I guess this brings us to the end of our six-month (or longer?!) journey.
Thanks so much for all of your time and support - it has been really helpful. I keep thinking: no one from my family has ever traveled outside India, and here I've been admitted to the best education brand in the world. This wouldn't have been possible without your help. Thanks so much for that.
If this Covid-19 issues abates over the next few months, then I'd love to meet you for coffee sometime before I leave for Boston in late July. But if not, I wanted you to know that it was a pleasure working with you, and I am grateful for all your support. Once again, thank you.
- Accepted to HKS, Fletcher, and Harris (the last two schools with scholarship)
Hi Karin,
Just got news that I’ve been admitted to Stanford MSME.
Even though we talked through this, omg this is still so hard for me to decide. Never had I thought that I would be choosing between these two beasts in engineering.
Soo.... basically you got me into Stanford, MIT and UC Berkeley. The top in the engineering business.
- Accepted to MIT, UC Berkeley, Stanford
THANK YOU KARIN!
I may have told you a thousand times before like a broken record, but this is the occasion to say it: Thank you for believing in me. I had talked with a couple of consultants before coming across your name on Google, and they told me I'm being too ambitious. Yet you gave me a target to achieve for the GRE, and then you took up the challenge. And then you helped me clarify WHY I am even pursuing higher education.
You signed up to be a consultant, yet you were much more than that: A counselor, motivator, and most importantly someone who taught me not to underestimate myself. I could not have done any of this without your help and guidance. Not only did you edit my essays, but you helped me develop my own story in the truest sense possible. You helped me secure admission to a place that I thought I could only dream of.
- Accepted to MIT Ph.D. program in Aerospace Engineering.
I am at a loss for words when I think of how I might describe how much of an impact Karin Ash has had on my being admitted to my dream program, Cornell University's MEng in Computer Science. With my undergraduate degree in a social science from a public state school, the odds of my getting into Cornell's CS MEng program (ranked 6th in the country) were very low. Thanks to Karin's amazing consulting, I was able to submit 2 very strong applications to Cornell's main campus MEng program and Cornell's NYC campus (Cornell Tech) MEng program and I was ultimately admitted to both!
I will note that, for the application season, I did an exhaustive consultant search, considering over a dozen firms and at least 50 consultants, with the intention of hiring the best of the best. I ended up hiring two different consultants from two different firms (in order to benefit from both of their perspectives). Both consultants (including Karin) were highly experienced (having adcom experience from top schools) and from top consulting firms. This testimony will highlight the areas in which Karin has outperformed in comparison to the other consultant.
Among the many enormous benefits that I have gained from Karin, perhaps the most valuable has been her ability to connect with me, understand my unique experiences/challenges, and help me best frame my story of both overcoming adversity and discovering my passion for computer science. Her admissions committee experience at Cornell gives her an authoritative ability and vision into how to craft an essay that inspires the reader to recognize my intellectual potential at their school, addresses any/all concerns the reader could have, and hits home on every point that an admissions officer from a top program may look for in the essay.
Beyond her exceptional essay advising and editing skills, Karin has vastly exceeded all of my expectations in her ability to provide expert advice including choosing which schools to apply to, how to tailor my application to each program, how to approach my faculty recommenders, how to best reach out to and communicate with Cornell's admissions staff, and how to make the (very difficult decision) of which of my admission offers to accept. For several particularly challenging decisions (including how my fit was for both Cornell programs, and how certain sensitive topics should be addressed in my essay), Karin had--on at least three occasions--gone out of her way to reach out to several of her other distinguished colleagues at Accepted AND reach out to several of her high-ranking contacts at Cornell (including the Director of Admissions at the Cornell's engineering college and the Associate Dean of Cornell Tech) to get me the most comprehensive and well-informed advice possible.
Lastly, I will highlight the general experience I feel that I have had in working with Karin. I purchased two different packages from her, for my applications to both of the Cornell programs. If you are serious about your graduate school applications, ordering one or more package from Karin is an absolute must because Karin fully leverages the freedom granted by the package option to put in as much time as she determines is needed to help me produce the best possible application, no matter how many revisions or emails or calls it takes. Between both packages, I have had 7 calls with her (totaling 4.1 hours), I have received at least 22 essay revisions from her.and we have exchanged hundreds of emails (176 from her). Although the package rate promises a 2-business day turnaround, it has almost always been the case that I would receive her essay revisions the same day within hours (or first thing in the morning at around 7AM). Karin has also, very generously, made herself available during evenings and weekends to accommodate my schedule.
In the realm of graduate admissions consulting, Karin is surely among the most qualified, insightful, motivated, creative, and resourceful that I could ever have hired. She has done everything in her power to help me produce the best applications possible, and I am forever beyond grateful to have been admitted to my dream school, which could not have happened without Karin!
