Meet Amber!

Amber May, College Counselor

Amber’s career has focused entirely on helping both high school and college students chase their potential. Her students have been admitted to a variety of colleges and universities, including Cornell, Columbia, Brown, Duke, NYU, Northwestern, Penn, Tulane, Northeastern, 

Pitzer, University of Michigan, University of Maryland, University of Washington, University of Wisconsin, and Penn State. 

Amber began her career as a college advisor with Pennsylvania College Advising Corps, meeting individually with students to chart their path to higher education. She continued this work as an independent college counselor working with students to improve their chances of admission by preparing compelling applications and essays. She further developed her admissions expertise as a seasonal application reader for Villanova University, and she has also logged successful stints on the college side, specifically at Penn State as a career counselor, an academic advisor in the College of Engineering, and an instructor in the College of Business. 

This deep experience with students in both high school and college settings allows Amber to bring a uniquely informed perspective to her work with Collegewise students. She understands the traits and habits necessary to be successful in college, the methods by which selective universities seek students with those traits, and the steps teenagers can take to begin learning and demonstrating those characteristics while preparing for college.  

It's no surprise that Amber brings so much passion to her college counseling work—as the first in her family to go to college, Amber acknowledges that she had to learn a lot about the process to meet her own excitement in chasing that dream. Amber is quick to credit her own college advisor back in high school who took an interest in her and changed the course of Amber’s education. It was this experience—learning firsthand the very real impact one caring and knowledgeable advisor can make on a teenager’s life—that inspired Amber to pursue a career in higher education so she could share all that knowledge with the next generation of applicants. 

A dedicated pizzaiolo who owns her own pizza oven, Amber can often be found vacillating between physically strenuous activities—hiking, biking, and camping—and the more mentally strenuous exercise of playing video games.

Education & Experience

Franklin and Marshall College, B.A.

The Pennsylvania State University, M.Ed. 

Seasonal admissions reader, Villanova University

College advisor, Franklin & Marshall College, Pennsylvania College Advising Corps (PCAC)

Career counselor, Penn State Career Services

Academic advisor, Penn State College of Engineering

Instructor, Penn State Smeal College of Business

College admissions specialist, independent college planning firm

Professional Organization Memberships

NACAC: National Association for College Admission Counseling