PrepScholar vs Empowerly Admissions Consulting: Which Is Better?

Getting accepted into college takes more than good grades and test scores. To get into your dream schools, you need a polished application that tells the story of who you are and why you’re a great fit.

One way to make sure your college applications are top notch is by working with a college admissions consulting company, like PrepScholar or Empowerly. While these companies offer many of the same services, they differ in terms of quality, cost, and the results you’ll see if you choose to work with them. 

To help you figure out which college prep company is the right fit for you, we’ll provide a full comparison of PrepScholar and Empowerly's admissions consulting offerings. Keep reading to learn more!

Section 1: Rationale

Section 2: The Best College Admissions Consultant

Section 3: Comparison of Core Offerings

Section 4: PrepScholar vs. Empowerly Comparison Table

Section 5: Comparison Point 1 - Counselor Experience and Responsiveness

Section 6: Comparison Point 2 - Results

Section 7: Comparison Point 3 - Personalization

Section 8: Comparison Point 4 - Value and Price Transparency

Section 9: Overall Pros and Cons

Section 10: FAQs

How We Picked Our Admissions Counseling Winner

To put together our comparison, we’ve spent hours researching, testing, and reviewing real student feedback on both PrepScholar and Empowerly’s admissions consulting offerings to give you a comprehensive picture of what they have to offer.

If you decide to work with an admissions consulting company, it’s important to know exactly how they’ll guide you through the college admissions process and what they’ll do to ensure that your college application is the best it can be. To help you pick the program that’s most likely to help you succeed, we reviewed both admissions consulting companies based on the following offerings and features:

• Value
• Price Transparency
• Range of product/program options
• Counselor experience
• Matching system
• Technology integration
• Results
• Personalization
• User reviews

Knowing exactly what you’ll get before you make your final decision will ensure that you end up working with the admissions consulting service that helps you get accepted into your dream schools. Read on to find out which admissions consulting service is most likely to help you achieve your college admissions goals!

PrepScholar vs. Empowerly: Which Has the Best Admissions Consulting? 

PrepScholar offers a personalized mentorship process that helps students build a college application that’s centered on an authentic, compelling narrative that showcases why they’re a great fit for each college they apply to.

Because of their commitment to intensive, customized guidance through one-on-one counseling, we rank PrepScholar as the winner for college admissions consulting.

Overall Winner: PrepScholar

PrepScholar goes the extra mile by matching students with admissions counselors based on more than just academic compatibility. Their personality-based matching process ensures that each student works with a counselor who has a deep understanding of their needs and goals — at 20% the cost of boutique admissions consulting companies.

Through continuous communication and intensive one-on-one sessions, PrepScholar provides the personalized guidance that students need to find and articulate their authentic story to resonate with top colleges. With easy, multi-year bundling with test prep resources as a bonus offering, PrepScholar provides the comprehensive college admissions counseling students need to achieve their goals and stand out in a competitive admissions landscape. 

Best for Efficient, Personalized Counseling: PrepScholar

PrepScholar’s admissions counselors provide a fully personalized admissions plan, tailored to each student’s unique personality and story, situated in a meticulously organized, data-driven timeline. You’ll stay laser-focused on crafting stand-out applications at every step of the process, and you’ll be guided by a consultant who fully understands your needs and goals and empowers you to meet them.

Best for Students Who Want a Team-Based Experience: Empowerly 

Although PrepScholar offers intensive, one-on-one support, Empowerly is known for its team-based, collaborative approach to college admissions consulting. If you’re seeking feedback from multiple experts on your application materials throughout the admissions process, Empowerly is a top-notch choice.

Comparing Core College Admissions Counseling Offerings

It’s important to know exactly what you’ll get from a college admissions consulting program before you commit. Below, we detail the core features that PrepScholar and Empowerly offer for admissions counseling.

PrepScholar Admissions Counseling Overview

PrepScholar offers two main admissions counseling packages: the Complete Admissions Package and the Annual Mentorship Package.

Both programs are designed to maximize your chances of admission to your choice schools by helping you build a spike approach that brings an authentic, compelling narrative to every aspect of your college application.

Complete Admissions Package, PrepScholar’s most popular offering, uses a personality-based matching process to pair you with an admissions counselor who understands your goals and will guide you through the entire college application process. Working together in weekly one-on-one meetings, you and your counselor will build 7 to 20 college applications, develop a killer application narrative strategy, and create a list of schools (with reach, target, and safety options). Your admissions expert will also provide essay coaching, timeline management tips, interview prep, and scholarship guidance so you're supported in every aspect of the college application process. This package is designed for 12th graders and rising seniors in order to make the most out a compressed admissions timeline.

The Annual Mentorship Package provides comprehensive admissions support for 9th, 10th, or 11th graders. Over the course of one year of high school, admissions counselors guide you through a profile-building plan that includes bi-monthly one-on-one meetings, extracurriculars management, summer activity planning, coursework selection, major and career exploration, SAT/ACT strategy, and passion project guidance. This gives you a head-start on the college admissions process, which is a significant benefit as college admissions becomes even more competitive at top-tier schools. 

This admissions package also comes in three distinct multi-year packages: Freshman Early Edge, Sophomore Success, and Junior Jumpstart. In addition to getting everything in the Annual Mentorship Package through the end of 11th grade, these packages include the Complete Admissions Package during 12th grade and complimentary SAT/ACT prep, plus a multi-year pricing discount. Essentially, this is an all-in-one package designed to help students build the skills they'll need for a successful college admissions process. Additionally, these packages are customized for each year of high school so students maximize the impact of their studies and extracurriculars. 

PrepScholar also offers two a la carte admissions counseling programs: Essay Coaching and Review and Passion Project Development. These services are included in the core admissions counseling packages, but you can also purchase them separately as one-off packages.

With Essay Coaching and Review, 12 graders and rising seniors get unlimited essay reviews and personalized guidance with every aspect of college admissions essay writing, from brainstorming topics, to planning your essay, to final editing before application deadlines arrive. 

Passion Project Development provides one-on-one guidance for 9th through 11th graders to turn your interests into a standout achievement that admissions officers will remember. PrepScholar emphasizes a "spike approach" that encourages students to pick one or two interests and go deep in your involvement with them to show your dedication and leadership abilities. Your counselor will help you showcase your spike through a project that solves real-world problems and creates meaningful change.

Finally, PrepScholar’s admissions counseling programs come with a free initial consultation call, a 3-day risk-free trial, and a 100% refund anytime before your first session.

Empowerly Admissions Counseling Overview 

Empowerly offers three main college admissions consulting programs: Freshman Admissions Counseling, Sophomore Admissions Counseling, and Junior Admissions Counseling.

Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior admissions counseling packages have the same program structure and offer tiers starting with basic, standard, and premium, with higher tiers offering more services at a higher price point.

All three core admissions counseling programs come with a set number of counseling sessions, essay edit rounds, and admissions committee reviews that increase from the basic to the premium tier. Each program includes Empowerly Score, a proprietary calculator backed by data from thousands of Empowerly student experiences to construct your applicant profile, one-on-one counseling sessions, essay editing and review, and review of your completed applications by a committee of consultants who provide feedback before your submit to colleges.

In addition to standard features, Empowerly offers several specialized programs, including Passion Project support, AI Scholar Program, Startup Internships, test prep, and a Research Scholar program. All of these are designed for a la carte support or can be added on to the core college admissions counseling packages at an additional cost.

Empowerly’s admissions counseling programs come with a free 30 minute consultation, unlimited college research access, and a month-by-month roadmap to keep you on track.

PrepScholar vs. Empowerly Comparison Table

To help you get a sense of how PrepScholar and Empowerly compare, here’s a side-by-side breakdown of all of the core features and offerings each admissions consulting company provides.

Comparison Point 1 – Counselor Experience and Responsiveness

College admissions counseling is only as good as its consultants. Here’s how Empowerly and PrepScholar compare on counselor experience and responsiveness. 

PrepScholar

PrepScholar’s admissions counselors are all 99th-percentile scorers on the SAT or ACT, graduates of the most prestigious universities, and experienced educators. They're also highly trained and skilled at guiding students through the process of building a narrative-driven college application that will make them stand out as college applicants.

To help you get to know your counselor ahead of time, PrepScholar publishes bios for each counselor on their website. These bios include a detailed description of the counselor’s education, professional experience, time at PrepScholar, and their strengths and passions as a college admissions counselor.

As you work with your counselor, you’ll have weekly one-on-one meetings or bi-monthly meetings (depending on the package you choose!) with your counselor via Zoom or Google Meet, with email used when information needs to be documented in writing. PrepScholar counselors adhere to a structured timeline to completion of your college application, which means weekly meetings stay focused on reviewing your application materials, addressing issues you’re having, and ensuring you’re making high-quality progress toward your goals.

Outside of weekly meetings, counselors are available to answer questions through email and review application materials through online document services like Google Drive and Dropbox. Using these document management tools, counselors will provide detailed written feedback on your application materials, recommendations for improvement, and comprehensive essay edits. You’ll be able to review and implement their feedback on your own time, and maintain ongoing communication threads

Many PrepScholar consultants are happy to take calls in the early mornings or late nights USA time, providing flexibility to U.S. students with busy schedules and easy access for international students in different time zones.  communicative and supportive, providing strong one-on-one access from the beginning to the end of the application process.

Empowerly

According to their hiring page, Empowerly admissions team members should be experienced high school counselors who have previously focused on college admissions and graduated from a top 50, national university. They should also possess a passion for education and a talent for teaching, essay writing, and essay editing.

Throughout the admissions counseling process, Empowerly consultants communicate with students via an online portal, where you can send messages to your counselor, track tasks and deadlines, receive essay editing, and review your application with former college admissions counselors. Video conferencing is used for one-on-one meetings, and you can email your counselor in between sessions with additional questions.

While Empowerly aims to hire high-quality, committed admissions counselors, some reviewers have noted inconsistencies in counselor qualifications. Empowerly tends to have a high turnover rate, and some students claim to have worked with counselors who were still in college, instead of an experienced college graduate. Their internal vetting process isn’t made publicly available, so it isn’t clear what Empowerly’s hiring process looks like in practice.

Despite these inconsistencies, Empowerly counselors are expected to be available for afternoons, evenings, and weekends in order to maximize scheduling flexibility for the students they work with. Testimonials describe their counselors as helpful, clear, and available enough to guide students through deadlines and next steps, even outside of normal hours. Empowerly also fosters a collaborative team environment, which aims to build structured accountability and confidence in each student they work with.

Another recurring complaint from some students is that responsiveness varies depending on the counselor, with some responding more slowly and consistently during peak application months, which is a critical time for students. And while the team-based approach may work for some students, others may find juggling feedback and interactions with multiple consultants to be more confusing than helpful.

Winner: PrepScholar

With a preference for a professional background in college admissions counseling at top colleges, Empowerly sometimes struggles to meet it. In practice, the responsiveness and consistency of their consultants can vary widely, which is why we rank PrepScholar’s detailed transparency about counselor qualifications as the winner here.

Comparison Point 2 — Results

Quality college admissions consulting does more than get you through application deadlines–it boosts your chances of getting accepted to your choice schools. Keep reading to find out how PrepScholar and Empowerly compare based on the results they help their students achieve.

PrepScholar

PrepScholar’s admissions counselors help their students get consistent results. For over a decade, they’ve helped more than 2,200 students get accepted into college. According to their website, on average, PrepScholar students apply to 16 colleges and 98% are admitted to at least one of their top 10 choice schools.

PrepScholar students also achieve better-than-average success applying to elite colleges. Their students achieve a 31% acceptance rate at Ivy League schools, which is 6.1 times higher than the national average of 4.8%. At Top 10 U.S. colleges, PrepScholar students hold a 38% acceptance rate, beating the national average of 4.9%.

Students who begin their college admissions journey with PrepScholar before 12th grade tend to have an advantage too. They’re three times more likely to gain Ivy League admission than those who start admissions counseling their senior year.

PrepScholar admissions counselors spend 26 times more time with the students they work with than high school counselors, giving students the comprehensive guidance they need to produce stellar college applications.

PrepScholar claims that 9 out of 10 clients recommend their admissions consulting services. With a 4.6 star rating on Trustpilot, PrepScholar’s admissions counselors are praised for building strong connections, doing an excellent job helping students tell their story, and providing exceptional essay writing guidance. They also respond to 100% of negative reviews, and typically reply within 24 hours.

Some reviewers have noted that PrepScholar isn’t fully focused on Ivy League admissions, but is instead dedicated to helping students achieve admission to a broader range of schools.

Empowerly

Empowerly boasts an 11 times higher acceptance rate than average, with 98% of their students gaining admission to Top 100 colleges. Since 2016, Empowerly claims, 98% of their students got accepted to at least one of their top three schools.

Empowerly also provides stats showing their acceptance rate at individual Ivy League schools in comparison to the national average. For instance, Empowerly’s acceptance rate at Yale is 7%, while the national average is 3.7%. While these comparisons are useful for students who are aiming for admission to elite colleges, including some more general figures, like acceptance rate to Top 10 or Top 20 schools, would be more useful for a broader swath of applicants.

By claiming to provide 25 times more time with admissions counselors, Empowerly provides a personalized counseling experience that helps students put together top-notch college applications.

While Empowerly holds a 4.8 rating on Trustpilot, it’s worth noting that they only respond to 66% of negative reviews, with a response time of one week. 

Winner: PrepScholar

When it comes to getting results, Empowerly sends mixed signals: while the fine print on their website claims that they’re dedicated to helping students gain admissions to all kinds of colleges, they only publish specific acceptance rates to Ivy and Top 10 schools, which suggests a bias for applicants to elite colleges. That’s why we rank PrepScholar’s commitment to helping students get accepted into any dream school as the winner for helping students get results.

Comparison Point 3 — Personalization

For an admissions consulting program to work to your advantage, your counselor must customize your journey so that it meets your needs and college admissions goals. Here’s how PrepScholar and Empowerly compare on personalization.

PrepScholar

Personalization is at the forefront of PrepScholar’s college admissions counseling philosophy. By gathering detailed information about your background and personality, matching you with a dedicated expert counselor, and working with you to build your unique spike approach, PrepScholar provides a customized admissions counseling experience that’s designed to help you get accepted into your top colleges.

When you get started, PrepScholar sends you their Complete Student Profile Questionnaire. Using this virtual quiz, they gather information that will help your counselor understand you fully, including your childhood experiences, your most important influences, your goals for the future, and much, much more. The questionnaire takes around 2-5 hours and engages you in deep self-reflection, which is the foundation on which you’ll build an authentic, compelling college application narrative.

Using the detailed questionnaire info, PrepScholar matches you with your personal consultant who follows you through every step of the admissions process. Within a week of matching, you’ll have a live video chat with your consultant, where your consultant will dig deeper into your background and ask clarifying questions to gain a more complete picture of your college admissions goals.

Next, your counselor will start building your overall application strategy, with your unique personal narrative at the center. Working together, you’ll answer critical questions that will guide your application strategy, including: What is the story that we want to tell about you? What is your past, present, and future? What is going to tie together all your experiences in a way that will be exciting to colleges?

Through these three steps, PrepScholar kicks off your fully customized admissions coaching journey. During your weekly sessions, you’ll focus on the PrepScholar Methodology, a strategic approach that helps you build and showcase a unique “spike approach,” rather than spreading yourself too thin trying to check all the boxes. Your spike is what sets you apart from other applicants and shows colleges that you’re going to accomplish great things!

A standout feature of PrepScholar’s college admissions consulting is their application essay strategy. To help you tell the kind of compelling story that colleges want to see, your consultant will coach you through writing and editing essays that talk about you as a person and what drives you.

Through each remaining step of the process, your counselor will thoroughly tailor the experience to your needs and goals until you’ve heard back from every college you applied to and received an acceptance to your top choice school.

Empowerly

Empowerly’s approach to personalizing the admissions counseling process is largely based on data-driven insights, which are gleaned from each student’s Empowerly Score.

After a free consultation with Empowerly’s program advisor, your goals and interests are placed in their matching algorithm to identify your best counselor match. During this period, you can also decide which program tier you want—Basic, Standard, or Premium—which determines how many counseling sessions, essay edit rounds, and admissions committee application review you’ll get. Once your match is made, you’ll meet your counselor and begin building out your college application strategy.

To customize your application strategy, your counselor will use the Empowerly Score, a data-driven tool that evaluates college application readiness across academics, extracurriculars, essays, and more using a proprietary algorithm based on hundreds of data points from colleges and universities and past student applications. Using this tool, you and your counselor can model different scenarios to get a sense of how they might impact your application profile before making final decisions. The goal is to help you understand your strengths and areas of improvement, then use what you learn to optimize your application strategy.

Empowerly also offers personalized college list building, which automatically categorizes schools as safety, target, reach, or high-reach for you based on the schools’ latest acceptance rates and your Empowerly Score. This process is key to finding the best fit schools for you and maximizing your chances of success.

You’ll work one-on-one with your counselor in weekly sessions, but Empowerly’s admissions consulting operates on a team basis. In addition to your admissions counselor, you’ll receive advice and feedback from a college research team, an essay editing team, and industry leaders from a range of fields. You’ll also have a case manager who oversees your entire experience and is available for consultation if you have questions or concerns.

While the team-based approach tends to work well for students who want a high volume of feedback from a range of experts, some students have noted that working with multiple teams at once and processing layers of feedback can be overwhelming.

In addition to the core admissions packages, which are tailored based on whether you’re a freshman, sophomore, or junior in high school, Empowerly offers specialized programs to meet different student needs, such as the GOALS program for neurodivergent students, a test prep program, and passion project support.

Winner: Empowerly (Team Collaboration), PrepScholar (Personalization)

If you’re looking for a broad team of consultants to provide feedback and guidance on your college applications, Empowerly can’t be beat. But if you want intensive, one-on-one guidance from an admissions consultant who’s fully qualified to help you develop a spike approach that makes you stand out from the crowd, PrepScholar is your best bet for college admissions counseling. 

Comparison Point 4 — Value and Price Transparency

If you want to choose an admissions consulting service that brings you the most value, you need to know exactly what services and features you’ll get at each price point. Here’s how PrepScholar and Empowerly compare on value and price transparency.

PrepScholar

PrepScholar offers two core programs for college admissions counseling: the Complete Admissions package for 12th graders and rising seniors, and the Annual Mentorship Package, which is for 9th through 11th graders. Each package can be customized to align with your college admissions goals and varies in cost accordingly.

PrepScholar’s Complete Admissions package is designed to support high school seniors through a full year of the college admissions process. With this package, you’ll get weekly one-on-one meetings with your admissions counselor, unlimited communication with your consultant, and comprehensive support as you craft your applications and navigate the admissions process after you submit your applications.

Because PrepScholar recognizes that each student’s college admissions goals are unique, they’ve built the Complete Admissions package so that it can be customized based on how many colleges you want to apply to. You can choose from packages that provide comprehensive support for up to 7, 12, 16, or 20 college applications, with the cost increasing the more applications your package includes.

The Annual Mentorship Package also offers multiple customizable tiers that come with price discounts. At the base tier, you’ll get a full year of admissions counseling during your 9th, 10th, or 11th grade year of high school. This package includes a 12-month profile building plan, bi-monthly one-on-one meetings, extracurriculars managements, summer activity planning, coursework selection, major and career exploration, and passion project planning.

PrepScholar’s mentorship counseling also comes in multi-year packages based on your year of high school: Freshman Early Edge Package, Sophomore Success, or Junior Jumpstart. All three of these packages come with access to all of the services included in the Annual Mentorship Package through the end of your 11th grade year.

The earlier in high school that you begin college admissions counseling with PrepScholar, the more support you’ll receive–and the more you’ll save. With each mentorship package, you receive full college admissions guidance through the end of 11th grade. If you start as a freshman, that translates to three years of support, with a multi-year savings discount of up to $3,100.

As a bonus, the Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior multi-year packages include the Complete Admissions Package and PrepScholar’s popular Complete Online SAT and ACT Prep completely free of charge.

PrepScholar packs maximum value into these multi-year packages by meticulously tailoring their services to the college admissions demands that students most commonly face during each moment in their high school career. Combined with personalized guidance based on a deep understanding of your needs and goals, the mentorship admissions packages are built to guide students to success every step of the way.

By allowing students to work with their counselors to set a meeting schedule and application completion timeline, PrepScholar helps students stay engaged with the admissions counseling process, building confidence and taking ownership of their progress along the way.

While the initial year of multi-year mentorship packages is generally non-refundable after the risk-free three-day trial ends, subsequent unused years can be refunded if you discontinue the admissions counseling program early. In order to avoid issues with accessing a refund, it’s crucial to read your admissions counseling contract before you begin your program, and reach out to PrepScholar via email if you have any questions or concerns.

Empowerly

Empowerly offers three core programs for college admissions counseling: Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior. Each package can be customized based on number of counseling sessions, essay edit rounds, and Admissions Committee application reviews. As the total number of these services increase at each tier, so does the price of the admissions counseling package.

Each core admissions counseling program comes in three different tiers: Basic, Standard, and Premium. At each tier, the Freshman package is the least costly, and the Junior package is the most expensive.

All one-on-one counseling sessions offer the same range of services, which include but aren’t limited to academic and extracurricular planning and assessment, college list finalization (including early decision/action deadlines, and intended majors), application theme strategy, essay, personal statement, and resume crafting, recommendation letters and reference strategy, interview preparation, application support before AdCom review, deferral/waitlist strategy, and scholarship application support.

At the Premium tier, Empowerly’s counseling packages offer a significant number of sessions, editing rounds, and reviews. At the Freshman Premium tier, you’ll get 62 counseling sessions, 40 rounds of essay reviews, and unlimited Admissions Committee application reviews. For the Junior Premium package, you’ll get 42 counseling sessions, 26 rounds of essay editing, and unlimited Admissions Committee application reviews.

On paper, these numbers look great, but for students who want to organize their admissions counseling program based on the number of applications they need to prepare for different schools, this structure may be confusing and impractical.

For instance, for students applying to 20 colleges, the number of essay editing rounds may not be enough to cover all of their application essays–even at the premium tier. Students who will be juggling dozens of applications will need to make a clear plan with their admissions counselor for crafting each application in an organized way, with adequate time and attention given to each one.

It’s also worth noting that Empowerly’s core admissions counseling packages do not include passion project planning and prep, which you’ll have to buy as an add-on instead. SAT and ACT prep aren’t included free of charge in admission counseling packages either.

Winner: PrepScholar

While Empowerly’s high volume of counseling sessions, essay editing rounds, and application reviews provide a lot of support, the structure of their admissions counseling programs aren’t intuitively aligned with the college admissions timeline.

For intensive support that’s fully aligned with students’ college admissions needs and goals during each year of high school and that bundles seamlessly with SAT and ACT prep, PrepScholar’s cost-efficient, comprehensive support is the winner when it comes to value and pricing transparency.

Overall Pros and Cons

To help you get a handle on where PrepScholar and Empowerly shine in comparison to each other, here’s a breakdown of the pros and cons of each service in each key area we’ve reviewed. 

	PrepScholar	Empowerly
Counselor Experience and Responsiveness	Pro: Counselors are held to high standards, with only the highest-performing retained long term. Students will work with time-tested consultants proven to get results.  Con: Only a small fraction of consultants are former college admissions officers.	Pro: Consultant team includes former admissions officers from top universities.  Con: Counselor quality is inconsistent, with reports of high turnover and some consultants being current college students rather than experienced professionals.
Results	Pro: Students are 7.8 times more likely to get into a Top 10 college than the national average and have a 99% chance of getting into one of their top schools.  Con: Caters to students across a wide range of competitive schools rather than specializing in elite or Ivy League placement.	Pro: 98% of students have been admitted to a top 100 U.S. college for the past 5 years, which is nearly 11 times higher than the national average. Con: High cost relative to uncertain outcomes, particularly the inconsistency of consultant qualifications.
Personalization	Pro: Uses a personality-first matching approach rather than just academic compatibility. Around 90% of families stay with the original match. Con: Students work mainly in Google Docs rather than a dedicated online platform. No proprietary student dashboard for progress-tracking.	Pro: Students are matched based on a suite of criteria and are supported by a large team of consultants. Con: Multiple counselors with varying qualifications reviewing applications may lead to inconsistent feedback.
Value and Price Transparency	Pro: Comprehensive admissions packages are priced more affordably than top-tier competitors. Offers a 3-day risk-free refund. Con: Piecemeal pricing could become expensive quickly if students add services onto the base admissions consulting package.	Pro: Wide range of services, including financial aid guidance and internship matching. Con: Prices are significantly higher than other platforms. No refunds are offered.

 

 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

We’ve covered a lot of information on PrepScholar and Empowerly. If you still have questions about college admissions consulting, check out our answers to commonly asked questions below.

 

Is PrepScholar or Empowerly better for college admissions counseling? 

While both Empowerly and PrepScholar use a data-driven approach to college admissions counseling, they’re built for students with different needs and goals in the admissions process. PrepScholar’s strategic approach to helping students center their college applications on a unique, stand-out narrative makes them the best choice for college admissions counseling. 

 

What is the best college admissions counseling program in 2026? 

PrepScholar’s college admissions consulting provides personalized, one-on-one services that focus on helping students build the kind of “spike approach” that will get them accepted into their choice colleges. With built-in essay editing and a 98% student success rate, PrepScholar’s admissions counselors provide the customized mentorship your student needs to succeed on their college admissions journey. 

 

Does college admissions counseling actually boost your chances of getting accepted into colleges? 

It can! College admissions counseling works best for students who need help building an application strategy and expert guidance in order to present their most authentic, polished, and compelling personal narrative.

While there are no guarantees, many students, like 98% of those who’ve worked with PrepScholar’s admissions counselors, gain admissions to at least one of their top 10 choice schools. With a commitment to hard work and expert guidance, a college admissions consulting service can boost your chances of getting accepted into the colleges you apply to. 

 

Should I invest in an ACT/SAT prep program and an admissions counseling service? 

Comprehensive test prep and college admissions support has a proven track record of helping students get accepted into colleges. While test scores aren’t everything, they’re a crucial piece of your college application, and good SAT/ACT scores can compensate for weaker aspects of your application, like a lower GPA or limited extracurricular involvement.

The most straightforward way to build a cohesive college application that integrates excellent test scores is by investing in a complete ACT/SAT prep and admissions counseling package. These comprehensive packages, like PrepScholar's SAT/ACT Complete Prep Online + College Admissions Counseling will customize a college application mentorship process that incorporates everything that  matters, from test prep, to building your profile, to editing your essays.

 

How do I choose the right admissions counseling program for my college admissions goals? 

The right college admissions counseling program for you is the one that helps you achieve your college goals through a personalized mentorship experience that’s tailored to your needs. While things like counselor experience and qualifications and a company’s track record of success definitely matter, what’s most important is knowing what kind of guidance you’re looking for, and ensuring that the admissions consulting program you’re considering has what it takes to help you succeed before you commit.