4

   Who would actually be sitting with my child: you, or an associate?

   Larger practices sell the founder and deliver an associate. That is not automatically bad, but you should meet the person, see their background, and know whether the founder reviews the list and the essays or only signs the contract.

5. 5

   What did you do before this work, and what training do you have in it?

   The useful backgrounds are admissions office experience, high school counseling, or a formal certificate program. Someone whose entire qualification is that their own children got in somewhere is selling one data point, and their information is already several years stale.

6. 6

   How many campuses have you visited in the last two years, and which ones?

   Campus visits and admissions-officer contact are how a counselor knows that a program changed, a major got impacted, or a school started weighting demonstrated interest. Answers built entirely on rankings and websites are information you already have for free.

7. 7

   How do you build a list, and how many schools end up on it?

   Listen for whether the process starts with the student or with a template. A good answer describes a first conversation about what the student wants out of four years, then constraints such as money and distance, then names. Lists that arrive at the first meeting were not built for your child.

8. 8

   How does cost factor into the list you build?

   Many counselors treat affordability as a separate conversation that happens after the list is set, which is how families end up with acceptances they cannot use. Ask whether they run net price calculators, whether they include schools likely to offer merit aid, and whether they will say a school is a bad financial idea.

9. 9

   How much of the essay do you touch?

   This is the question with the widest range of honest answers, from brainstorming and line notes only, to sentence-level rewriting. Get the line in plain words, because your child will be asked to write on demand later, and an essay that does not sound like them is a risk in an admissions read.

10. 10

    What happens when a student's list is unrealistic, and how do you tell the family?

    You are hiring someone partly to deliver bad news you cannot deliver at home. Ask for the actual script they use. A counselor who says it rarely comes up is either avoiding the conversation or agreeing with whatever the family already wants.

11. 11

    What do you expect from my child each week, and what happens when they do not do it?

    The whole model depends on the student doing homework between meetings. Find out whether there is a consequence, whether missed work rolls into your paid hours, and whether the counselor chases the student or reports back to you.

12. 12

    How do you work with the school counselor, and do you tell them you are involved?

    Some high schools are relaxed about outside counselors and some are not, and the school still controls the transcript, the recommendations, and often the early decision policy. A counselor who works around the school instead of with it can create friction your child absorbs.

13. 13

    How do you advise on testing now, and how do you decide whether to submit scores?

    Policies at individual colleges keep moving, so this question tests whether their information is current. Look for a school-by-school answer tied to published score ranges, not a blanket rule applied to everyone.

14. 14

    Do you receive any payment or referral fee from programs, tutors, or summer courses you recommend?

    Referral arrangements are common and are not always disclosed unless you ask directly. The answer does not have to be no, but it should be specific, and anything undisclosed should change how you read every recommendation that follows.

15. 15

    How do you handle early decision, given that it is a binding financial commitment?

    Early decision is where the counselor's incentives and your family's can diverge, since it improves outcomes on paper and removes your ability to compare aid offers. A careful counselor raises the money side before recommending it rather than after.

16. 16

    Do you help with activities and summer plans, or only with the applications themselves?

    Starting in junior year, this is often where the real value is. Be wary of anyone selling packaged summer programs as an admissions advantage, and ask instead what they suggest for a student with a part-time job and no budget.

17. 17

    What do you do with waitlists, deferrals, and appeals?

    This is the work that happens after most contracts have quietly ended. Ask whether letters of continued interest and aid appeals are included, since these are the moments when experienced help is worth the most.

18. 18

    Which families are a bad fit for you?

    Anyone with a real practice has turned people away. Naming a type, such as families who want a specific school guaranteed or students who will not write, shows a defined method. Saying they work well with everyone means the method bends to whoever is paying.

19. 19

    If we are unhappy three months in, what happens?

    Get the refund and exit terms before you sign, not from the contract's fine print afterward. Many packages are paid in full up front and prorated by milestone rather than by hours used, which is a very different thing when you leave in November.

20. 20

    What can you honestly not do for us?

    The correct answer includes influencing an admissions decision. Any suggestion of relationships, pull, or insider access at a specific college is a reason to end the meeting, since no legitimate counselor has that and the claim itself tells you how they sell.