MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, and Cambridge, high school students from all over the world dream of walking through the fabled hallways of these elite institutions and getting a chance to attend lectures taught by Nobel laureates. In 2021, there was a 41% increase in the number of Indian students pursuing their undergraduate degrees from schools abroad.
However, given the stark contrast between the admissions processes of Indian and foreign universities, juggling the different parts of the application—curating college lists, writing essays, applying for summer programs—can prove to be quite challenging. Education consultants often help bear the load of the application process, allowing scholars to focus on their extracurricular profile development and honing essential life skills.
Choosing a consultant can be daunting, here are the five vital factors to consider while choosing the right consultant for your overseas education journey:
- Experience
The most important factor while choosing an education consultant is experience: both their years of experience in the education industry and their personal experiences with the application process. Having experts who have experienced and have gone through the process themselves allows them to offer an insider set of tools to help students navigate the complexities of the application.
The team of consultants must be intensively trained, and must encompass a diverse company of counsellors, writers, and subject-experts acting with a shared sense of meaning and purpose, maniacally focused on transforming students and achieving the best admissions results.
- Personalisation
Each student has a unique set of talents and abilities. Therefore, the education consultant must tailor their mentorship to best fit the students’ individual journey by cultivating and nurturing their natural brand of creative intelligence. From deciding majors, zeroing in on suitable programs, and curating college lists based on their academic and financial resources, scholars must receive one-on-one attention and should be given flexibility based on their needs and desires.
A well rounded team of admissions experts, research specialists, writers, psychologists, and tech mentors—all educated at the best colleges in India and abroad— is essential to make sure that all the needs of the student are met by the consultants. Through intimate guidance, the consultant must fill many roles: mentor, life coach, college counselling expert, and most importantly, cheerleader!
- Results
Counsellors must follow a philosophy of holistic coaching—embracing both depth and breadth—to achieve a dual purpose: to help students become the best versions of themselves and, as a result, get them into the top colleges in the world. These results of the education consultant must speak for themselves, their commitment to excellence must be unparalleled.
From elite universities in the US, UK, Canada, and other countries, the consultant must have a high and consistent rate of acceptances across different majors and disciplines.
The hallmark of a good education consultant is an underlying philosophy of challenging themselves to embrace innovation, chase quality, and push boundaries by incorporating best practices in organisational excellence.
- Reviews and recommendations
A good education consultancy is incomplete without positive reviews from previous clients and scholars. Before choosing an overseas education consultant, it is imperative to carry out research about the people involved and the overall brand. Education is a long-term investment with lifelong returns; going through reviews, watching student testimonials, and contacting previous students is essential before committing to an education consultant.
An education consultant is useful in navigating the rough waters through the incredible Odyssey that is studying abroad. Although this is your ship, for YOU are the captain, having a trusty mentor figure can go a long way. At Athena, we empower high-school students to gain admission into the most elite and selective undergraduate universities worldwide. Our mission is to transform the Indian education system by cultivating and mentoring the intellectually-curious scholars and leaders of tomorrow.
(This article is written by Rahul Subramaniam, Co-founder, and MD, of Athena Education, and the views expressed in this article are his own)
