What we do
IB prepares students for the academics. We prepare them for the system.
US colleges make the rules available in handbooks, on department websites, and in registration portals. Reading them without knowing what to look for is not the same as understanding what they mean for your child's degree. Our services make the structure visible before it becomes consequential.
The action plan
Every engagement begins with the same document: a written action plan given to the family. The plan is specific to the student's university, intended major, academic profile, and interests. It is not a template.
The plan documents the semester course schedule with prerequisite chains mapped out two and three semesters ahead, so that a freshman course choice is never made without visibility into what it gates in sophomore and junior years. It records the GPA thresholds that matter at the student's specific institution, maps the academic calendar with the deadlines that carry real consequence, which campus offices to use in the first six weeks and which can be postponed; and how to open productive working relationships with professors and academic advisors from week one.
The plan is a working document. We update it across the year as decisions are made, courses are taken, and the picture sharpens. Families who continue with us into Year 2 begin sophomore year with the document already rewritten around the new terrain-- declared or near-declared major, established faculty relationships, and the upper-division prerequisite chains that now matter.
Pre-departure session
An intensive working session with the student and parents before departure. We discuss the written first-year action plan in detail to ensure the student is confident in their next steps.
Families leave the session knowing what the first semester will look like, what decisions are coming, and what the early-warning signals of trouble are.
Arrival check-in
A video call with the student in the first days on campus to ensure the student has landed well and that the action plan still reflects what they are seeing on the ground.
It is the first opportunity to hear from the student directly, without the pre-departure pressure of planning. Questions that seemed abstract in Madrid become concrete once the student is living the experience. We make space for those.
Drop/add check-in
Video calls timed to the moment where the semester is actually shaped. We touch base inside the drop/add correction window, not after it closes.
We look at how the first weeks of classes have actually gone, assessing issues such as workload, professor fit, and scheduling conflicts. We decide together whether the course schedule needs to change while there is still no academic or financial penalty.
Mid-semester review
Structured video call at the point in the semester where the picture becomes clear. Early grades are in, workload patterns are visible, and there is still time to act.
The call identifies both where the student is excelling and where risk is emerging. Strengths are noted and built into the forward plan. Where a course is trending toward a grade that will damage the GPA or block a prerequisite chain, we decide together what to do about it while the semester still allows for correction.
photo: Pix Tresa on Unsplash