Sprints are personalized, so they may look different for each student. We designed our sprints to strike directly at what you need; however, the work isn't rushed. We count successes, not hours. We individualize the guidance for each student, and this may involve additional meetings, spread-out meetings, shorter and more frequent meetings, or asynchronous feedback when this helps them achieve their result. As long as our Luminary students maintain their commitment to complete their tasks and communicate well with us, we make sure the result is something they'll be proud of.

In general, sophomore year of high school is an excellent time to start. It's the planning, growth, and development year. The college search usually kicks into full gear in the fall of junior year, and students begin essay and application work in the spring, with a big push in the summer to get the major essays and application tasks completed before the busy fall semester of senior year, when students submit their applications.

Senior year is not the ideal time to start, but if you're already there, don't lose hope! As long as our students are willing to put in the work, we can help anyone, and we'll do our best to make the process as smooth and low-stress as we can with a more limited application timeline in front of us.

The primary college counselor will be Robert, the College Torch founder, who meets students on Zoom. Students in the Los Angeles County area may request in-person meetings at the office in Sierra Madre, subject to availability. College Torch communicates with families through email and the Telegram messenger app (in lieu of texting).

Students may interact with other (awesome) staff at College Torch, including our admin, academic specialists, and test prep specialist, depending on the sprint and the tasks at hand.

Each sprint provides one or more specific deliverables for the student's college plan or college application. Additionally, we provide asynchronous feedback when it applies, and we remain available to communicate with students and parents between meetings to support the process. We provide resources in various formats. We especially want students to feel confident in their college plan, and we provide clarity, flexibility, and expert recommendations to help them achieve their best college results and set themselves up for their most successful future.

Fine print: Aligning with the college counseling profession's ethical standards, we do not make any guarantee of college admission offers (as they're not ours to offer) or any similar guarantee. We can't guarantee completion of work in the case that students do not complete their tasks sufficiently, meet our deadlines, attend scheduled meetings, or communicate with us. For college essays, we help students through the full brainstorming, writing, and revision process, and we provide final edits that align with a student's voice and writing ability, but we can never write essays for students. We do not collaborate with parents on student essays. (Trust us, it always works better this way.)

At College Torch, we don't just believe we can help all students, we enjoy doing that. Yesterday's low grades can be the setup for tomorrow's success. As for major and career, there are far more opportunities to explore these in college than families realize; and, it's often better to have a flexible mindset around future pathways than a narrow one. We just need our students to want to go to college. Otherwise, we're here to help them wherever they're at in their educational journey.

Check out the Master Admissions Plan (MAP) sprint! It's a perfect way to test the waters, and we can make a plan for your family to segue into a full program afterward if that feels like a better fit.