Our History
Our founder, Mehmet SaÄŸlam, first met College Counseling in San Diego, USA, where he went for graduate education in 2006. While applying to universities for undergraduate education, the fact that students can do the studies they want both academically and socially, and that they can manage this process in peace with themselves in the naturalness of life, was impressed. Thus, making a significant change in his life and career, he decided to head towards College Counseling and started the College Counseling Extension program offered by the University of California San Diego. Completing the program, he worked with many students for 7 years, first in San Diego, then in San Francisco, and then in Los Angeles as a private College Counselor.
Our Partners
MEHMET SAÄžLAM
With my 16 years of experience in College Counseling, I can say that this journey is a constantly renewed and evolving process for both the counselee and the counselor. Our main goal is to ensure that our counselees not only receive the education abroad they dream of, but also become independent, goal-oriented global citizens on this journey.
HASAN KARAHAN
As a person who has worked in the field of education for many years and worked as educator and manager in administrative units, it is of great importance to know the person who will receive the training well and plan the process individually. My experiences have shown me that preparing the best opportunities, environments and spaces for the counselee to express themselves well are the key elements of success.
About Us
Our founder, Mehmet SaÄŸlam, first met College Counseling in San Diego, USA, where he went for graduate education in 2006. He was impressed by the fact that students were able to deal with both their academic studies and daily social lives while applying to universities for undergraduate education, managing this process peacefully in the natural flow of life. Thus, making a significant change in his life and career, he decided to head toward College Counseling and completed the College Counseling Extension program offered by the University of California San Diego. He worked with many students for 7 years, first in San Diego, then in San Francisco, and later in Los Angeles as a private College Counselor.
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Many of his counselees during this period were American students. In 2009-2010, he started to have counselees from Turkey as well. With the number of counselees in Turkey exceeding the number of American counselees in 2012-2013, he realized that Turkish students needed more professional support in College Counseling and came to Turkey in November 2013, deciding that it would be more beneficial and meaningful to conduct his studies in Turkey. Here, he continued his work, which he started as an individual, institutionally with the company he founded in 2016.
Over time, he saw that many of his counselees in Turkey were preparing for universities abroad, while at the same time they wanted to prepare for universities in the country. This pushed him to search for a formula that could do his foreign and domestic studies together. Meanwhile, in 2017, he crossed paths with Hasan Karahan, who had worked at various levels in domestic education activities for many years in Turkey, and in 2017 together they founded Universal Counselor. As the CEO of the company, Mehmet SaÄŸlam, and General Manager of Turkish Operations, Hasan Karahan, provide domestic and international university consultancy services under Universal Counselor.
At Universal Counselor, we try to ensure that when working with counselees, they can truly be themselves, not be content with what they have, push their potential and do the best they can. In order to achieve this and always achieve the better, we have been in search of new ones. New teammates joined our consultant team, as there are many academic and social studies that counselees need to do in this process leading up to university. Counselors generally prefer to be alone in this process, but contrary to this understanding, at Universal Counselor, we believe that the secret of our real success is to work in great synergy with our established departments and our teammates who are experts in their fields. This is one of the most important aspects of Universal Counselor that makes it different and successful.
We have helped hundreds of counselees make their dreams come true by touching their lives with the work we have done so far. Our counselees have been accepted by many prestigious universities that are at the top of the world rankings. It's your turn now!
Our Perspective
Why Universal Counselor?
Today, education is more of a responsibility than a necessity. In a world that is getting smaller every day and where distances are decreasing, it is a fundamental right for people to go to the best school, university and institution to get the education they deserve. The consultancy service that our counselees will receive from Universal Counselor is unique in many ways and always counselee-oriented. It is one of our unique works to provide them with an environment where they can prepare for both Turkish and world universities simultaneously. The experience we have gained over the years, teamwork and constantly updating ourselves enable us to provide the most accurate information to our counselees as soon as possible. Our most important goal is to bring our counselees to the highest level that their potential can reach, both academically and socially.
What awaits me in this process?
Your success in high school should go beyond just a good grade point average. Students who are considered the most successful are those who make an impact in their environment with every activity they do. Regardless of the department he aims at, he should be able to show that he can become a global citizen with his school success. So how should this be?
The first step should be to choose the right institution that has proven its expertise in the business with successful results in the past and present. Your counselor with whom you will work together will determine a roadmap that is completely specific to you.
If a counselee who wants to study abroad and is involved in this process has not been able to reveal his potential before, he first conducts in-depth studies on this subject with his counselor. In a short time, it can be determined in which areas the counselee is talented, in which areas his existing skills can be improved, and in which areas he is open to development. We believe that a counselee with potential awareness has both learned to think multidimensionally enough to design projects beneficial to humanity and succeeded in being equipped enough to realize his projects.
In addition to helping our counselees realize their strengths, we also provide opportunities for them to use and further develop these strengths. We are moving forward together in this process, which includes many steps such as one-on-one meetings, online resources, activity planning, and improving your communication skills in both your social and educational life. The aim of the consultancy service we provide is not only to get you accepted to the university, but also to ensure that you gain the right vision until the decisions you will make in the next process.