What do wealthy parents do to bring their children to elite colleges (legally)

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"Many parents are spending money, it is not new" explains Jill Shulman, who has been working in the field of university admissions as a coach, teacher and evaluator for 20 years. "The alums will be hosting a big event when the president comes to town, they will meet their contacts at school, they will become donors." None of this is new, but the level of this scandal is symptomatic of helicopter periposcopy. . "

Admissions based on donations – though not necessarily illegal – are often not considered ethical or equitable.

But with a constantly expanding landscape of university test preparation companies, academic tutors, personal athletic trainers and university admission consultants, the family with resources can often improve the chances of their child's acceptance without breaking the law.

For some, the solution is to pay a university consultant – such as William Rick Singer, the alleged head of the college admissions scandal – to introduce their child to an institution.

At H & C Education, an application consulting firm based in New Haven, Connecticut, offers students a full-year program – including high school course selection, extracurricular development and test tracking – cost $ 15,000, says co-founder Pierre Huguet. The test preparation courses are extra. Some families start working with them in the first year of high school.

Huguet hopes this scandal will make a clearer distinction between what is acceptable and what is not in the admissions process. "Some parents think they can give their child a place in the best schools," he says. "We have had clients who want us to write college essays who want us to put them in. That's not what we do."

Although his company offers a premium service, it's not the most expensive option, he said. Some go from hundreds of thousands of dollars to over one million, says Huguet.

Court documents filed by college consultant Ivy Coach revealed that the company had charged a parent $ 1.5 million to help her child apply to 22 colleges and seven high school boarding schools.

Many parents are already paying thousands of dollars for test preparation programs for their children. Industry leaders such as Kaplan Test Prep, The Princeton Review and Khan Academy once took up space, but dozens of other companies – such as Noodle Pros, which offers personalized and personalized tutoring from $ 200 to $ 550 time – are emerging.

"There are two problems with test preparation," says Neill Seltzer, managing director of Noodle Pros. "The first problem is that it works, the second is that it costs money, we are aware that we are creating an advantage for those who can afford it." He says the company is proud to pay well trained tutors and works to mitigate this benefit by providing volunteer tutors to underprivileged children.

Along the way, parents could bid on fundraising bids organized by schools when other parents offer internships or opportunities. On CharityBuzz, anyone with this money can buy an internship or an individual meeting with a range of entrepreneurs or artists – and this can also be deducted from taxes.

The process has already started in kindergarten

Matthew Fraser, who runs a university test preparation camp, described the allegations contained in the Varsity Blues admissions scandal.
"These parents could have taken a fraction of the resources they paid for bringing in their children and working with a writing teacher to improve their writing," said Fraser, who runs Education Unlimited, a university test prep camp. . "Not only is the student better prepared to take the tests, but he also writes better papers in all of his classes."

His company trains students in test taking, essay writing, and interviewing techniques, starting at around $ 5,000 for an 11-day session. Or, a student could go on a six-day university tour (East or West Coast), where visits to about twenty different colleges are offered at prices ranging from $ 2,800 to $ 3,400.

Fraser says parents are looking to develop these skills in their children earlier. "Now we start in college and before and, step by step, develop students' skills for several summers."

The program now offers 15 different types of academic success programs starting in the fourth year.

Yelena Shuster, a college essay coach who works as an intake test guru, says the pursuit of excellence can begin even before kindergarten. It starts with private daycares, private elementary schools, she says. Then there are private tutors for children from the age of 7 years old. The preparation of dedicated colleges comes next.

"There is a whole consulting industry where advisors will help them find what is best for them, so that they have the best chance of succeeding," said Shuster.

She said that many of the children she has met with have already begun extracurricular activities that, they say, will look great in a university application.

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"They will write an article on an assistance trip to Guatemala to help fund an orphanage with their parents' money," she said. "It was a joke."

But Shuster recognizes that all the extra effort is often effective. Her own family did not have the money to pay for consulting services or preparation camps while she was applying to the university a little over ten years ago. She eventually attended Columbia University, but not before reading all the books and websites on the best ways to enter alone in the best schools.

"I remember the anxiety I felt for getting into a good school," she says. "I understand why the admissions sector has become out of control.It seems like there is a key to a lifetime of success.And parents may feel that this is the only thing that will guarantee the success of their child."

And many parents may think it's their last hold on control of their children's lives and they have a hard time letting go, Shulman says.

If your main goal as a parent is to bring your child to only one of the top 8 colleges, she says, you have a parenting problem.

Shulman, whose book "Admissions in troubled colleges: Saving your child (and yourself) from madness" will be released in August, indicates that parents accused of having participated in the cheating ploy of a college came honestly from their anxiety, even if their actions were dishonest.

Increased competition for college is everywhere.

"It's really impossible to ignore, if you're trapped, you're normal, you need a strong person to not let it take over you."

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