Sunny Grewal (right), owner of Advantage College Planning East Bay, and Cole Filipek, one of the team’s consultants, are finishing up the 2023-2024 college admission cycle and are already gearing up for next year.
Last October, Advantage College Planning – a college consulting company with more than 15 years of experience and locations across the East Coast – opened its first California branch. The new team, led by Orindan Sunny Grewal, has a mission: guide students through the increasingly competitive college application process without sacrificing personal growth.
Over the past few years, the number of first-year students applying to college has risen dramatically. Across the University of California (UC) system’s nine campuses, there was an uptick in applicants from 2020 to 2021 – from around 170,000 to more than 200,000 – a trend that has continued into 2023.
According to Common App (an undergraduate college admission application used to apply to over 1,000 member colleges and universities) data published in March, there has been a seven percent increase in applications nationwide this year.
These developments are noteworthy because as the number of college applications rises, acceptance rates tend to fall. At UC Berkeley and UC Los Angeles, two of California’s flagship schools, the relationship is clear.
In 2019, the colleges accepted around 16% and 12% of first-year students, respectively. By 2023, with thousands of new applications flooding in, those numbers dropped to less than 12% and 9%.
Despite the evolving landscape, for Grewal and his team, their outlook on college consulting remains the same – the student comes first.
“Instead of focusing on what UC Berkeley or what UCLA wants, why don’t we focus on what the student wants? Why not find ways to empower and also to challenge them, so they get a better sense of who they are,” said Grewal.
Grewal, who had worked in the healthcare industry for more than a decade before starting Advantage College Planning’s East Bay branch, was inspired to make the pivot to college counseling after working on projects related to mental health. Observing how much stress teenagers attribute to college admissions, he thought there had to be a way to help students successfully navigate the process while not forgoing their personal well-being, hence his team’s emphasis on self-discovery.
The self-discovery process, Grewal explained, involves setting age-appropriate goals. If his team is working with a freshman, their emphasis is helping the student adapt to high school, create good study habits and explore extracurricular interests.
For sophomores, it’s about having them keep up with tougher course loads, understand the SAT and ACT, and make the most of their summers. Only by junior and senior years do discussions finally pivot to choosing colleges and preparing applications.
One of the company’s consultants, Cole Filipek, who was a private-college counselor for nine years before joining Advantage College Planning, further elaborated on why helping students pursue their passions is the surest way of guiding them toward the right college decision.
“Just doing things for the sake of college doesn’t help students get into college,” he said. “What they need to do [are] activities they love. Then they will be able to talk about them with joy and exuberance and write about those experiences. That’s what colleges want, and that’s what I want – I want my students to be happy.”
Beyond one-on-one sessions, Advantage College Planning’s East Bay team has also been sharing their insights via free webinars and in-person community events, such as career panels that expose students to different post-graduation opportunities.
Currently, the group offers both virtual consultations and in-person appointments at its Moraga and Walnut Creek offices. To learn more about their services, visit advcp.com/eastbay.
“For me this has been the best job I’ve had,” Grewal noted, reflecting on the work he and his team have done over the past year. “When you talk to a parent and that parent tells you that your consultant has changed their daughter’s study habits, or that your consultant is part of their son’s decision support, that is what fills our cup.”
