In addition to general admissions counselling, Adam also provided reapplication analysis for one of
my schools, as well as interview prep. Adam gave me very honest feedback on where my previous
application had fallen short, and also gave me his candid views about my prospects as a reapplicant
for that school (they were not high). If you can’t already tell from his blog, Adam doesn’t mince
words! It was something I appreciated throughout the process of working with him. If an essay
sucked, I was told exactly why. Conversely, if Adam said an essay was “done”, I could be pretty
confident that I didn’t need to worry over it further, and could move on and focus on the other
essays.
Although he was very honest, Adam was never pushy about his views. For example, even though
I decided to proceed with a very small number of applications (one of which was a re-application
to that school) and did not choose any safety school as I was recommended, Adam respected the
choices I had made and was professional and extremely supportive throughout my application
process. In smaller ways as well, throughout the process Adam was always consultative in his
approach, with the result that the applications were all very much ‘me’.
In working with Adam, in addition to having an experienced eye go over my essays and expose
underlying assumptions, areas of weakness, or just pick out weird sentence constructions (happens
when you draft essays at 3am!), I appreciated that he took time to understand me and my
background. We spent a relatively large proportion of the time at the beginning just doing the
getting-to-know-your-background, and talking though my stories and my resume, before I got down
to writing. This gave me a sense of assurance that he wasn’t just following a formula based on a
template, but based on what would work best for me.
During interview prep, he readily recommended alternative admissions counsellors to me (without
my asking) so that I could practise with someone new. This reinforced the fact that Adam was fully
invested in helping me maximise my chances of success.
Finally, if you’re worried about costs, and how much time you will need, Adam will give you an
estimate at the beginning of the process, and will help you manage that. He keeps a strict timelog
and sends that to you after every session so it’s always transparent to you. And he can accomplish a
lot in an hour! His turnaround time was also very quick (I typically got my responses within 24 hours,
and this was during the peak season for R2 applications, around Dec-early Jan).
I would definitely recommend Adam to you.
