College Admissions Assistance workshop... scam?

<p>Every user on this site defending CAA is someone from the same company trying to do damage control so they can keep suckering people in. </p>

<p>If I said I was the Dean of a College Prep School with 18 satellite schools would you believe me?</p>

<p>If I said I was Brenda Watkins the DIrector of Student Services for CAA would you believe me?</p>

<p>I received this letter a couple days ago, so i checked with the BBB…here is the link and hopefully you can get on it and see what the company is about. [BBB</a> at Fort Worth: BBB Reliability Report](<a href=“http://www.fortworth.bbb.org/commonreport.html?compid=222153102]BBB”>http://www.fortworth.bbb.org/commonreport.html?compid=222153102)</p>

<p>My daughter and I attended a workshop this past weekend. I was sceptical from the start…“why did my daughter get picked for this”? On our one-on-one, I explained to the main person (that did the hour long prep speech) that my daughter pretty much had her college picked out that was right in our state, but still being knew to the college admissions scene we naturally had questions. She showed us the ‘sign up’ sheet and immediately pointed to the $1995 fee for their assistance. That’s when I asked her ‘why my daughter’…she said because of her good grades and community service. I replied, ‘she’s not the only one in her group she hangs with that has excellent grades and community service, you had to get her name from somewhere!’. I then heard from the table next to us the ‘counselor’ ask an Indian family of 5, “do you want the program or not” with a rather nasty look on her face (possible the family was having a hard time communicating?, not sure). The father of that family was glaring at the wife… That’s when I looked at my daughter and said ‘let’s go, this is a joke’. Our state paid high school counselors have been very helpful and I have all the confidence that my daughter will get into the college of her choice and we will have help in the process for FREE.</p>

<p>Something to note…while waiting for our one-on-one, we got to watch a video that said from the beginning something about it not being affiliated with CAA (interesting) but it was informative on different colleges around the country (female/male ratio, food grade, housing grade, social grade, academic grade, etc…all from the students that went there) Interesting none-the-less…</p>

<p>these posts are completely fake, don’t believe some of these posts. They must be made by the company</p>

<p>Yes, we know. Which is why this thread should die and be LOCKED by the mods because it is a spam magnet.</p>

<p>Take it from me DO NOT get involved in this company. It seems to be very similar to a company called College Partnership, that is now out of business. (There are numerous posts on the internet about this company-College Partnership) I paid about $1200.00 5 years ago to College Partnership and they did absolutely nothing for my daughter except take my money send information that was readily available over the internet.
Last month I received a letter from College Admission Assistance to bring my son to a presentation. Their invitation letter was exactly the same as College Partnership’s, 5 years ago except for a paragraph. Isn’t that a coincidence?
I was curious and called College Admission Assistance and spoke to a supervisor who became angry I asked such a question. She avoided the question and did not know what to say. She was literally tongue tied and said they had a business to run.
So DO NOT waste your money. You and your child can do it all on the internet, gather the grades, essays, report cards, recommendation letters etc. The FASA is not difficult at all. Just have your financial information available.
Just to let you know, my daughter and mom and I did it ourselves. When the acceptance letters came in, each and every one had scholarship money offered. The lease amount was $40,000 and most was $64,000 over 4 years. And Collage Partner ship did absolutely nothing. And if this is the same company except for a different name I would expect the same thing.
By the way-both companies are based in Texas.</p>

<p>I just received the letter in the mail. I am a skeptic by nature and all the while I am reading this letter the more I am realizing this is a scam. Also curious about what others are saying on the web about this company…I google and find this site. For the people who do not think it is a scam please read the first sentence of the letter and let me point out the unscrupulous tactic they have tried to use on you. </p>

<p>“You and your student, XXXXX, are scheduled to participate in an educational group presentation followed by a personal interview to help determine college admission and financial aid eligibility.”</p>

<p>This is a tactic used to suggest this is some type of California State run or something associated with our child’s school district.</p>

<p>Here is another one: “Therefore you need to attend in order to receive assistance in making critical decisions that will arise in the few months.” </p>

<p>Come one people, companies like this bank on knowing there is a fool born everyday…don’t be in this population of fools!!!</p>

<p>Read the letter again…and realize their unscrupulous tactic.</p>

<p>This is definitely a scam. I received the letter in the mail and went to the conference thinking that it was just for information. They give you a presentation and then at the end of it they call you back for interviews where they will then tell you that to enroll it is 2000 dollars with an interest fee of around 8.7%. Then they ask for your banking information so that they can take out the payments monthly or bi-weekly. I would stay away from this if I were you.</p>

<p>I am glad I found and read this thread before sitting thru the seminar Sunday.I thought something wasn’t right when our friends kids had not gotten the same letter.We also never qualify for help but at first i thought was thru the schools to help us find programs.Then started figuring might been a sales thing to suck people in.Shame people have to prey upon others to make a buck.</p>

<p>I attended the workshop as well today. And you guys are probably going to assume that I am a scam artist because this is my first post. As well as you suspect any other post on this thread relevant to the success of the program as a scam. I’m sure I could possibly do this college process on my own, I got signed up with the program. 2 thousand dollars is pretty hefty, but you guys act like the company doesn’t follow through with their promises. I am eligible to call them at any time to ask a stupid question, I can send in essays for them to critique, I can have them take my interests and select a fitting career and have them choose the colleges for me. I can have them do basically all the work and more. They also offer PSAT, ACT and SAT Test prep in the program, which normally costs around 800$ standalone, so obviously you are getting something in this program that is more than what a guidance counselor can give. Most of you didn’t even attend the workshop, and are already calling it a scam. Even a self-proclaimed coach of the site came on here in the company’s defense. There’s nothing your losing by attending the workshop, so stop falsely accusing a company you know nothing about as a hoax, and just visit the free seminar. Sure, as any other company, after the seminar, they ask you to sign up. But still, they have success stories and they do mostly all of the college selecting and career selecting for you. They also handle all of the financial aid for you and outline all of the dates you need to attend and all the information you need to deal with. This is for people who admit to not know-it-all, and are giving it a chance. I think 2,000 is worth it to have professionals review my applications for financial aid who can edit it to get me more aid. Oh well, I guess it doesn’t matter what I think. It is a big price tag, but honestly I don’t see why a company asking for a large sum could be a scam, when they deal with you person-to-person. I could only see how you could be concerned if the company was based in Nigeria.</p>

<p>This is the best thing I ever did… and saved a boat load of money!!</p>

<p>

Doesn’t sound fun to me.</p>

<p>Nice to know that you need someone else to pick your life out for you.</p>

<p>=__=</p>

<p>You fill out questionnaires and do most of the work and they take that and filter out the colleges that don’t apply to you. Your acting like they pick some random college for you, which that assumption is only produced from the ignorance derived from thinking that I am not independent and can’t do anything for myself. Which is not true. You haven’t been on the website, but I can assure you that it is very helpful. It has hundreds of careers organized to different categories and whatnot. Each career profile contains tasks that the career ensues, the average wages in each state, the credentials and a video showing the career in action. The database has all existing colleges with every bit of information about them, and you can do searches based on areas of interest, majors, college location and size, clubs, religious affiliations. As I said before, it includes a full and professional test prep system that with my experience, is VERY helpful and has taught me a lot. They select a starting list of colleges in which you and them pick out whats best for you. Every question I have sent to a coach so far, has literally gotten a professional answer withing 5-10 minutes. They are very helpful and easy to contact. Perhaps most of you feel you are too informed for this, which is fine, but you don’t need to claim everything is a damn scam and deter possible customers.</p>

<p>Also, what I wrote there is not everything the company provides, there are plenty of unscathed features of the program.</p>

<p>all of the people defending it have 0 posts.
hmm</p>

<p>This thread is also 3 years old.</p>

<p>oh sorry, didn’t realize that
however, the last post was last night, so it’s not that massive of a <em>bump</em></p>

<p>“there are plenty of unscathed features of the program”
Misused words ftw!</p>

<p>Can I see it please.</p>

<p>AA is GAY. My parents and I went to the workshop, and I told my parents it was a waste of money, and now we’re two THOUSAND dollars poorer.</p>

<p>It’s not a scam per say, it’s just that they pray on the weak willed and parents who don’t know much about college these days. The website is full of exciting and usefull features such as a quiz to tell you how to study! That’s pretty much it. The rest is a bunch of bs pdf files, and a like to an external website that actually has a lot of information about majors. It, however, doesn’t have anything to do with CAA. If you want to see what it’s like, e-mail me.</p>

<p>I’ll send you my log in information. It’s not like I use it or anything.</p>

<p>Well you’re on CC, which already tells me you don’t need it. I have it and I have to say the only useful thing about it is that they help you build your college list and help your parents with the financial aid process… all of which can be accomplished through 10 minutes of research.</p>

<p>I joined it before I found CC which is why I found it useful at first but it’s just another 2000 you shouldn’t need to spend.</p>

<p>Ok, so I found this thread just like everyone else after googling CAA. My mom and I went to one of the workshops and felt pressured into this decision. My mom is not the best with computers so I decided to look into it myself. I read ALL of the 10 pages of posts, and the one thing I find surprising is that no one seems to notice that on one of the first pages, one of the ACTUAL COACHES encourages anyone who has questions to call. </p>

<p>So I did just that.</p>

<p>I called and asked them if they knew about what is posted about their company on here when you google their name. The coach I spoke to said they did, and she said that everyone has read the posts and the only post by an actual CAA employee was the post that Coach Brett put up over 2 years ago. At first, I didnt believe her, because I was still really skeptical, and even a bit upset about the way the workshop went.</p>

<p>The coach I spoke to (female) was really nice and even said that she understood why we would have reservations about spending a large amount of money. She was very down to earth and was not high pressure like the workshop was. She even said that their program is not for everyone. For families who actually have a good/involved counselor at their high school, they might not need as much assistance as other families who only ever see their HS counselor when they’re picking their classes each semester. I felt a lot better about it just because of her laid-back attitude. She said that they are legally bound to that contract just as much as their clients are. Which makes sense.</p>

<p>Anyway, the thing that made the most sense to me is that she said that with CAA, you’ll get as much out of it as you put in. The coaches aren’t going to hunt you down and MAKE you do anything, but they are there to help and will go above and beyond to do so if you just call and ask for help and are actually proactive about it. The important thing to remember is that the first thing they ask you to do is to “Make a Commitment”. If you are committed to going to college like I am, then I am going to use every bit of help I can get, and CAA seems like the best option for getting that help since my counselor is way too involved in all of the HS drama crap to help me get into a good college.</p>

<p>This is just my opinion, but if you want the same reassurance that I got, just call! I really don’t get why all of these people say it’s a scam when half of them just base it off the mailing. </p>

<p>The number I called was 1-866-642-4750.</p>