Watermark College Advising

Results

Four hundred students, one at a time.

Over ten years, the students I have worked with have earned admission across the country, from flagship publics to the most selective private universities. Along the way they have been awarded more than $8 million in scholarship and merit aid.

UC BerkeleyUSCPrincetonJohns HopkinsRiceNortheasternUT AustinU WisconsinPenn Stateand many more

Scholarship and merit figures reflect total awards offered to students advised by the practice since 2015.

What's included

A complete engagement, not a package of parts.

No junior associates, no handoffs, no basic tier. Every family receives the full scope of the practice, for as long as the process takes.

The list

Twenty schools chosen for fit, admissibility, and net price, not for how they look on a sweatshirt.

The essays

Outlines, drafts, and line-by-line editing on the personal statement and every supplemental essay.

The application

We open the Common App together and go field by field. I stay on the call until it's submitted.

Financial aid

FAFSA and CSS Profile filed correctly and on time. The CSS is where families quietly lose the most money.

Scholarships

Merit targeting, outside awards, and reading the fine print on what renews and what doesn't.

Interviews

Mock interviews with real feedback, so the first one your student does isn't the one that counts.

How it works

How an engagement works.

Free consultation

Thirty minutes on Zoom with the family. We review where the student stands, the timeline ahead, and whether the practice is the right fit. No charge, no pitch.

Build the list and the plan

Twenty schools selected on fit and admissibility, with a working calendar built backward from every deadline.

Write, edit, submit

Essays, supplements, and the application itself, reviewed and returned draft by draft until everything is submitted.

Aid, offers, and the decision

FAFSA, CSS Profile, and then the part almost nobody helps with: comparing award letters and appealing the ones worth appealing.

Who it's for

Freshmen through graduate applicants.

Engagements run anywhere from a single application season to several years, depending on when a family starts. All advising is virtual, so scheduling works around school, sport, and work commitments.

High school freshmenSophomoresJuniorsSeniorsTransfer studentsGraduate applicantsRecruited athletesInternational students

No clock running, ever.

One flat fee for the full engagement, however long the process runs. Students can request another read of an essay without anyone doing math about it.

Ask about the fee

Advised personally by Josh Ginsberg, never an associate
20 colleges included, not counted against you
Flat fee for the full engagement, start to finish
A limited number of engagements each year, so availability stays real

About

Josh Ginsberg

Josh Ginsberg, Founder

For ten years I have advised students and their families through the college process. I have worked with applicants headed to state flagships and applicants headed to the Ivy League, and the approach is the same either way: understand the student first, then build the strategy around them.

My career is in marketing, which sounds unrelated until you look at what an application really is. Thousands of qualified applicants, one reader, a few minutes each. The work is making a real seventeen-year-old legible on paper without flattening them into everyone else.

The practice is intentionally small. I take on only as many families as I can advise while remaining responsive to every one of them, through every deadline. I also founded and run a 501(c)(3) that provides this same advising at no cost to students who could not otherwise access it, which keeps me sharper on financial aid than most independent counselors need to be.

BA, University of Richmond, 2012 · MSc, University of Edinburgh, 2013
Marketing career at JPMorgan Chase, Barclays, Samsung, Avis Budget Group, and Verizon.

An independent advisory practice, deliberately small.

Included in every engagement