Expert Will Plan Your Kid's Summer So He Has Something To Write About On College Applications

Now there are experts who help motivated (and moneyed) teens find fulfilling summer activities - the kinds that lend themselves to college application essays.

The New York Post spoke with one such expert, Jill Tipograph, a "professional summer planner" at Everything Summer, whose services cost around $300 an hour.

"In terms of writing his college essays, it was pretty much a slam-dunk," New Jersey mom Marla Isackson told The New York Post. Isackson said she hired Tipograph to plan two trips to China for her son, who now attends Yale. "We made an investment in our child. It was important to us, and it was our priority," she said.

Tipograph's business appears to have aged with her clients: In 2004, The New York Times wrote about her as a "personal shopper" for sleepaway camps.

"The service is for parents that are discerning," Tipograph told the Post. "They seek guidance for their children so they can develop in the most appropriate manner, like a tutor or a specialist or a vocal coach."

But there are some detractors. The New York Post spoke to NYU's dean of admissions, Shawn Abbott, who said, "If one can't figure out how to spend his/her summer in a meaningful way, I worry about what is in store for that person when they arrive on a college campus, when they will be faced with far more opportunities and choices that require independent thinking."