*Names have been changed for the family’s privacy
Julie and Peter B. live in Philadelphia and have two children, Louis and Rachel. Campus Bound came recommended to them by friends in the Philadelphia area, who were pleased with how the counselors had tailored the college admissions process to each of their children. Louis (high school class of 2025) and Rachel (high school class of 2028) were different students with different personalities and goals, so this customized process appealed to the B. family.
Peter and Julie recognized too that college admissions had evolved over the last few decades. “There’s urban legend about how the process works and what matters to the school, who’s going to get in and who isn’t,” says Julie. “Any hearsay about what kid gets into what school is meaningless these days. We needed to set rumors aside and rely on people with deep, current experience.”
The parents were equally concerned about their bandwidth, as Julie is in wealth management and Peter in financial services. They had demanding careers and professional commitments. “I knew the process was going to be mine to own if we didn’t have help, and I didn’t have the time. I needed to focus on my business,” Julie remarks. “I also knew that high school counselors are so overloaded—they handle everything for students, not just college applications. I had a client at the time who was going through the admissions process with her son who was at a private school, and she resented the fact that she had spent the last year as a project manager instead of a parent. This was a pivotal moment for me because I didn’t want to do that. I wanted it to be Louis’s process, not mine. Hiring a counselor had a lot to do with preserving the relationship with my child and less with outcomes.”
While quite organized, Louis understood that having an accountability partner would be helpful… or as mom says, “someone who could hold his feet to the fire.” He was a sophomore at a magnet school in Philadelphia when he began working with Jen Forand, Campus Bound’s associate director of college counseling. The B. family didn’t consider other firms. “We met with Jen and said, ‘she’s perfect!’” Julie adds that she was very glad they started then because “sophomore year matters. Campus visits took some time and you have to fit them in the calendar between sports tournaments and exams and vacations. That lead time was great!”
The partnership between Jen and the family was the model of success. The first few meetings were Louis, Julie, and Peter together, then came the point when Jen said, okay parents, it’s just me and Louis from here on in
Julie notes that throughout the process, Jen kept him accountable. “I was grateful to have someone doing that who wasn’t me.”
Jen identified areas of Louis’s transcript that were strong, and she emphasized that any pursuit of extracurricular activities should be because he was genuinely interested, not just for the sake of his college application. With Louis wanting to study engineering, there were numerous factors to consider such as the range of engineering degrees, which colleges had accredited programs, and what outcomes employers might be looking for. The family learned about schools that were unfamiliar to them as well as the nuances among engineering programs—biomedical vs. mechanical vs. electrical and so forth.
Because Julie and Peter were Ivy League graduates, prestige was important to Louis; this played into his college list which included Brown, Princeton, Carnegie Mellon, and Northwestern. Jen was clear, however, that in light of his highly competitive high school environment, it was critical to develop a balanced list of likely, target, and reach colleges. Brown University admitted Louis from the waitlist, leading him to three finalists: Brown, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and University of Pittsburgh Engineering Honors College. “Louis had fantastic admitted student days at all three schools,” remembers Julie. “It was a tough decision, all terrific but very different options. But my son said something that really resonated—’I feel like I’d find my people at Pitt and WPI, but everyone at Brown could be my people.’” He chose Brown.
Louis graduated from high school in the spring of 2025 and is loving his freshman year. Brown doesn’t require freshmen to declare engineering on entry; instead, they take Engineering 101 to get a taste of all the subspecialties, which piqued his interest in electrical engineering. As for campus life, Louis tried out for ultimate frisbee—a very strong sport at Brown—and made the B team, which is providing “endorphins and a great community.” He’s having a wonderful experience. “When we went for a weekend visit, I looked at him and he was getting sleep, eating well, happy, using the math resource center, enjoying his classes,” Julie observes. He is now thinking of majoring in applied math.
The B. family has already recommended Campus Bound to several friends. Says Julie, “It always felt like Jen was going above and beyond, like she was really in it with us. She and the essay specialist were so good at saying, we need to preserve Louis’s voice in his writing, he’s got this. And Campus Bound’s Custom College Plan portal is excellent with so many tools in one place to make logistics easier.”
Now, it’s Rachel’s turn. Louis’s sister will graduate high school in 2028 and has just started working with Jen Forand as a sophomore. “We had such a great experience with our first child, why wouldn’t we want the same successful process for our second?”
