I’m a college senior from a competitive public high school in the Midwest. I was accepted to almost every college I applied to, including Harvard, Stanford, Princeton, Columbia (Egelston Scholar), Yale, University of Pennsylvania (Jerome Fisher M&T program), Vanderbilt (Crescere scholarship), WashU, Duke (Robertson Semifinalist), Berkley EECS, Dartmouth, etc. I received no rejections—I was waitlisted at the universities I wasn’t accepted to.

Before working with Peter, my greatest challenge was essays—specifically, figuring out what personal qualities to highlight, how to highlight them, and getting under the word count. I had this problem in everything from my Common App personal statement to my supplement essays. I had spent my entire high school career pursuing activities I was passionate about, but when it came to portraying myself on paper, I was completely lost. I didn’t even know how to start thinking about my Common App topic—much less crafting meaningful supplementals—and all within the Early Decision deadline. The summer after my junior year, I was so stressed because I knew how much work I had to do, and I wanted to do it to the best of my ability, but I just didn’t know how to. High school doesn’t teach you how to write about your own experiences and draw meaningful insights from them. I decided I needed help, and that’s when I found Peter.

My parents and I chose to work Peter because he’s sincere. I first decided to schedule a complimentary 30-minute call with him to see if he would be a good fit. Instead of 30 minutes, Peter gave me almost an hour and a half of solid advice that was perfectly tailored to my situation. It seemed like he genuinely wanted to help his students, and after going through this process with him, I can confirm that this is true.

I wrote almost 30 drafts of my Common App—7 of which were fully polished—before I found “the one.” Anyone else would’ve gotten frustrated or called me crazy for going through that many drafts, but Peter believed in me and patiently supported my efforts to create a Common App essay that we both felt truly reflected me. We must’ve spent hundreds of hours polishing each and every word in that essay until the entire thing was bullet-proof and eloquent, and I truly believe that essay was a large part of why I was so successful in this process. And that was just the Common App personal statement.

For the supplementals, we wrote two or three complete versions for almost every prompt, brainstorming how each version would fit into the theme created by my larger application. Peter worked through Halloween, Christmas, and NYE with me on these supplementals. When I wanted to give up and submit essays that loosely answered the prompt but didn’t hit it right on, Peter could’ve agreed and made it easier on himself. Instead, he convinced me to get back to brainstorming, and that allowed us to create nuanced versions of the same essay topic that were uniquely tailored to each prompt. Those nuanced essays were, in my opinion, my best supplementals. Peter also reminded me (many times) when I wasn’t answering every part of the prompt, and helped me brainstorm how to craft a story so it would answer every part of the prompt. Peter was even with me when I submitted my applications. He helped me proofread everything one last time before I pressed submit. And when he wasn’t helping me with my essays, he answered my other college apps questions, like how I should draft emails requesting extra letters of rec and which updates to send in after the initial deadline.

Now that I’ve gotten into all of my dream schools, I’m eternally thankful to Peter for having gotten me here. I’ve said it many times before, but I’ll say it again: THANK YOU! You helped me do what I didn’t even think was possible. Going through the process just once was a soul-sucking nightmare for me, so I can’t even imagine how amazing you must have to be to go through it every year with multiple students.

I would recommend Peter to any rising senior who thinks their application has a clear focus, but who lacks the writing or introspective ability to explain why they have that focus. Peter helped me express my personality perfectly through the common app, and he helped me flesh out my extracurriculars through the supplementals. He helped transform a bunch of disjointed essays into a full person in the eyes of the admission officers. Above all, he was patient and he listened. When you’re a stressed-out highschooler who thinks college apps are the end of the world, you really need someone who will listen to you.

If you’re younger (i.e. sophomore year), and you want to do well in the college apps process, I would recommend hiring Peter early-on to help you pursue extracurriculars you enjoy and create a focused application. Then, when it comes time to write, you can work with him to craft your essays based on those focused extracurriculars.

Thanks for reading this, and good luck!

"I’m not sure how I would’ve gone through the college application process without Peter’s guidance and support.

Peter’s probing questions unlocked new angles to college admissions I hadn’t even considered previously. In our first college application meeting, Peter provided exercises to spur my memory of events that had happened in my life. He reminded me that any event, no matter how small, could be written about in a college essay. He also led me down potential essay topics as he asked me questions about minute details about my life. Upon retrospect, I realize he was capturing an image of me as a student and a person, which I could portray in my college applications. In fact, my final main personal statement connected extracurriculars I hadn’t even realized could be linked together before. Through Peter’s advice, I was able to efficiently describe multiple extracurriculars in a single essay.

One aspect of essay writing that I struggled with was word count. After I completed rough drafts of each essay, Peter’s editing allowed me to concisely express the same ideas, often in half the length. I feel that this allowed me to provide double the amount of detail and analysis in my essays. More than conciseness, Peter’s editing allowed me to better capture the nuances of what I wanted to show colleges. For instance, when we were discussing the common “Why Us” essay, he taught me that I should focus on myself and my own passions and how they matched the school's offerings, rather than simply regurgitate why the specific school was good. He said that admissions officers already know the programs the school offers, so the “Why Us” essay can be used as yet another place to demonstrate passion and knowledge in a subject.

Outside of writing, Peter helped me with pacing. I didn’t not know the logical order to write essays, but he spent hours crafting an individualized writing schedule for me. For instance, he suggested that I write my “Why Cornell” essay first, as I could incorporate ideas from this long essay into shorter ones. This saved me countless hours. Without his pacing advice, I likely would have experienced the senior-year winter break panic of writing college essays that many of my friends struggled through.

Ultimately, I have Peter to thank for my acceptances at Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and many more!

He helped me with a plan to ensure all colleges received a full picture of who I am and what I am passionate about, then he allowed me to eloquently and clearly express those ideas."

"My name is Ishaan Dev and I am a graduating senior from Arcadia High School. I will be attending the University of California Berkeley to study chemical engineering in the College of Chemistry.

I had a previous tutor before Peter. She would help me with PSAT preparation and writing. I improved under her direction, but after some time I found that I had hit a wall with my tutor. She had nothing more to teach me nor did she have any guidance to offer. And so we went our separate ways. On my first practice SAT I scored an 1850 out of 2400, a very good first-time test score. But I struggled to improve on my own. I took practice tests, and I looked online for other tips. I knew I needed outside help. Finally, I heard of Peter through a friend. From our first consultation, I knew Peter had something new and different to offer.

I received instruction from Peter from October/November of 2013 until January 2015. During that time we tackled SAT, Math 2, ACT, and college essay writing. Peter first taught me his extremely unique and effective techniques for the critical reading section, my weak point. We then moved on to math and writing. What I really admire about Peter is his work ethic and his ability to understand my thinking process and tailor a curriculum to my needs. Whenever I hit a wall or a mental block, Peter is able to find its weak points and tear it down by teaching me fresh new techniques and methods. Peter also always keeps up with the latest changes to these tests and creates new curriculum and techniques to help his students conquer them.

I improved my SAT score from an 1850 to a 2300 (2350 super-score). I scored an 800 in Math, an 800 in Writing, and a 750 in critical reading.

Initially, my mother suggested I try the ACT. With little preparation, I scored a 32 on my first try.

With Peter’s support and ACT techniques, I was able to pull that score up to a 35 by my third try. On my last try, I also scored a 36 on the ACT science section, opening doors to opportunities in any major in the STEM field.

As I studied for my SAT and ACT in the fall of my senior year, I was also starting my college essays. Peter helped me brainstorm ideas for my essay that not only had a lot of depth and meaning, but also conveyed who I was as a person. Peter worked alongside me through nights of typing and rewriting. He is a very calm and open individual, so it was easy for me to share my personal thoughts with him. He then took these thoughts and the bits and pieces of myself that I had shared with him and created a rough road map as a base for my essay. Peter’s tutoring gave me direction and confidence as I wrote applications for 15 universities. In January, I came out of my application-writing hibernation satisfied with the product I was sending to schools.

The results were fantastic. I received acceptance letters from 11 out of the 15 schools I applied to including: UCLA, UCSD, UC: Davis, UCSB, UCI, UC: Berkeley, Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Illinois, and University of Texas at Austin. There was one issue though. With so many choices, I didn’t know where to go! Which, honestly, is not the worst problem to have. After talking to Peter, my parents, and friends, I happily decided to study chemical engineering at UC Berkeley.

Peter is a lot more to me than just a tutor. He is my mentor. He has stuck with me through thick and thin. While I was balancing Boy Scouts, Percussion, and other activities, Peter was always very supportive and took the time out of his schedule to answer my annoying questions and even shoot me reassuring texts before my SAT and ACT.

When I finally became an Eagle Scout, I was allowed to hand out little medals of gratitude to a select few who had made a lasting impact in my life. I spent hours forming and refining a list, taking names on and off. One was never erased though. And that was Peter Peng.

So who needs Peter? I recommend students who are struggling to improve their scores with any section on the SAT, ACT, SAT Math 2, etc., from the essays to the bubbling, to seek out Peter’s help and instruction. He truly has mastery of these tests and is more than willing to share his mastery with his students. Besides testing, Peter is an absolutely exceptional counselor for essay writing. He not only helps with the editing, but also teaches his students to be better writers. I definitely produced some great college essays and improved dramatically in AP English after working with Peter.

It is also important to understand that working with Peter is a two way street. Peter can set you up for success and guide you in the right direction, but as the student, you have to be willing to work hard and practice his methods to really see improvement and achieve success. So furthermore, I only recommend students who are ready to work hard and see major improvement to seek tuition from Peter.

All in all, what I have shared today barely scratches the surface of what Peter Peng is capable of. I have sifted through many websites of tutors from Kaplan to Princeton Review and I can guarantee, by comparison, Peter is one of the best tutors available and for an extremely fair cost. Your search for the best tutor around is over.

"Hi! My name is J.D., one of Peter’s students for 2 years. I am now headed down south to Duke University. In the end, I got into several schools that made choosing one difficult...schools like Duke, Columbia, Cornell, Rice, Vanderbilt, Washington University in St. Louis, Amherst, University of North Carolina, and University of Michigan.

I went to a prep school in New York for all of high school, but Peter was able to meet with me on Skype. My school was very intense, and I would come home late from sports practice, games, with long nights of studying ahead. This made meeting times difficult, but Peter was very flexible and made himself available to me. We would meet at strange times and on the weekend, but Peter never would complain, even if it was 4 or 5am for him in California.

Before working with Peter, I went to an SAT camp because of my poor 10th grade PSAT scores. My 11th grade PSAT scores did not bode well for the schools that I wanted to go to either. My mom found several SAT tutors for me, but the only one I clicked with was Peter. Peter was able to find my weakness and knew what exercises to do to make me better. He is no doubt knowledgeable as he was my tutor for the SAT, SAT Subject Tests, ACT, and college admission essays. I think the main reason why we got along so well is because of how friendly he is. Let’s face it, the college process is not a lot of fun. Luckily, Peter friendliness and positivity help out.

I started with only a PSAT of 134 out of 240, but with Peter, I hit 2080 out of 2400 on the SAT, which was good, but Peter wouldn’t let me settle for that. He encouraged me to try the ACT because he knew I could perform better there, and ended up with a 34 composite, a near perfect score. On the SAT Math Level 2 test, he helped me get a 750. He also helped me reach 730 on the SAT Literature test.

We also worked extensively together on the college essays. Writing essays with Peter was always a little bit magical. I remember feeling like I had nothing to say in the beginning, but Peter helped me find essays in events of my life. He was able to get on paper feelings that I was unable to explain. Having the college process behind me, I am very glad that I had the help I did. Peter was an amazing tutor. While Peter is friendly, he knows what he is doing and is tough. The best student for Peter is one who is ready to work hard. I can promise you that if you do work hard, great results will come about. I would recommend Peter to anyone who needs help in the college world."

"I planned to take my ACT in February of junior year; however, my junior year course load took over my life, and before I knew it it was April, and I had two months to study for the June ACT. I didn’t know where to start—my math scores weren’t great, the science section completely overwhelmed me, and the reading section was too fast. After I realized my scores were not improving, I asked a friend how he scored so high on his ACT. He recommended Peter. I started weekly sessions with Peter a month before my ACT, and in a month my score raised 5 points. Five!

The two things that Peter helped me with the most were math and science. I improved my math score by four points from listening to Peter’s tricks for speeding through the math section, like plugging in the answers and making up answers, and from the copious math worksheets he gave me that targeted my problem areas. Similar to math, my science score improved four points. Science was completely overwhelming and fast-paced before starting my sessions with Peter. Peter helped me break down the science section until I understood the fastest way attack the science section effectively. Peter is always very clear and easy to understand, while still fitting a huge amount of material into an hour and a half long session.

I’m currently in the process of applying to college, and I feel so relieved that not only my ACT is finally over with, but that I scored what I feel I need for I the colleges hope to attend. I’ve only taken the ACT once, thanks to Peter, and now I feel free to work on maintaining improving my GPA and college apps. I recommend anyone who believes the scores they are getting don’t match what they should be to consider Peter. If this is you, you’re probably missing something simple but major. Peter will point out what you’re missing like he did for me."

My name is Greg Van Kirk. I graduated from Arcadia High School in 2015 and worked with Peter for my SAT prep. I began prepping to take the SAT in the summer before my Junior Year. I took a blind public practice test with no prep and no direction and scored around 1900. I wanted to do better, but didn’t quite know where to start. The test seemed long and some of the questions needlessly confusing, so I began asking around for tutors and was referred to Peter by a close friend who had a lot of success working with him.

Going into our first meeting, I was not sure what to expect. However, during his initial presentation, I saw that Peter was precise and thorough; he had done his research and had a well-thought out strategy to help a student succeed. As I worked with Peter, I was impressed by his calm demeanor and detailed explanations. He always knew multiple ways to attack a problem and always had a way to make the problem make sense. Outside of our face-to-face meetings, he was always responsive and flexible, working our meeting times around my busy Percussion and Boy Scout schedules. We met at all times of the day, from the early morning to late, late at night. He perfectly tailored the whole experience to me, something that I truly appreciated and something that ultimately helped me be my most successful.

I ultimately met with Peter from June until October every week or two before taking the SAT twice, in the October and January of my Junior year.

Through Peter’s help, I was able to improve my SAT score to 2300 (out of 2400) with 770 in Reading and Writing with a 760 in Grammar, a score I was very proud of.

After college decisions came out in April, I was accepted to: Rice University (my top choice), UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Davis, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, Occidental College, and Santa Clara University. I eventually elected to attend Rice University, where I am very happy. I owe a lot to Peter for helping me get to this awesome school, and I highly recommend him to anyone in need of help with their test prep. He is flexible and can definitely work to help you achieve your goals!

“There aren’t enough words to explain how grateful I am for Peter. In just a few short essay sessions, Peter expertly identified key points in my son’s life and got him to reflect deeply about the meaning of his experiences. Before finding Peter, we struggled to find topics and essays that would capture my son's sensitivities and best qualities. We needed to stand out, but we needed help.

Peter had no problem quickly discarding topics he knew would not be effective, and he drilled deep to find the impressive and unique details that truly painted Matthew as the intelligent, compassionate young man I know him to be. Just meeting for Peter for the first time, my son got so excited at what Peter was explaining. His eyes lit up, and under Peter’s mentorship and personal commitment, my son produced beautiful and poignant essays that truly moved everyone who read them. When he got the acceptance from Harvard, we were just floored! Peter is one-of-a-kind, truly an incredible writer and mentor!”

“My name is Nick Sarriedine and am currently a senior at Oaks Christian High School, a rigorous academic college preparatory school. As my junior year came to an end, I began to feel anxiety when I would think about what was ahead of me, college applications and essays. I asked a friend who I knew got excepted to UCLA whom she had help her with her college process. She told me about Peter and highly recommended him. My mother reached out to him and he responded immediately. Before I knew it, he had scheduled me for our first virtual meeting. I suddenly felt some relief!

My greatest challenge was writing down all my thoughts and knowing how to condense it. Where to even begin with my thoughts. Would it be my accomplishments? Charity involvement? My work? etc. This is where Peter helped me significantly. He would ask me questions and it would all pour out, one right after another. We spent days and hours, and so much would be accomplished during our sessions. He helped me narrow down all my thoughts, to end up with an extremely effective essay with just the right number of words (another challenge I faced). More and more I felt comfortable and less anxious. We were ahead of schedule and before I knew it done! I liked how he helped me organize everything and how we tackled one thing at a time, one university at a time. We always submitted a couple or few days prior to the deadlines.

I'm excited to share I was accepted to my first choice, Chapman University! My brother will definitely be using Peter and I have already started to recommend him to my brother's friend group and anyone else looking for the best of the best for college counseling!”

"I'm honestly speechless at what Peter has helped me accomplish. I'm naturally a picky person—almost a perfectionist. I almost never work with the same individual for an extended time, but Peter's skills and personal commitment are unparalleled. Peter not only went above and beyond my extreme expectations, but was a true friend who put personal care into making my dreams a reality.

I knew I needed to stand out, but I didn’t know how. I had great overall grades and scores, but essays were the one thing that would breathe life into my app. As more of a math/science guy, I have to confess that I’m a terrible writer and always feared English, my worst subject. But Peter’s patience and vast experience allowed him to quickly help me organize my thoughts and reflect on my life. He suggested so many creative and deep ideas. It was as if he knew my inner thoughts better than I did—because he knew just the perfect questions to ask to get me thinking in the right direction. He gave me more than direction and mentorship. In my moments of doubt, he gave me hope, backed up with complete competence.

His incredible writing skills and creativity truly shone through in the application process. He helped me map out my life and put the details together persuasively. Honestly, I didn’t know where to start or how to write a cohesive story. Before Peter, I was never the most eloquent and loathed to write, but his feedback completely upped the sophistication level of my writing, both in content and style. He even helped me earn multiple As for papers in English class, a subject I've always struggled with.

Peter's tremendous attention to detail helped us fine tune our strategies and make sure my application fit together as a whole. We came up with many unique, impressive essays that showed all the best parts of myself. Even though I had a thousand questions, he would not let any detail get past him, so I felt truly secure under his guidance.

Upon his recommendation, I even created a website that demonstrated why I thought I was a great fit for a particular college. It showed colleges why THEY should accept me. This is one of many examples of where his creative thinking paid off. The results were more than I dared dreamed. I got into a top Ivy League school, Columbia University, and can’t wait to go! My god, it would be impossible to overstate exactly how I felt when I saw my acceptance letter. My father, who runs an extremely successful business, told me that this was by far the happiest moment of his life.

In the end, Peter and I became true friends. He is constantly encouraging and advising me in life outside of just school and essays. He has been and will always be there for me, and I just can’t say enough how committed and great of a person he is. Working with Peter has by far been one of the greatest decisions I’ve made in my life. If you are a student looking to create incredible college essays, and be admitted to your dream college, I implore you to work with him. He IS the best out there, and I’d consider anyone lucky just to have the opportunity."

"My name is Tamao Cmiral. I am currently a senior at Campbell Hall High School. I am writing this now with the entire college application process behind me and I am glad it is all in the past. It was without a question one of the most mind numbing and time consuming tasks I’ve had to undertake and I wish the best of luck to anyone who will still have to go through those challenging few months. Looking back on all of it, I can say I am very happy with my results; I was accepted into eight out of the eleven schools I applied to. I can honestly say that without Peter, those results may not have ended up being the same.

My weakest points were basically all in the English and Reading sections as well my writing for the essays. English and Reading have always loomed over me as my most difficult challenges. Before working with Peter, I was embarrassed to still be struggling with some of the simplest aspects of grammar. I really wanted to work with Peter after a discussion I had with a close friend of mine. He had already worked with Peter in the past and saw major improvements in his SAT scores. I knew that the entire college process was right around the corner and that the standardized tests were a big part of the application process. I needed a guide and a lot of help through the testing so I quickly contacted Peter soon after my friend recommended him. I was lucky to get a hold of Peter knowing he is constantly busy with his hard work.

The best part about working with Peter was he knew exactly what I needed in terms of what my weaknesses and how to turn those around. First of all, Peter helped me realize that the SAT was not right for me. I switched to the ACT at the last second. They both had their challenges but I struggled too much with the English and Reading sections in the SAT. The ACT had the same challenges in these sections but Peter knew that I had a better chance of working around them in the ACT. He was able to pinpoint the most difficult parts of these sections and helped me bump up my ability to do better in them. There were a lot of baby steps in the process and it was very difficult but in the end it was worth it.

Peter helped me bump my score by 4 points in an extremely short time.

Another fantastic way Peter helped me out was the he way he worked on the essays with me. The amount of time, support, and work he put into them to help was amazing. There were several brainstorming sessions that got the best ideas out of me onto paper. My main essay topic was unusual and difficult to write about but Peter found ways to work with them and we concluded with one of my most interesting and absorbing essays. I went through the college audition process for piano and at one of my auditions, a professor congratulated me by telling she really enjoyed reading my essays and that she liked my style of writing.

What I found to be Peter’s best approach to help with the essays was when he and I would sit together and talk everything out. Anything I mentioned or any idea in his head was immediately written down. The more we wrote down, the more we had to work with and later we could take everything by putting them together to formulate the essay we strove to write. I think the essays he helped on by pouring nothing but hard work into really pushed me forward in the application.

After getting my results from the colleges I applied to, I can easily say I am very glad I worked with Peter. He helped me get into most of my schools including a few very difficult and challenging schools, which include both USC and Carnegie Mellon University. To have this entire process behind me is a huge weight off my shoulders. For anyone who has college process still awaiting them, all I can say is that there are no short cuts and the best results only come from hard work.

If you choose to work with Peter, he undoubtedly will be there with you through the whole thing and help you significantly as well as motivate you, but ultimately it all has to come from you. Every student has something they could benefit from Peter. Everybody has his or her strengths and weaknesses. Peter is an expert at figuring them out and using that knowledge to his advantage to help the student improve on his or her weakest points. If you are all around good at each section of the standardized tests, Peter will still find a way to push your limits and improve
your score by either boosting your speed or by teaching you his special tricks and tactics."