By Amy Seeley & Mike Bergin
4.8
4040 ratings
The podcast currently has 582 episodes available.
The bespoke nature of homeschooling can be a great advantage for tailoring education to a student’s individual needs. However, those differentiated programs present challenges when the time comes to apply to college. Amy and Mike invited education consultants Michele Evard and Holly Ramsey to review the intricacies of college documentation for homeschoolers.
What are five things you will learn in this episode?
Should homeschoolers claim credit for every potential learning experience?
MEET OUR GUESTS
Dr. Michele Evard is an independent educational consultant who assists homeschooling families with planning & documenting K-12 education as well as the college application process; she specializes in assisting families of gifted and 2E young people.
She is an active member of multiple professional organizations including IECA, NACAC, SENG (Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted) and the Digital Learning Collaborative.
While homeschooling her three children and mentoring others, Dr. Evard co-founded Many Rivers Unschoolers and served as president of Voyagers Homeschool Cooperative and Resource Center.
Michele can be reached at https://evardconsulting.com.
Holly Ramsey is an independent educational consultant specializing in working with homeschoolers and their parents to create clear, concise, and compelling college applications and counselor documents.
She is a professional member of Independent Educational Consultants Association, where she served in a variety of roles and is a recipient of IECA’s Making a Difference Award. Ms. Ramsey is also a member of the Texas Association for College Admission Counseling.
In addition to homeschooling her own five children over 20+ years, Holly taught writing to hundreds of homeschoolers through Brave Writer™ and mentored new Brave Writer instructors.
Holly can be reached at https://thoughtfulhomeschooling.com.
Dr. Michele Evard and Holly Ramsey are co-authors of College UnMazed: Your Guide to Design & Document Your Homeschool. This book provides guidance for any professionals helping homeschoolers in the college admission process.
Tests and the Rest listeners can use the coupon code HOMESCHOOL10 for 10% off this book AND anything else on the College UnMazed site.
LINKS
College UnMazed: Your Guide to Design & Document Your Homeschool
How to Create Your School Profile As A Homeschooler
RELATED EPISODES
COLLEGE ADMISSIONS FOR HOMESCHOOLERS
LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION: GOOD VS. GREAT
CRAFTING YOUR COLLEGE RESUME
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
We focus so much on our teens getting through high school and into college yet spend little time looking at the space between or how everyone involved needs to change and adapt for success. Amy and Mike invited educator Dr. Andrea Malkin Brenner to discuss the parent transition from high school to college.
What are five things you will learn in this episode?
What role can parents play to support their students as they become self-reliant and college-ready?
What are the major differences between being a high school parent and a college parent?
How can parents help students prepare for the academic, practical, and social responsibilities that come with independence?
When should conversations about college transitions ideally begin?
What are scenarios parents of college students might not expect but should be ready for?
MEET OUR GUEST
Dr. Andrea Malkin Brenner is the creator of the Talking College™ card decks and co-author of How to College: What to Know Before You Go (and When You’re There), a leading guide for college-bound students and their parents/guardians. Andrea brings 25 years of experience as a college professor and university administrator at American University in Washington, DC to her presentations with high school and college audiences. See her website for her articles, podcast recordings, and upcoming talks and webinars.
Find Andrea at www.talkingcollege.com.
LINKS
Talking College card decks
How to College: What to Know Before You Go (and When You’re There)
RELATED EPISODES
THE ROLE OF PARENTS IN THE COLLEGE PROCESS
ADVOCACY FOR PARENTS OF HIGH SCHOOLERS
THE W-CURVE MODEL AND NEW COLLEGE STUDENTS
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
When the most important exams in our lives tend to be meticulously crafted instruments based research, statistics, and standards, a sloppy and spontaneous approach just won’t cut it. Amy and Mike invited educator Russ Hanush to outline a scientific approach to test-taking.
What are five things you will learn in this episode?
Why is general knowledge an irreplaceable foundation for test takers?
What’s the best way to create study aids?
What test-taking strategies do most students fail on?
How can you leverage the odds on multiple choice?
What physical preparation is necessary for a successful testing experience?
MEET OUR GUEST
Inspired by the rings of Saturn at 8 years old, fascinated by San Francisco's Exploratorium at 14, and motivated to make a difference in education when he witnessed a mother unable to help her child with their homework, Russ Hanush has always been about learning. After a research career in nuclear physics and chemical kinetics spanning decades at America's national laboratories and inventing The Periodic Table of Dimensions, Russ opened Physics Phor Phun Tutoring in 2007.
Over the years the name has changed, Physics Phor Phun Tutoring is now Acclaimed Tutoring, and they've grown from a single tutor driving around the dusty vineyards of Templeton and Paso Robles, CA to helping students from Beverly Hills to Portland, OR, and Honolulu to Paris, France. Acclaimed Tutoring has helped hundreds of students become successful scientists, engineers, doctors, lawyers, vets, teachers, professional athletes, and entertainers.
Besides inventing The Periodic Table of Dimensions, Russ is also the author of over a dozen technical publications as well as two books: The Parent's Guide to Choosing the Right Tutor and Harnessing Your Seven Senses.
Helping students navigate their education, and their life after high school is Russ' passion. With one-on-one tutoring available for most math and science classes from middle school through college, college, and career counseling, and standardized test preparation, Russ' promise is to help students become happier, more confident, and more successful, guaranteed.
Russ can be reached at 805-610-1725 or [email protected].
LINKS
Harnessing Your Seven Senses: Help Your Child Become A Happier, More Confident, More Successful Student by Harnessing Their Seven Senses (A Scientific Approach to Study Skills)
The Periodic Table of Dimensions
PhysicsPhorPhun AP Resources
RELATED EPISODES
EFFECTIVE STUDY SKILLS FOR TEST PREPARATION
MAKING LEARNING SCIENCE WORK FOR YOU
HOW TO BECOME A RIDICULOUSLY EFFECTIVE STUDENT
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
While choosing a college feels like one of the biggest decisions of your life, choosing to leave one may be even more difficult. That said, swapping the wrong school for the right one can do wonders for your grades, mental health, and future prospects. Amy and Mike invited college advisor Jaime Smith to explore what you should know about transferring.
What are five things you will learn in this episode?
How common is college transfer?
How has the rise of credible online programs impacted transfers?
What are the best and worst reasons to transfer?
What are the main transfer pathways?
Can a student transfer at any time?
MEET OUR GUEST
Jaime Smith, M.A., MS.Ed., is a Certified Educational Planner with 25 years of experience in the field of education. After many years of teaching English at the middle, high school, and college levels, Jaime turned to online education and founded a virtual K-12 supplementary education program, Online G3, where she continues to teach gifted and twice-exceptional homeschooled students. As a college advisor, Jaime specializes in transfer admissions, application essays, homeschoolers, neurodiverse learners, and other non-traditional applicants. In 2023, she completed a Post-Master's Certificate in Transfer Leadership and Practice at the University of North Georgia in collaboration with the National Institute for the Study of Transfer Students.
A California native, Jaime now lives in Oregon with her husband and pet bunny. She has one daughter, a former homeschooler turned transfer student who just started grad school.
Learn more about Jaime at TransferSavvy.com and follow her on Linkedin.
LINKS
Common App for transfer
https://www.transferology.com
https://www.assist.org
RELATED EPISODES
HOW TO BE A SUCCESSFUL COLLEGE FRESHMAN
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THE UNWRITTEN RULES OF COLLEGE SUCCESS
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
Ready to learn the history, philosophy, and practice of an experienced professional in the test prep industry?
MEET OUR GUEST
Meet Alex Pint, the owner and founder of Pathway Prep in Kansas City! Alex attended Kansas State University, where he received a BS/MS in Architectural Engineering. To earn some extra money during college, he got a campus job tutoring math and physics, and thus the seed of being an educator was planted. After graduating in 2015, Alex started working at a KC consulting engineering firm but soon began a test prep side hustle. Alex continued working in engineering for 5 years, earning his Professional Engineer’s license along the way, before deciding to pursue test prep full-time in February 2021.
Alex works with high schoolers in the KC area, focusing almost exclusively on ACT prep through individual and small group formats. He enjoys experimenting with insights from psychology and business in his test prep process.
In his free time, Alex enjoys spending time with his wife (high school sweetheart), enjoying his season tickets for Sporting KC, and reading new books. He is also an avid runner and completes multiple half-marathons and/or marathons per year.
Find Alex at https://pathwayprepkc.com/ [email protected].
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
Ready to learn the history, philosophy, and practice of an experienced professional in the test prep industry?
MEET OUR GUEST
Meet Remy Zaken Andersen. Remy is a graduate of Columbia University, where she majored in Psychology with a focus on social cognition and emotion. A former professional actress, she serves as a strong role model for students striving for academic excellence while balancing extracurricular and career interests. She scored in the 99th percentile on the ACT and SAT, and also received perfect scores of 5 on the AP exams in Biology and US History.
Tutoring professionally since 2013, she is a skilled instructor who has found students connect well to her warm, engaging, and energetic personality. She is passionate about teaching important study and organizational skills, while working with her students to manage test anxiety so they can reach their full potential on these exams and in their future academic careers. She has tutored Lower, Middle, and Upper-level students on the SSAT and ISEE and has seen at least 100 point increases in both the verbal and math sections for SSAT and 3 stanines on the ISEE. Every single one of her SHSAT students who started tutoring in April and completed their homework has been accepted to a specialized high school. She's also had students accepted to Hunter College High School. There are many more success stories upon request!
Find Remy at https://www.and-ed.com and [email protected].
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
Ready to learn the history, philosophy, and practice of an experienced professional in the test prep industry?
MEET OUR GUEST
Meet Jason Hankins, who graduated in the year 2000 from Milwaukee School of Engineering with a Bachelor’s in Computer Engineering and a minor in Business Administration. Jason works full time as a Software Engineer and part-time as a test prep tutor. He has a love of math and teaching others how to understand it. In 2004 he started his tutoring business, J. Digital Tutoring Services. He specialized in tutoring mathematics courses, math sections of standardized tests, Business courses as well as computer programming courses. Tests that he has helped students with include the NCLEX, TEAS, CLEP, ASVAB, GMAT, ACT, and SAT. With his business minor has been able to help students with accounting, finance, microeconomics, and managerial science courses.
Jason is the founder and moderator of the SAT Exam Prep & Discussion and ACT Exam Prep & Discussion Facebook groups.
Jason has been involved with math tutoring for a long time. His first tutoring job was in college working in the college’s Learning Resource Center. Since then, Jason has produced math instructional DVDs, worked as a math tutor at a local college (15 years), ran a tutoring program at a local church, maintained a math education YouTube channel, managed ACT and SAT Facebook groups, and is currently running his own private tutoring business. When he is not solving math problems Jason enjoys watching the stock market, looking for the next great stock, and watching professional sports.
Find Jason at http://www.j-digital.net.
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
Ready to learn the history, philosophy, and practice of an experienced professional in the test prep industry?
MEET OUR GUEST
Loni Lebanoff founded CogniTutor with a simple mission: help millions of students Learn to Learn. She is an international teacher who, to name a few, has worked with doctors in Vietnam, taught English to Italian children, and conducted piano lessons in Canada. Loni conducts and studies the latest research on memory, learning, and cognition. She demonstrates her belief in life-long learning through her dance, art, musical instruments, and other varied pursuits. Through her research, learning, and travels, Loni continually improves her and CogniTutor’s effective and original methods of teaching. Some of these methods are the same methods that she used throughout her schooling and that helped her receive a perfect score on the ACT. “CogniTutor instructors are enthusiastic and care about their students. No one ever stops learning. By helping students learn to learn, our tutors aid students in their academic careers and the rest of their lives.”
Find Loni at https://www.cognitutor.com.
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
Ready to learn the history, philosophy, and practice of an experienced professional in the test prep industry?
MEET OUR GUEST
Meet Mike Settele, the founder of Settele Tutoring, an SAT prep company that specializes in creating user-friendly SAT resources. Mike has published thousands of hours of SAT lessons on his YouTube channel, which are watched every day by students around the world.
Mike began his SAT career while an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University, where he studied political science and philosophy. He started as a Writing section tutor for Capital Educators, a test prep company that runs courses in the Baltimore-Washington metro area. After graduating, Mike became a full-time program director for Capital Educators, but he eventually found his true passion helping to create their curriculum for the new SAT in 2016.
Once the new test was released, Mike moved to Los Angeles and founded Settele Tutoring, shifting his focus to private tutoring so that he would have time to create new SAT materials. He has since published the “SAT Packets” study guides for both the Reading and Math sections of the exam, with new editions coming soon for the digital SAT. In fact, when he’s not tutoring, Mike can often be found sitting on Santa Monica Beach, writing SAT questions.
Find Mike at https://setteletutoring.com/ or his YouTube SAT channel.
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
An undergraduate education should never be mistaken for a job training program. That said, gainful employment is usually the obvious expectation after graduation. Amy and Mike invited educator Bill Coplin for thoughts on how to guarantee career success after college.
What are five things you will learn in this episode?
Why is coursework alone not enough to explore and get jobs?
Is there academic coursework that would help build skills, experience, and networks?
How should students increase their chances of getting internships and/or part-time jobs?
Are some colleges better than others to help students gain skills through experience and build networks?
What steps are essential for students who don’t know what they want to do after graduation?
MEET OUR GUEST
Based on his experience mentoring 2,000 alumni over the past 50 years, Bill Coplin knows how undergraduates can be ready for the next step after graduating college with or without going to graduate school. Success is not guaranteed by the brand of the University, the degree program chosen, or the GPA. Employers want students to demonstrate skills that include taking responsibility, communicating effectively, interacting with people, and developing computer and analytical skills. To do this, students should see undergraduate programs as a Skills Gymnasium where they practice these skills in the classroom and outside the classroom, while they are building their networks through student activities, jobs, internships, and community service.
Bill can be reached at https://billcoplin.com.
LINKS
Five Steps for Success After Graduating From College
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MAKING THE MOST OF COLLEGE SUPPORT SYSTEMS
HOW TO PREPARE FOR A COLLEGE ADMISSIONS INTERVIEW
ABOUT THIS PODCAST
Tests and the Rest is THE college admissions industry podcast. Explore all of our episodes on the show page.
ABOUT YOUR HOSTS
Mike Bergin is the president of Chariot Learning and founder of TestBright. Amy Seeley is the president of Seeley Test Pros. 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.
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