I'm Patrick Brennan. For fifteen years I've worked in college admissions and high school counseling: roughly ten years inside the Providence College Admissions Office, five years on the high school side. I started Brennan College Advising to help families approach the college search the way it should be: thoughtfully, personally, and without the pressure.
My interest in the college admission process began when I was a young child helping my father, then the Dean of Admission at Manhattan College, set up for an Open House. As I moved into middle school, he switched sides and became the Director of Guidance at our local high school. Sitting around the kitchen table, I'd hear his stories about where students were applying and why they ultimately chose a particular school.
By the time I got to high school, my friends started asking me questions about the process. It turned out two of my brothers were also becoming high school counselors. Family parties often turned into my dad and my brothers comparing notes on the latest trends in admissions. It was, in retrospect, the best possible education I could have had.
During my undergraduate years at Providence College, I served as a tour guide and ambassador for the school. I loved talking about PC, but even more, I loved getting to know what each prospective student was actually looking for. I took every chance I could to spend more time in the admissions office. I gave tours, hosted students for the day, spoke at information sessions, traveled to high schools, attended conferences.
After graduation, I moved back to New Jersey to earn my Master's in School Counseling from Monmouth University. While I was a graduate student, I worked part-time as a junior counselor in their admissions office. They eventually offered me a full-time role, but Divine Providence intervened, and I ended up back at PC, my second home, working in admissions there.
Over the next ten years or so I traveled the country recruiting, read thousands of applications, served as an athletic liaison, oversaw student groups, helped plan major events, and got a front-row view of exactly what goes into building a class: what colleges actually look for, beyond the grades and test scores.
When I finally hung up the travel suitcase, I switched sides of the desk for good. For the past five years I've worked closely with high school students and families through every stage of the college journey. I've read thousands more applications from the other direction, counseled hundreds of families, and helped students identify colleges that line up with their academic goals, personal values, and long-term aspirations.
This is the work I was raised to do. Brennan College Advising is how I keep doing it, on my own terms, for the families who want a calmer, more thoughtful version of the process.
Two generations of admissions and counseling in the family: a former Dean of Admission, a Director of Guidance, two high school counselors. This work was the background music of my upbringing.
Inside the Providence College Admissions Office: reading thousands of applications, recruiting across the country, serving as an athletic liaison, and seeing firsthand how classes get built.
Working directly with students and families as a high school counselor, translating what colleges look for into a process that families can actually live with.
The right fit matters more than the rankings. The "best" college is the one where this specific student will thrive: graduate, build relationships, and find their footing. That's almost never the same school for any two students.
The process should be calmer than it usually is. Most families I meet are running on more anxiety than they need to. A real plan, made early, takes most of that anxiety off the table.
Insider knowledge changes the conversation. Knowing how admissions officers actually read an application (what they notice, what they overlook, how they build a class) changes which schools belong on a list and how a student presents themselves.
It should sound like you. Essays, interviews, the way a student talks about themselves on an application: none of it should sound like a marketing document. The students who get noticed are the ones who sound like real people.
The first conversation is just that, a conversation. Tell me where your student is in the process, and we'll figure out the right way forward.