Counseling & College Admissions
Social-Emotional Counseling
Counselors help students develop positive attitudes toward self, school, family, and community. We help students explore who they are, what they want to do in the future, and how to achieve their goals.
Individual Counseling
Counselors meet one-on-one with students to address issues professionally, confidentially, and respectfully.
Advisory
Counselors facilitate the planning and delivery of the advisory curriculum in grade 9.
Student Support Teams
When students need additional help to be successful at school, counselors serve in a team of adults that also include the student's teachers, the Dean of Students, and principals. These teams create individual action plans for student success.
Small Group Counseling
Counselors meet with groups of students to find solutions and resolve conflicts, helping our students to achieve the social excellence that is the school's mission.
Child Protection
Counselors provide trainings to staff and students about best practices in child safety and wellness.
Parent Workshops
Counselors deliver parent workshops several times a semester to help parents understand their teenager's social emotional needs and how to support their child's wellbeing.
Personal and Professional College Planning
Our college counselors are ethical professionals trained to help students find the right fit given their academic and personal interests, and our program develops these interests throughout high school.
Freshman Year
College Exploration & Preparation
- Academic planning
- Participate in ASAs & leaderships organizations
- Explore summer opportunities
- Start thinking about your life after school
Sophomore Year
College Planning
- Continue academic planning meetings
- Explore future career options that fit
- Complete college and career assessments
- Meet with college/university representatives
- Take PSAT
Junior Year
College Selection
- Explore careers
- Research universities
- Continue to meet with college representatives
- Take standardized tests
- Complete Junior Seminar
Senior Year
Applying to College
- Finalize college list and application plan
- Continue to meet with college representatives
- Complete Senior Seminar
- Take standardized tests
- Receive post-application guidance
Our College Admissions Advantage
A Unique Application
Each year, over 300,000 Chinese students go to study in the United States, making it important to stand out from the crowd. NCPA's college counselors guide students to make sure their college lists and application both reflect the individual student and also showcase the student's unique strengths.
Expert Advice
Students complete the college applications process through the Junior Seminar and Senior Seminar courses. They also meet one-on-one with their college counselor to find the best fit. Parents benefit from a series of parent workshops to demystify the Western college application process, which has important differences from the Chinese one.
Colleges Come to You
Colleges visit NCPA and/or offer virtual information sessions to entice our students to apply. This variety ensures that our students make the best-informed decision to find the schools that fit them - whether it's a well-known state university in California or New York with hundreds of Chinese students, or a small liberal-arts college in the Northeast with excellent academics and an intimate setting.
All Hands on Deck
It's not just our college counselors who know their stuff. Every teacher has gone through the same college applications process as our students, and our teachers are alumni of the same wide variety of schools to which our students apply. This means students are surrounded by a network of mentors and support resources. It's especially exciting when students are accepted to the same alma mater as their teacher!
Finding the Right Fit
Our college counselors are professionals committed to finding the right fit for each individual. By contrast, unscrupulous college agents in China are worried about putting in the least amount of work possible for them to be paid their high fees. Our approach means that our students find the institution that fits their dream; their approach means sending applicant after applicant to the same list of ten schools which are well-known in China.
