Hyll: College Consulting for the Multiculturally Minded

At Hyll (pronounced “hill”), they work with students throughout their high school years, exploring and encouraging their passions. They assist them in the choice of courses, extracurricular activities, and summer opportunities that not only enrich their personal growth but also optimize their profiles for university admissions. For athletes, that includes guidance in using university athletic recruitment to increase their chances of admission and access to scholarships.

Exploration of students’ innate and developing talents helps Adam and Celeste understand the schools where students will be happiest as they work with them to develop a balanced list of universities for their applications. As scholars with degrees in literature, cinema, and linguistics, Adam and Celeste are expert writers and have years of experience nurturing student ideas until they grow into compelling essays. They begin working with students a year or more prior to application to help them identify unique and authentic topics about which to write for their personal statements, supplemental essays, and motivation letters. Doing so allows them to pace the creative process and subsequent revisions in order to evoke the best of each and every student.

In the months prior to application deadlines, they also work with students on devising an optimal application strategy that takes into account the geographic and financial concerns of their families and includes (where applicable) interview preparation and practice, demonstrating interest, and recruitment advice.

Adam and Celeste have been mentoring students for many years. As instructors at Harvard University, they worked with students endeavoring to identify majors, careers, and plans for graduate, medical, and law schools. They developed enduring relationships with students that allowed them to understand their hopes and dreams and to help them tell their stories with authenticity. They wrote many letters of recommendation that supported their applications, whether for graduate schools or for prestigious fellowships like the Rhodes, Fulbright, and Marshall.

Their experience as university mentors was not limited to the classroom. Indeed, it straddled both major realms of the student experience: the academic and the social. For many years Adam and Celeste were active members of the residential life at Harvard University. Their experience residing and learning alongside students in two university residential communities allowed them to connect with students’ lived experience, which in turn gave them insight into what makes students thrive (and what makes them struggle) in the university environment. This unique experience informs their expertise in assisting students to find the colleges most aptly fitted to their values, personalities, and ambitions while at the same time optimizing their profiles to make them candidates who stand out in the highly competitive admissions process.

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