"I am blown away by this whole experience. I am amazed at how well the process worked for guiding our teams to create meaningful personal statements. Frankly, the students were even amazed at their ability. I hope to be invited again and again as a Writing Coach. What College Summit is doing is believing in the young people most others have written off. Your program is causing them to see their own potential for excellence.”

-Alexandria Balkissoon (Gainesville, FL), Graduate Student and Certified Health Education Specialist, College Summit Writing Coach

“I had assumed that a New York City kid, an average student at best, with no money and whose parents never went to college, would feed his soul a regular diet of pop culture entertainment. I had totally sold Victor short. It was mortifying. But it was useful. It reminded me what the college application personal statements are meant to accomplish-- to help admissions officers do what I did, to get past my preconceptions about Victor and see the actual person—a strong young teenager with a passion for the arts. It was pretty embarrassing for me, but pretty great, too.”

-Randy Cohen (New York, NY), Columnist for The New York Times Sunday Magazine, College Summit Writing Coach and Writing Coach Coordinator

“The entirety of the College Summit experience transforms these students from kids that didn’t want to talk to me and ‘HATE writing,’ into expressive youth who will go on to college. I find it rewarding to play a small part in something bigger than myself, to receive the gift of listening to these students and helping them articulate their dreams. If that makes me selfish, so be it.”

-Hilary Thorne (Boston, MA), Marketing & Communications Project Manager, College Summit Writing Coach

“It is a great feeling to see teenagers begin to believe in themselves. In just an hour of counseling, I see hope in their faces. Their faces glow with the confident thought, ‘I know I can do this and I know there are people here to help me.’ Sometimes they literally stand taller. At College Summit, we create an atmosphere of hope.”

-Barry Baker (Long Beach, CA), Head Counselor and Director of College Counseling at the California Academy of Mathematics & Science, College Summit College Counselor

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