I am so happy to write a positive review for the College Planning Center (Granite Bay) and our…read morecounselor Sara Batchelor. We started the process during our daughter's freshman year in high school. By starting early, Sara was really able to guide my daughter through career exploration, summer activities, volunteer opportunities, college application/essay process, and so much more. Sara was always available to us and we always felt she was supporting us in the utmost way. We had major life events that occurred over the last 3-4 years and Sara went out of her way to support us and find help to our answers. She truly wants to see her students exceed through the high school/college preparation experience. She feels part of our family and we will truly miss connecting with her through our meetings. I can't thank her enough for her generosity, positivity, and encouragement through what can be a very stressful experience. With Sara's help and my daughter's hard work and commitment, she has wonderful colleges to choose from. Thank you Sara and the College Planning Center!

If I could give more stars I would! The College Planning Center was so helpful through a stressful…read moretime in a high school students life. The test prep course they offer not only increased my sons score for the ACT but also taught him how to take a test better. The program is easy to use and helped so much to improve his scores! Their The one on one attention you get from your college planning person made the process of finding the right college for my student was amazing. Everyone is very professional but I appreciated the support they gave my son to help his confidence grow and found colleges we hadn't even considered. This made us excited about what the future holds for him! Thank you to The College Planning Center.

In short, ESM is the best you can get. ESM's team of mentors helped me immensely throughout my time…read moreas a high school student. From my AP tutoring needs as well as ACT prep (BTW increased by 5 points!!), Billy, Adam, and Justin really prepared me for the college application process. As stressful as high school was for me, Billy and his team of warm, SUPER intelligent, polymathic mentors, guided me through every step of the way, being accessible 24/7 by text, call or email. Any question that my parents and I had, at any time, was answered. Looking back as I start my second semester at Columbia University, I could not be more thankful for the time that I spent with the amazing team at ESM! I trust the team at ESM and cannot wait to have Billy and his team help my own future children apply to college!

ESM has supported me and my family for years now. Not only did Billy help improve my high school…read moregrades, get phenomenal ACT scores, and get me accepted at a majority of my college choices, but he continues to support me and offers his thoughts and help whenever I text or email him about grad school and career choices. Billy has a wonderful set of tutors that really cares for their students and want to see them achieve all their academic and extra-curricular goals. My tutors always worked around my schedule and made meetings fun and educational. ESM truly wants their students to succeed on any life path they decide to take. I recommend ESM to every family I know with students still in high school because no matter how successful a student is, ESM can help.

I didn't have a good birthing experience at Kaiser - I went into Kaiser with full intention of…read moreepidural but Kaiser didn't believe I was advancing fast and they asked me to wait until it was too late for epidural; what's worse was they didn't wait for my planceta to come out so they manually removed my planceta without any pain meds. Painful isn't enough to describe the experience. Pregnant with my second son, I didn't want to repeat the experience. Knowing I am likely birth fast again, I wanted to go without pain meds again, with as much help I can get, and natural birth of the planceta. I reached out to Tashina pretty late in my pregnancy. Knowing my situation, she responded to my email right away and managed to squeeze me into her schedule. She did a very thorough interview with me and my husband, fully understood what experience we are looking for and made amazing recommendations. She recommended me with a hospital I wasn't aware of that has great staff and with midwifery care. Since I was late stage pregnant (32+weeks), she pulled all her strings to help the new hospital accept me as a patient. And all the way up until the delivery date, she was only one text/call away for any questions I had. The birth was still painful, but with the midwifery care, Tashina's preparation with me and my husband, the hot tub setup, and her being there as my advocate, the birth was quick, smooth, and no manual extraction of placenta! My second son was almost 8lbs and no tear or stitches. Even weeks after birth, Tashina came visit and always checked in with me to help me with breastfeeding issues, baby colic issues etc. Tashina is so knowledgeable, caring and loving. We will always appreciate her help and she will always be a special person in my second sons life!

I'm convinced that fate brought Tashina into my life so I could have a beautiful, natural, and…read moreconfident first birth. Other than her deep knowledge of pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, there is something extra special about Tashina and the calm presence she brings into your pre and post birth space. She not once shied away or avoided any of my questions or expectations for my birth and was so understanding of my boundaries around specific things. I felt absolutely safe and held by her to surrender to birth completely. Moreover, she helped my husband feel confident in supporting me in a natural birth too. All I can hope for is to have her at any of my future births as well! :) Thank you Tashina!

My son worked with Alex on his post-graduate schools and doctoral program applications, and working…read morewith Alex made huge difference. He was extremely knowledgeable about the process and easy to access at any time. My son accepted to a fully funded program.I highly recommend Alex if anyone looking for a coach to help with their writing. Thank you Alex, I m grateful for your dedication and availability

I honestly cannot begin to describe the impact Dr. Blum had during the medical school application…read moreprocess. He worked with me every week to ensure I meet the many deadlines that come with applying to medical school and spending copious amounts of time reviewing my personal statement as well as many secondary essays. Beyond that, his positive demeanor and constant encouragement helped frame my mindset for the daunting process of applying to medical school. He also checked in on me and gave me advice prior to my MCAT and interviews. I truly could not have done this process without Dr. Blum and highly recommend everyone reach out to him for help with applications.

Came to the soccer stadium at ARC to watch Sac Republic vs. Stanford in an exhibition match. Sac…read moreRepublic won 1-0 and dominated on pretty much every area of stat. Sac Republic dominating the game is pretty much expected especially since they're essentially the triple A of soccer and playing against a college team. It was a fun match to watch and especially cool to see some of the future major league soccer players coming out of Stanford. Tons of potential there. The soccer stadium at ARC is well kept and clean. The bathrooms were clean and the snack bar had plenty of options. The stadium announcer provided updates on the snack bar being open and when it was closing too. It was a packed house at the stadium and the announcer said total attendance was 429 people.

The campus is beautiful!! I went recently to see a band performance and I loved it. They sounded…read morebeautiful! Everyone I spoke to was very nice. I would recommend going here to see a performance in the future.

Kevin is a knowledgeable, friendly, and patient math tutor. He's helping my daughter with AP…read morecalculus. I highly recommend him.

Ahn has been tutoring my daughter in pre calculus. She was struggling and just needed help…read moreunderstanding the lessons. Ahn has been a fabulous tutor. She works with my daughters schedule and makes sure she understands the lessons. My daughters grades have gone from c- to a b +. I couldn't recommend Ahn enough. We are very lucky to have found Ahn.

Completely unhelpful and not at all managed…read more If you call, it says check the online service. If you use the online service, you are told to call. Neither mention that you can walk in. Not that you should bother as that line fills up at 6 am but counseling office opens at 8. The online and call service also do not mention that they use the SAME SCHEDULE AS THE WALK IN. Walk in wait times are horrendous and you will be waiting for many hours after 8 am. A student I spoke with while there at 6 pm had not been seen at all that day and told to leave despite being there since 6 am. Unfortunately, the student staff at the front desk is usually rude or condescending as all get out, unless you're again lucky and get someone sympathetic. Wait times even with an appointment scheduled can be hours, days, or weeks. Some students I spoke with said they booked appointments in June but couldn't be seen until September or October long after semester starts. There are criminally few counselors for a school of at least 50,000 students. Even when you CAN speak to one, a few of them are cold and arrogant and will try to bog you down with classes that look better on THEIR payroll. Not all of them are bad, but it's really noticable with how few there are. I cannot stress enough how bad this counseling service is, and with the utterly Byzantine class layout and requirements for even a simple gen-ed degree, I say it is completely not worth it to schedule here, which is a shame because the school is great but counseling is not.

I had several times appointments with this office. They really helped me to select my unit and…read moredesign my educational plan.

I have never seen such dedication to education and the nurturing of young minds as I have with San…read moreJuan. I have taught all ages classes and programs from California to Colorado. This district knows how to teach! The schools are safe and well maintained by the operations staff. When I go by campuses now, I see HVAC workers on the roofs and custodians cleaning classrooms in preparation for the school year. It's good to know that there are people actively workin g behind the scenes to help facilitate the safety of our children.

San Juan Unified's interest is money and not the students. They are desperate because their…read moreenrollment is low and students are leaving the district. The district hires and retains inexperienced, rude, unmotivated, privileged teachers set in their ways, racist staff, and have discriminatory practices. I am a parent of 4 students who attended schools in the district since 2008 and it has only gotten worse. My youngest is at Rio Americano and the culture is toxic and dysfunctional. His counselor Sydnee Butcher needs training and support as an academic guidance counselor. Doesn't surprise me being trained by Elizabeth Irwin. When Sydnee first appeared last year, she was very vocal about change and supporting students. She stated she once was a student there and her experience there allowed her to identify areas of improvement. My experience with her is that is far from the truth. Sydnee doesn't perform any research nor does she fact check. She just blindly regurgitates what Elizabeth feeds her. My son is in a unique position and has aspirations for which he has set goals. While trying to reach those goals, Sydnee and Elizabeth have only worked to hold him back with hard stops. They are not helpful at all. You would think your academic guidance counselor wants students to succeed and instead of delivering hard stops, they will use their discretion (they have levels of discretion) to find ways and create opportunities to support students success. If you are able to get your children into a different district. Please do so. You will not regret it. If you are not able, please listen to your children, the teachers and staff lack integrity.