We had terrible experience with Crimson. I was with them for 4 years unfortunately. I was expecting…read morethem to help build profile so that college admissions can get smoother. I just realized that they were upselling some of their products which resulted in no real outcome. No clear advice was given to pick right universities or majors in last year which ended up with large rejections. Also, everything was pushed to last minute and decisions were made in hurry. I guess the strategist are too busy with too many students.

My personal experience with this business as a potential client was the worst I ever had. This…read morecompany acted in bad faith towards me, ethnically profiled me, was unable to handle the simplest things, and did nothing to fix their bias and obvious mishandling of the situation. A few months ago, we started looking at the market of education consultant businesses to find someone who could help us, a fresh immigrant family with teens, navigate the complex world of American higher education. After several Crimson webinars, I decided to join their Facebook group, which they solicit at every webinar. Not a big deal, right? Just answer a few simple questions, including an odd one about where you live, and you're in. Not so fast. Long story short, I was declined several times (I kept applying because I could never imagine they were rejecting me repeatedly). The reason they finally condescended to provide was that they checked my Facebook profile to verify my location and found that I "live in RUSSIA!" Can you imagine anything more daunting or criminal than having that on your Facebook profile? So, once again: a business solicits you to join its group, and when you do, indicating several times that you live in the US (a requirement for acceptance), its representatives rush to your Facebook profile to double-check if you're telling the truth. Can you imagine making decisions based on Facebook profile info? Your nanny, Crimson Education, requires you to keep your Facebook profile updated, peasant! The irony? Four out of six moderators don't have any location information on their profiles. I bet many of the 4,000 group members either have incorrect locations, locked profiles, or no location at all. It's 2024, after all. I believe the only reason to decline me was that I'm from Russia. 'Russian bots' moral panic, or something similar. They applied their made-up rule to me personally because I'm Russian. They didn't reach out to clarify. They didn't provide a reason for declining until I started questioning them directly in the Facebook form, which isn't a convenient way to converse. And they not only declined my applications, filled out in good faith with correct information - they banned me after I started questioning their mishandling of the situation. No business has ever handled me with such outrageous disrespect and humiliation. I even sent a message to the company's main email asking for help. Guess what? I never received a response or support. They can't handle simple, everyday situations. They make up artificial rules, don't follow them, treat you with disrespect, and never admit their mistakes. They don't change their outrageous behavior or correct it, let alone apologize to you. Now, tell me, how can these people help kids get into the Ivies if they're unable to get parents into their own Facebook group?

There's simply no GRE coach better than Orion Taraban. I say that as the longest-practicing…read moreacademic coach in the greater San Francisco Bay Area (since 1978). A Princeton grad and clinical psychologist, Orion also knows how to help GRE takers deal with the stress of taking the darn test out of the way, and what to do if anxiety hits during the test itself. Very helpful tips for turning anxiety off during a test-taking experience. I understand he has an online GRE prep program. I would seriously check that out. I imagine it's superlative.

Without Stellar GRE, I wouldn't have gotten the GRE score that I did, and I probably wouldn't be…read morematriculating at an M7 MBA program this fall. After months of test preparation, feeling discouraged and exhausted, I found Orion and Stellar GRE. He gave me new tools for the math section that helped me break through my plateau -- and even beat my target score. Orion is kind, creative, and -- in an over-saturated, over-promising industry -- unique. Not only does his approach cut through the usual ineffective clichés of test prep ("skip the hard questions"); it actually works. If you're feeling discouraged, reach out to Stellar GRE for a class, private tutoring session, anything: Orion could be the difference between you and your dream school this fall. Thank you for everything, Stellar GRE.

I took the June-July LSAT class with a fee waiver and had Austen Yueh as my instructor. This review…read more(and the five stars) is primarily for Austen's teaching. Austen is a phenomenally bright instructor who exudes warmth and a genuine desire for her students to succeed. She is methodical and highly skilled at explaining complex inferences, which was incredibly helpful for mastering logic games. Austen often went above-and-beyond to help ensure that her students could succeed. She made herself available to her students before and after class via email, and often stayed for well past-hours after each class to field any additional questions her students had. Despite the fact that nearly every student was taking this class after a full work day, Austen did a tremendous job keeping the class thoroughly engaged and entertained (with pizza and ice cream to boot!). Having primarily self-studied for my first attempt at the LSAT (using 7sage, Powerscore, the LSAT Instructor, etc.), I was initially wary of taking a course for my second attempt. Having received my results last week, though, I can definitively say that taking Austen's class affirmed my choice and will (fingers crossed!) be what makes the difference in getting accepted into my dream law school. If you're looking for an LSAT prep course, I would highly recommend taking Austen's class at Blueprint!

Aaron is literally the best. There are so many LSAT courses so I know it can feel overwhelming…read more After doing research for two months Blueprint stood out as the best course. I took the Spring San Francisco course with Aaron who was an awesome instructor. Every day of class I would come to class excited to learn and hear his lame jokes. Not only did the jokes help me stay up since the class is from 6 pm - 10 pm it also allowed to remember complex concepts in a fun way. I felt throughout the course I was overly supported. My instructor was available to offer advice, study tips and homework review before and after class. After each exam (especially when I hit a wall with my score) Aaron helped me switch up my testing strategies to find something that worked for me so my score would continue to increase! I also enjoyed the class overall because everyone there was very friendly, and it was a lighthearted environment where no question was viewed as stupid or obvious. The online component was also super helpful, one day I was too sick to go to class so I had to watch the lesson online which allowed me to keep up with the class. I love the Chain of Being because it feels like studying for the LSAT is a video game which brings me back to my PS2 days. Overall, great course for anyone who really wants to perform above and beyond on the LSAT! Also, my score has increased drasitcially!

If you are in the SF/LA area, you are a very lucky person. You have the opportunity of working with…read moreone of the best LSAT instructors out there: Nathan Fox. When I joined the class, my LSAT score was plateauing. I received a 166 on my first official take, but after 2 more months of self study I did not make any improvement. That's where Nathan came in. His class is absolutely perfect for those who have a solid foundation for the LSAT but need a little more improvement to meet their test goals. He's a great resource to ask with questions about the problems you've missed, as he provides a logical map to help you get to the right answer yourself. In addition, the live testing done each week acquaints you with actual LSAT conditions and the LSAT Demon is a godsend for those looking for reinforcement of material. Eventually, I was practice testing in his classes around 173-175. And then on test day, I beat that with a 176, a 10 point increase from my first official score! In conclusion, I'm a satisfied customer. Nathan will help you truly understand the test (regardless of your previous exposure) and you'll reap the rewards as a result. Good luck!

I've been writing Yelp reviews for a while and it is extremely rare for someone to have 40+ reviews…read moreand have almost all of them be 5 stars. In this instance they are well-deserved. I was in Nathan's LSAT class in April and May of 2013 and benefited greatly from it. The material on the LSAT is boring as hell and Nathan does a great job of making the class fun with his humor. Nathan is constantly arguing with the speaker and using profanity (which is hilarious, btw) to keep the class alive. Actually, I think he's just being himself which makes the otherwise dry material very entertaining. Nathan scored a 179 on the LSAT so it seems he can do most of these in his sleep if he wanted to. The class is located at the Westfield mall right above the Powell Street BART station so getting there is very convenient if you MUNI or BART. In addition to covering the LSAT section he does a 30 minute Q&A before every class (530pm-6pm) where you can ask him anything related to law school. He is always honest about the pros and cons of pursuing a legal career which I appreciated. He also did a great job of bringing in guest speakers to answer questions you may have. Nathan is always available to his students. You can always email him and he'll get back to you. If you have a question about applying, want to send him your personal statement or got stuck on a question he's your man. I admire how available he makes himself. You can tell he wants to help people succeed on the LSAT and get into the best possible law school they can. One thing I particularly appreciated is he allowed me to pay on a payment plan. This helped ease some of the financial burden of a $500 a month class. His prices are very reasonable and worth every cent but his flexibility was very much appreciated. Nathan also offered proctored tests on the weekends so you get to mimic test conditions. I found those valuable. Unless you're an outstanding test taker my advice would be to take the class for 1-2 months. At that point you start to see the patterns in some of the logic games and get a feel for how to set them up and you may be able to recognize certain types of questions throughout the test. I 100% unequivocally recommend Fox Test prep. I researched a couple of places before choosing Nathan's class and preferred to support a local business and I can guarantee Nathan is funnier and more effective than any of the big test prep services out there. Thanks Fox Test prep!

I would highly recommend Manhattan Prep instructor Ryan Jacobs for your studying needs! Ryan helped…read moreme study for the GMAT in just under 9 weeks, during which my score improved 130 points. Ryan helped tailor the material to my needs and gave me plenty of homework to do that helped me strengthen my weakest content areas. He was very calm and focused but also made things feel light-hearted and less intense by cracking jokes or reassuring me of his own past GMAT mistakes. Ryan was a great resource to have and I couldn't have done as well as I did on the GMAT without him! I would also recommend the Manhattan Prep GMAT books (All the Quant, All the Verbal, companion guides, etc.) as they extensively cover everything you need to know for the GMAT exam.

I took 5 classes with Ryan Jacobs and I highly recommend him as a tutor. My verbal was stagnating…read moreat 32 and I needed my verbal to go higher so I could break into the 700 range. Ryan offered me many tips and gave many insights as to how to improve my verbal. One of them was how to change my mindset when studying for the GMAT. The shift in mentality was what helped me improved my verbal by 6 points in the actual GMAT.

TestCrackers completely changed my GRE experience, especially thanks to Yuri (Quant) and Seth…read more(Verbal). I worked with TestCrackers for over a year, primarily through small-group tutoring, and I cannot recommend the program highly enough. I came into GRE prep from a humanities background and had historically struggled with quant. Math had never felt intuitive or comfortable for me, and I truly never imagined I could perform well on the Quant section of the GRE. Yuri, who taught Quant, is hands down the best tutor, and honestly the best math teacher, I've ever had. He completely transformed how I approach math. From day one, he created a learning environment that was supportive, engaging, and genuinely enjoyable. His lighthearted teaching style, dad jokes, and famously theatrical reactions to common mistakes made concepts stick in a way I had never experienced before. To this day, I still hear his voice in my head catching me before I repeat errors, and it works. Beyond his teaching style, what makes Yuri exceptional is how genuinely invested he is in his students. He took the time to get to know me, truly believed in me, and pushed me to do better in a way that made me feel capable rather than intimidated. He often went over time, not because he had to, but because he wanted to help more. It was clear his motivation came from a place of real care and generosity. To put my progress in context: my first Manhattan diagnostic was a 151 in Quant, and my first official PowerPrep test was a 144. I ultimately ended with a 163 in Quant on my exam. At the time, I didn't even know if meaningful improvement was possible for me. With Yuri's guidance, I not only improved significantly, but gained the confidence to apply to MBA programs that once felt completely out of reach. Seth was equally impactful on the Verbal side. His guidance completely changed how I approached the section strategically. I still hear him asking, "Is this 100% provable?" in my head during verbal questions, which helped me stay disciplined and precise on test day. One of the biggest breakthroughs from Seth's teaching was learning to let go of certain science passages and instead focus my time and energy on passages I knew I could get right, a strategy that made a huge difference. I started with a 153 in Verbal and finished with a 161. Thanks to Seth's emphasis on error logs, thoughtful review, and strategic prioritization, my Verbal score improved dramatically. I consistently reviewed session notes, maintained a detailed error log, and applied his frameworks throughout the exam. Thanks to TestCrackers, and especially Yuri and Seth, I finished my GRE journey with results I genuinely never thought were possible. More importantly, they helped me see what I was capable of before I believed it myself. If you're serious about improving your GRE scores and want instructors who are deeply knowledgeable, incredibly effective, and truly invested in your success, I cannot recommend TestCrackers enough.

Thank you Testcrackers!!!! So grateful for the Testcrackers Team, Yuri, Andrew and Sarah!!! I spent…read moreover a year studying on my own with Gregmat, Magoosh, Kaplan and ETS PowerPrep and I just wasn't getting anywhere as far as progress goes. It felt like there were too many videos to watch, too many areas to study and I felt overwhelmed and unmotivated. At 38 years old, the last math class I had taken was over 15 years ago, so it was a pain relearning all the math they test on Quant. Andrew broke down which areas were not tested as often and let the class know which topics to study on their own (due to class time restraints) if they were trying to score 320 and higher, which I very much appreciated. I only need a 290 for a program that requires that for admissions. The first GRE I took in August, 2025 was 279 (141V, 138Q) with practice tests ranging in the 270-280's. Today, I scored 294 (147V, 147Q), with practice tests ranging from 289-302. I studied 3-6 hours a day, 4-6 times a week (homework included) for two months to obtain this score, which I am very happy with. I'm sure I could have scored higher if I studied a bit more and did more homework. If you are thinking about taking their prep course, take the next step and make that investment because it is totally worth it!!!!!

I had a simple tutorial request. A tutor to teach basic Microsoft & how to use a smart phone to an…read moreadult living in the Bay Area. Shame ...I was unable to find anyone in the technology capital of America. One Supposedly SAT tutor actually said he was unfamiliar with technology and does not own a smart phone. Beware Thumbtack is not verifying the people on their website . Be careful...

It's not easy to find a tutor in SF. I wanted to find a tutor who is not only smart but can also…read moreexplain concepts in ways that are easy to understand. At Tutor Me SF, the tutors graduated from top tier universities like Stanford and Harvard and have track records with their students. This was especially important for me when I was looking for an SAT tutor for my niece who needed to raise her scores. Tutor Me SF recommended a tutor who scored in the 99th percentile on the SAT and really knew the tips and tricks to doing well on the math and English portions. After working with Tutor Me SF, my niece improved her SAT scores and she felt more confident going into the exam. Since then, I have recommended Tutor Me SF to multiple friends for Math tutoring, English tutoring, and even ISEE tutoring! 5/5!