Los Altos High School graduate Leah Guesman ‘19 has a solution to your college application woes: College Contact. After graduating from the University of Virginia in 2023 this past year, Guesman and co-founder Sophie Smith founded College Contact to bridge the gap between lower and middle-income students by providing counseling services to those who aren’t able to afford expensive programs. Many of their consulting options, with their plans ranging between $205 to $720, cost less than half of an average college counselor in the United States, which can range from $4,000 to $6,000.
“20 percent of public schools in the United States don’t have a guidance counselor,” Guesman said. “In the schools that do have them, the average amount of time they spend is about 10 minutes a year with each student. So the public options are failing students, and the private options really start at $250 per hour.”
Guesman explained how her experience in applying to colleges during her time at LAHS, as well as her background as a former counselor, influenced her decision to create the organization.
“Los Altos is the convergence of a lot of types of students,” Guesman said. “Coming from Los Altos, I was always really sensitive to students who felt a lot of academic pressure when I was a counselor.”
Guesman also recently raised over $1 million for College Contact, a huge success this early in her career. With this, she hopes to expand the company and reach more students. She reflects back to her beginning at LAHS with gratitude.
“Thank you to Los Altos and MVLA,” Guesman said. “They not only made me able to recreate some of their support, but also inspired me to change systems that are not working as well because when the system is truly supporting them, they can have such a big impact on students.”
Guesman flourished at LAHS, with her past teachers attesting how her character, clear even in high school, made her achievements possible.
“Leah was super dedicated, diligent and hardworking,” English and AVID teacher Keren Dawson-Bowman said. “Leah’s very proactive — she’s someone who’s going to seek out opportunities.”
“She’s very amicable, likable, and that’s such a big component in start-up culture, because you have to build connections with people and build a network,” English and AVID teacher Jonathan Kwan said. “So it doesn’t surprise me that she took the initiative to start her own company.”
The most unique feature of College Contact is the near-peer system, which pairs high schoolers with college-student counselors. They may come from a similar background or attend a university that the student may be interested in.
“We find that the counselors know the college application process really well because they’ve just been through it within the past four years,” Guesman said. “It also provides an opportunity for students to really build a relationship with their counselor that goes beyond the application process.”
Part of the company’s initial challenges came from learning how to balance students of all socioeconomic demographics, according to Guesman.
“We’ve been working a lot to figure out how we can get them access to our services and make sure that we’re not just serving the top, we’re not just serving the middle — we’re truly serving all students,” Guesman said.
