Alpha Academia To Make College Admissions Advice Affordable and Accessible

WASHINGTON - July 7, 2015 - PRLog -- GREAT FALLS, Virg. – 7 July 2015 – As America’s high school students settle into their summers, some are using the time away from class to study for the SATs and ACTs, build their resumes, visit college campuses, and draft application essays.

Many more, however, are not taking proactive steps towards shaping their college applications to their advantage.

Sometimes the difference is one of motivation.  On its face, the American university system is a meritocracy in which students from every socioeconomic background have an opportunity to gain admission to the best university they can through applications that show off their high school grades, standardized test results, extracurricular activities, essays, and recommendation letters.  In truth, the system can be unfairly manipulated to the advantage of those with the money and wherewithal to spend thousands of dollars on private schools, tutors to raise test scores, and expensive college admission counselors.

According to a study cited by the Huffington Post, 26 percent of applicants in 2013 hired a private college admissions consultant to assist with their applications.  Contrast this with the 18 percent of “college-ready” Delaware high school students that never even apply to college, and the latent inequality in the college admissions process starts to become more apparent.

Alpha Academia is a new firm dedicated to making college admissions advice affordable and accessible to all.  Alpha Academia has built an entire online course to guide students and their parents through the college admissions and application process.  The newly launched Complete College Admissions Adventure course provides 3 hours of video lectures, sample essays, organization tools, and dozens of outside resources to help students put together their best college application—all of the advice a private college consultant could give at a fraction of the cost.

Private college admissions consultants cost thousands of dollars, making them inaccessible to the vast majority of applicants.  Alpha Academia is offering its flagship course for $19 to the first 100 students to purchase the class through its website— http://www.alphaacademia.com —and will only charge $29 through Labor Day.

Alpha Academia was started in 2014 by Sarah Ballard, a Georgetown University and Law Center alumna.  After college, she was endorsed to compete for the Rhodes Scholarship and won the George Mitchell Scholarship.  She has her Masters and her Juris Doctor.  She was never rejected from a single school to which she applied, including the Ivy League, graduate school, and law school.  She has personally won more than $150,000 in competitive, merit scholarships and has coached high school and graduate students through their admissions and scholarship applications. She has read and reviewed applications for the Mitchell and Fulbright scholarships and has volunteered to do admission interviews at the undergraduate level.