It’s been in the works for some time, but as of today, our own Arun Ponnusamy, college counselor extraordinaire, is taking on a much larger role at Collegewise—Lead Counselor for the Los Angeles Basin.
Who is Arun?
Previously an assistant director of admissions at Caltech and the University of Chicago, Arun first joined Collegewise ten years ago to open one of our offices. Since then, he’s built himself into one of the most experienced, credentialed and well-respected college counselors in the country. He speaks at high schools and conferences. He helps train Collegewise counselors. He’s mentored dozens of colleagues and counseled hundreds of students through the college admissions process. Arun is the kind of private counselor who still goes out of his way to visit colleges, to read every article about admissions, and to attend nearly every conference, all so he can pick up new information to add to his knowledge arsenal.
If you're looking for a working example of a private counselor who does this job both well and right, I can't think of a better example than Arun.
What’s the plan?
We’ll be adding 8-11 counselors throughout the Los Angeles area this year. Who should they be? Where exactly will they work? How will they get trained, launch their offices, and become indispensable parts of their communities? That’s where Arun comes in. He’ll recruit, hire, and train our LA counselors. He’ll help them launch and run good businesses. He’ll teach them how to be so good at what they do that families and schools will feel lucky to have found them.
Arun knows Los Angeles. And more importantly, he knows the business of college counseling. You’d have a difficult time finding a private counselor anywhere who’s invited to speak at local high schools more frequently than Arun is in Los Angeles. In fact, one of the reasons we’re going to expand so aggressively in Log Angeles is so that we can play to our strengths—we already had the best person to help us do it.
Great for everyone
Arun and I have a successful history together of working hard doing something we believe in. Expanding Collegewise isn’t going to be easy, but we’re excited about it. This year, Arun and I will have even more reasons to collaborate on all things Collegewise. That's going to be great for our business, for our students, and for me.
So everyone, please offer some well-deserved congratulations to Arun and to Collegewise.