Davud Skenderi

As a first-generation, low-income high-schooler, I spent my afternoons researching for hours on how the college application process worked with nobody to explain how any of it worked. I didn't have perfect test scores or the best educational environment. Though I did have a story worth telling and the stubbornness to learn how to tell it, and that's what carried me to Columbia as a likely-letter admit and a C.P. Davis Scholar, with offers from schools like Johns Hopkins, NYU Shanghai and Georgia Tech. Since then, I've earned my way into fiercely competitive research programs with no network to lean on, from a synthetic biology residency in Barcelona to a global summer research program that took 16 students out of roughly 1,100 applicants. I truly believe that almost every applicant is far more admissible than they think; they just haven't found the real story yet. So that's where we start. I don't hand you a template and send you off. (Templates, in general, are never that effective. Run away from them.) I go deep with you, one on one, until we uncover the moments and strengths that actually make you you, and then we build a narrative around them that an admissions officer will genuinely love to read. We'll work through your personal statement and supplements draft by draft, shape your activities list and résumé so they pull their weight, and think strategically about which schools fit the story we're telling. My students have gone on to Columbia, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford, and into selective programs like the Summer Science Program (SSP) and Yale Young Global Scholars (YYGS). If you're first-generation, non-traditional, short on connections, or just aiming at something that feels out of reach — trust me when I say I know what it's like. But I also know the way through! You can do far more than you think. And I'd love to help you get there.