With Starboard Advising, you will receive guidance and structure to help chart a clear course to college.Balika Haakanson, Independent College Consultant, is excited to help families tackle the college admissions process, but is geared towards meeting you where you are in the process by delivering just-in-time specialized assistance. Serving North East Seattle in-person and online, rural Alaska (online), and many places in-between! Services can be hourly and as-needed (just help with the essay or help making a college list) or more extensive, start-to-finish guidance.Hiring a college consultant is a way to offload some of the stress of high school and to quiet the noise that sometimes makes junior and senior year so overwhelming. Similar to how the starboard light on boats helps you navigate, so will an independent college counselor help steer families in the direction they are meant to go.After graduating (St. Andrews University in Scotland), Balika headed back to her home island of Kodiak, where she taught gifted education for 12 years and helped middle and high school students dig deep, figure out what drives them, and where they might flourish after high school.Balika moved to Seattle in 2013 where she teaches middle school science and works with families on weekends and evenings. Her goal as an independent college advisor? To use her years of experience with adolescents to make the college application process an empowering process.Balika truly enjoys the college admissions process, has always read deeply and analyzed institutional data, and feels a calling to help guide students and families towards making the best college decisions for their families.

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Reviews and Testimonials
"We cannot express enough how grateful we are to you for helping A. through this time. It is incredible how stressful senior year is, finishing applications, keeping up with schoolwork and activities, working on this essay. You took such a load off of us and A. and made our level of worry go down quite a bit. For this, we are eternally grateful." (Parent after 4 hours of hourly work that started with an idea and a couple rough drafts and ended with a beautiful essay!)