Author Talk: The Golden Ticket to College Admissions

Brought to you in partnership with the Library Speakers Consortium.

Another college application season is around the corner, and stress is already beginning to ratchet up for teens and their parents. You’re invited to join us for this must-watch talk by author, Dr. Irena Smith. You will hear about constructive and healthy ways to approach the college application process, preserve your relationship with your teen, and help them define success on their terms instead of chasing the elusive “golden ticket.”

Irena is a former Stanford Admissions Officer who has spent 18 years advising accomplished, tightly-wound students in Palo Alto and around the world. She saw firsthand the extreme measures parents took to help their children gain admission to highly selective colleges and the toll it took on the children as well as on their parents.

About the Author: Irena Smith is an author, former Stanford admissions officer, independent college counselor, and mother of three extraordinary children. She emigrated from the former Soviet Union with her parents when she was nine years old. In spite of her fierce insistence that she would never, not ever, learn English, she went on to earn a BA in English and then a PhD in Comparative Literature (both from UCLA, where she received a Distinguished Teaching Assistant Award and Dissertation Year Fellowship). Irena taught literature and composition at UCLA and Stanford before transitioning to college admissions, college advising, and writing. Her recently published memoir, The Golden Ticket: A Life in College Admissions Essays is the winner of the Story Circle Network's Gilda Award, named in honor of comedian Gilda Radner to recognize honest, authentic writing that "makes us laugh even when we want to cry."