Teens on the road to college tend to encounter a variety of counselors positioned to support them on their journeys. However, not every one of these counselors has the same job. Amy and Mike invited educational consultant Margaret Rothe to define the different roles of school and private counselors.

What are five things you will learn in this episode?

1. In what ways are school and private college counselors the same?

2. Do you have to be a high school counselor to be a private college counselor?

3. What is something high school counselors do that IECs don’t or can’t do?

4. What is something an IEC does that school counselors don’t or can’t do? 

5. What resources support all counselors supporting college applications?

MEET OUR GUEST

Margaret Rothe is a leading authority in higher education and student affairs policy. With over 20 years of experience, Margaret has been a driving force behind shaping institutional policies that deeply impact student communities. She was instrumental in pioneering the nation’s first live/learn communities, creating powerful connections between faculty and staff that enrich the student experience, earning both campus and national recognition for her efforts.

Her expertise spans from first-year programming to balancing enrollment goals, even stepping into public safety roles when needed. After leaving university administration, Margaret brought this extensive experience into private college counseling, where she recognized a significant gap in college readiness that contributed to student attrition. There was no standard for guiding students on how to choose the right school or how to prepare academically and personally. Moreover, no software existed that was truly counselor-centric—most were built for government reporting or data extraction.

This realization led her to co-create CounselMore Educational Services Management Software, a platform that combines both the art and science of college counseling to reduce counselor burnout and better serve students. CounselMore now supports over 1,000 private college counselors and has earned two EdTech Digest awards for education innovation and she was honored in 2023 with the Innovation Visionary award.

Margaret can be reached at [email protected].

LINKS

The Role of the School Counselor

FAQs on the Independent Educational Consulting Profession

RELATED EPISODES

HOW SCHOOL AND PRIVATE COLLEGE COUNSELORS CAN WORK TOGETHER

OVERWORKED SCHOOL COUNSELORS

HOW TO CHOOSE A COLLEGE COUNSELOR

ABOUT THIS PODCAST

Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our past episodes on the show page and keep up with our future ones by subscribing to our email newsletter.

ABOUT YOUR HOSTS

Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros and LEAP. If you’re interested in working with Mike and/or Amy for test preparation, training, or consulting, feel free to get in touch through our contact page.