Educational Perspective

Consequences

If education is understood in the old Latin sense of bringing out or drawing out, then college selection is, truly, an educational experience. The process brings a student’s skills and abilities into an exciting, new arena, where outcomes have real consequences. It draws the student into a world of greater autonomy and responsibility.

The Romans gave us more than the Latin alphabet and hundreds of useful words.  They created the mythology of Janus, the twin-faced god, looking to both past and future. College selection makes each of us behave a bit like mythical Janus.

• Looking backward, a good college match demands that students apply skills and knowledge gleaned during the high school years. 
• Looking forward, undergraduate success depends on the same abilities that students use when making good college matches.

Here at Becker Academic, LLC, we call these fundamental, learned abilities, Key Educational Competencies (KECs). 

In our work with student-clients we cultivate KECs through a carefully developed learning paradigm, or pedagogy.  The goal of enhancing core competencies throughout the college selection process remains the same; the applications change with the needs of our student-clients. 

A student-client typically progresses through the three Becker Client Packages.  In each phase, we address specific KECs. For example, during the Run Up, student-clients compose their personal essays.  They write, edit, rewrite and edit again, repeating the steps more times than anyone cares to count. 

Essay writing is an intricate exercise in endurance.  Some student-clients require assistance with grammar or organization.  Others struggle over details to include in the stories they wish to tell.  Many, debating the merits of competing possibilities, seek guidance in establishing criteria for chosing a topic. We begin, always, with the expressed need and work onward to excellence.

Our rigorous, college-level training in critical thinking and clear exposition is not for the indulged child or the impatient parent, eager for the next activity on an overcrowded calendar.

If you and your teen view college selection as an adminsitrative task to dispatch with alacrity, then you will not find our pedagogy congruent with your values.

At Becker Academic, LLC, we see college selection as an early step into emerging adulthood.  For us, this decision is one of the most exciting moments of a lifetime. We believe that the making of a superb college match warrants effort and deliberation.

If you share our belief, we invite you to consider our client services.  We accept eight students in a graduating class.