Private admissions advisory
Admissions help from someone who actually studied at Stanford and Harvard.
I help undergraduate, MBA, masters, and dual degree applicants build applications with sharper strategy, stronger stories, and a clearer sense of what top schools are really looking for.
Harvard MBA and Harvard MS. Stanford BS. Strategy, storytelling, and application support for applicants aiming high.
Selective, personalized support. No guarantees. No ghostwriting. No generic essay factory.
The landscape
The process is more competitive, but most advice is still too generic.
Top applications are not just a list of achievements. They are an argument. They show judgment, direction, self-awareness, and fit. They make a reader understand why this person, why this program, and why now.
Everyone has an opinion. Forums, school websites, consultants, friends, alumni, family. The hard part is knowing what actually matters for your profile.
Many applicants start writing essays before they know the story they are trying to tell. That leads to scattered applications, generic essays, and missed opportunities.
A lot of consulting feels polished at the start and passive once the work begins. Applicants need real thinking, not just light edits and recycled advice.
Market note
Admissions has become more strategic. More applicants, especially at highly selective schools, are getting outside help. Some do it openly. Many do it quietly. The problem is that a lot of support is expensive, generic, and surprisingly hands off.
Why this exists
I built this after watching how broken admissions consulting can feel.
I saw my sister struggle with a consultant she had paid for. She had interviewed dozens of people and still ended up with someone who barely helped. The advice was thin. The process was vague. The emotional weight stayed on her.
Eventually, I stepped in. I helped her think through the application like a strategy problem: what schools needed to understand, what parts of her story were strongest, what essays had to carry, and how every piece could work together.
That experience stayed with me. Families are spending serious money on support, but too often they are not getting serious thinking.
“Good admissions support should help you think better, not just sound better.”
Leni Peterson Redondo
What makes this different
Not just admissions advice. Insider-level pattern recognition.
I have sat in the classrooms applicants dream about. I have built applications for Stanford, Harvard Business School, and a Harvard dual degree. I know the difference between an impressive resume and a compelling candidacy.
Stanford undergrad. Harvard MBA. Harvard MS in Engineering Sciences. I understand the academic, professional, and personal signals that top programs look for because I had to build that case myself.
Essays are not just writing. They are evidence. We clarify your positioning, find the strongest patterns in your life, and make sure every piece of the application supports the same larger argument.
I completed the MS/MBA at Harvard, combining business and engineering. I can help applicants who do not fit into one simple box turn that complexity into a strength.
This is intentionally personal. I do not want to run a volume business. I work with applicants where I believe I can be useful, direct, and meaningfully involved.
Results
Applications I have personally supported, reviewed, or helped shape have contributed to acceptances at:
Acceptances depend on many factors, including the applicant's profile, timing, school fit, execution, and admissions context. I do not guarantee results. I help applicants build stronger, clearer, more strategic applications.
Packages
Fewer clients. Higher touch. Choose the level of support that fits.
For applicants who want to edit their own essays, or who are one to two years out and want to prepare early.
Four coaching calls to build the foundation of a strong application. No essay editing.
- ·Diagnostic and goals: profile, targets, timeline, honest odds, gaps
- ·Positioning and narrative: core story, differentiation, what admissions wants
- ·Fully creditable toward Core or Full Cycle if upgraded within 4 weeks
For applicants who want strategy plus one essay taken all the way.
Everything up to and including one perfect essay. No editing beyond it.
- ·School selection: building and refining the target list across reach, target, and safety
- ·Overall narrative positioning: the through-line and differentiation that anchors the application
- ·Reference letter strategy: who to ask, how to approach them, how to brief recommenders
- ·One primary essay, fully worked: personal statement or main essay from blank page to finished, with unlimited rounds of structural and line-level editing
For applicants who want end-to-end support across a focused school list.
Everything in Core, plus supplemental essays for your target schools and full interview strategy. Capped at 3 to 4 fully edited schools to protect the high-touch promise.
- ·Everything in the Core Package
- ·Supplemental and school-specific essays for each target school
- ·Full interview strategy and advice
- ·Priority scheduling through the cycle
- ·Mock interviews available à la carte
For Core or Full Cycle clients who want to apply to many more schools.
We help you strategize and create prompts so you can apply broadly using AI. You write the essays; we do not edit each one.
- ·Your AI drafting workflow, end to end
- ·A master prompt library tailored to your profile
- ·A positioning brief you can feed into any prompt
- ·Per-school prompt strategy for unlimited additional schools
- ·Prerequisite: an active Core or Full Cycle package
Not sure which package fits? Start with the free 30 minute call.
Process
A clear process, without the overwhelm.
The first step
Start with a free 30 minute call.
In the first call, we will go over your profile, why you are applying, your timing, and the strategy you have so far. I will also explain what I do, how I work, and whether I think I can meaningfully help.
- ·Your profile
- ·Why you are applying
- ·Your timing and current strategy
- ·What support would be most useful
- ·Whether we are the right fit to work together
This is a two-way interview. I only work with a select group of applicants so I can provide personalized support.
What we will cover
About
About Leni
I am Leni Peterson Redondo. I studied Engineering at Stanford, then completed both an MBA at Harvard Business School and a Master of Science in Engineering Sciences at Harvard.
I have spent my career at the intersection of strategy, storytelling, product, entrepreneurship, and systems thinking. I have helped applicants, peers, and family members shape applications to some of the most competitive universities in the US and UK.
I do this because I know how much the right story matters. Not a fake story. Not a polished version that sounds like everyone else. A real one, built with clarity, evidence, and intention.
Philosophy
What I believe about admissions
A strong application is not just impressive. It is coherent.
Your essays should sound like you on your clearest day.
Top schools are not only asking what you have done. They are asking how you think.
Strategy matters because every word has limited space.
AI can help people draft faster, but it also makes generic writing easier to spot.
The best applications feel specific, grounded, and alive.
FAQ
Questions applicants often ask.
No. Nobody ethical can guarantee admission. My job is to help you build the strongest, clearest, most strategic application possible.
Apply with strategy, not panic.
If you are aiming high, do not wait until the essays are due to figure out your story. Start with a conversation.
Selective, personal admissions support for undergraduate, MBA, masters, and dual degree applicants.