College Cafe Cookbook_011717_press

The Cookbook

Table of Contents

OUR MISSION ........................................................................................................................................... 3
OUR MENU ................................................................................................................................................ 4
OUR INGREDIENTS ................................................................................................................................ 5
OUR COURSES ......................................................................................................................................... 9
SMALL GROUPS ..................................................................................................................................... 13
OUR TEAM .............................................................................................................................................. 15

Our Mission


Awhile back, we sat down to discuss what makes someone successful in
life. While answers spanned a huge range of topics both personal and
professional, the conversation eventually moved toward things that we could
do to help young people become happy and successful. Ultimately, we agreed
that a young person's ability to access the college of their choice was
critically important to eventually pursuing those things in life that fit their
abilities and interests.

Drilling down further, we decided that creating a way to prepare for college
admissions tests, a critical part of the college admission process, was the
best way for College Cafe to make a real impact. The problem is, many
families cannot afford to access high-end test prep because it doesn't fit into
their budget. In order to address this problem, College Cafe created our two
fundamental goals:

• Provide elite tutors that offer the highest level of test prep.
• Offer tutoring that is affordable to anyone that wants it.

College Cafe Mission

To give students the tools necessary to access their college of choice.




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Our Menu


Our grade level menus are designed to give students and families a list of
tests, supports, and tutoring that we recommend for each school year. We
work with families to create a plan based on the student’s current academic
level and goals for the future. Some students may elect to take most of
these classes, while others may need just a few. Detailed descriptions of
these menu items are available in the later section titled “Our courses.”

Formal Testing 8Th Grade
Support Activities
Tutoring PSAT (8/9)

Personality Test, College Counseling Introductory Session

Test Prep Fundamentals

Formal Testing 9Th Grade
Support Activities
Tutoring PSAT (8/9)

Personality Test, College Counseling Introductory Session

Test Prep Fundamentals, Content Tutoring

Formal Testing 10Th Grade
Support Activities
Tutoring PSAT (10)

Practice ACT/SAT, College Counseling

ACT/SAT Success, Content Tutoring

Formal Testing 11Th Grade
Support Activities
Tutoring PSAT / NMSQT, SAT, ACT

Applications, Portfolio Prep, Financial Aid, College Counseling
ACT/SAT Success, Essay Sensai, Math Blast, Reading Rockstar, Grammar
Master, Science Superstar, Content Tutoring

Formal Testing 12Th Grade
Support Activities
Tutoring SAT, ACT

Applications, Portfolio Prep, Financial Aid, College Counseling

ACT/SAT Success if done summer before senior year

4

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Our Ingredients

For completely understandable and rational reasons, most parents, students
and teachers assume the SAT and ACT primarily test a student’s math and
verbal skills.

We admit that when we first started tutoring, we thought the same thing.
We were surprised when, after doing a really excellent job of bringing our
students’ algebra, grammar and reading skills up to elite levels, we saw only
modest increases in their scores. These kids had serious skills! Why wasn’t
that showing up more dramatically in their scores?

It was a question we dedicated an enormous amount of time and energy to
answering. We analyzed thousands upon thousands of test questions,
carefully observed students’ performance in test situations and after more
than a year we came to a conclusion: excelling on the ACT and the SAT
requires four key ingredients. Let’s tackle the first three now and the
fourth a bit later:

1. Knowing Stuff: Yes, you have to have great math and English skills!
It’s very important and it accounts for about 50% of success.

2. Test Strategy and Pacing: Most students don’t finish one or more
sections of the test and almost all report high levels of panic and
confusion when they encounter a question they don’t know how to
answer. Managing the test is crucial. It accounts for about 25% of
success.

3. SAT/ACT Thinking and Analysis: The tests ask students to apply their
knowledge in very particular ways and the tests use very particular
language and very particular scenarios to cue students to do very
specific steps. As one student recently told us, “I know all this, but
they ask it in such weird ways”. It is essential to understand how to
decode test language and understand what the test is really asking you
to do and how the test expects you to move through a question. That
accounts for another 25% of success.

Now things became very clear to us. The reason we were getting only
modest gains from our students, despite polishing their math and English skills
to perfection, was because we were only preparing them for half the test!

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We found that when we equipped our students with all three ingredients,
scores rocketed: SAT scores jumped by 250+ points and ACT scores went up
by 10+ points.

That is the backbone of our philosophy. Teach the students all three skills.
We absolutely focus on elevating math and English skills to very high levels,
but we simultaneously work on the other 2 skills.

Examples of our philosophy applied to actual questions

Math Example:

When we give a student the question: 20 * 5+ !" =?
!

Our students know that diving directly into the algebra will likely get them
caught in a time-consuming morass of arithmetic awkwardness.

Instead, our students are taught to first analyze the question in a very
particular and rigorous way. Before picking up a pencil they see 3 crucial
things: 1) there is a denominator (which we don’t like), 2) there is a (+) sign
(which don’t like) and 3) the numbers under the radicals aren’t all reduced to
their prime factors (which we don’t like).

Given that analysis, our students know that the priority is to get all the
numbers into prime factors because the other two issues will usually resolve
themselves.

So 20 * 5+ !" becomes 2 2 5* 5+ !!! and things get A LOT
! !
easier.

The 5 in the numerator and denominator cancels off on the right side, so no
more fraction to deal with. The radicals all combine on the left side and the
right side to make integers, so the (+) sign is no problem because we are just
adding regular numbers together.

2 * 5 + 2 OR 10 + 2 = 12

That is a fairly hard question that becomes fairly easy because the SAT and
the ACT set up similar situations to test certain skills over and over again.
After you have been taught how to recognize and diagnose those situations,
the mechanics of arriving at an answer is fast and easy.

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Granted, you still have to know your exponent rules, but notice that just
knowing those rules isn’t nearly enough to get you through these types of
questions fast enough and accurately enough to post a very high score. You
have to know how to analyze the questions in a specific ACT/SAT framework.

Verbal Example:

If our students are given the choice among these three sentences, all of
which are technically correct, how do they determine which one the test
prefers?

The test has a strong and definite preference for one of these sentences.

1) The jury had found the executive guilty of fraud and then sentenced
him to nine years in prison.

2) The jury found the executive guilty of fraud and sentenced him to nine
years in prison.

3) The executive was found guilty of fraud and was sentenced to nine
years in prison.

Our students are taught a simple but very powerful rule: you never need a
reason to remove words from a sentence but you always need a reason to put
words into a sentence (especially with verbs - use only one verb when
possible).

Right away, our students will spot that “had found” in sentence number 1 is
inferior to the active verb “found” in sentence #2. Also, they will ask why
the word “then” was inserted into sentence 1? It’s not necessary and our
students are VERY sensitive to extra words inserted into sentences.

Sentence #3 not only uses “was found” instead of “found” but also uses “was
sentenced” instead of “sentenced”. That is a disaster as far as the ACT/SAT
is concerned.

Clearly sentence 1 is superior and our students will spot it quickly using one
rule.

As it turns out, sentence 3 is called “passive voice,” which the ACT and SAT
both dislike. Notice that our analysis didn’t need to go that far. We caught

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the passive voice error, not because we needed to take the time to analyze
active vs. passive voice, but because we are skeptical of compound verb
constructions. Our one rule cut through a lot of needless analysis and
indecision and arrived at the correct answer fast.

The last (and maybe most important) ingredient

The fourth ingredient to raising scores is practice and more practice.
Knowledge, pacing/strategy and SAT/ACT analysis can be taught and
understood by nearly all students. Getting really good at the SAT and ACT
works just like everything else in life – the more you practice the better you
get.

What really separates out excellent test takers is the amount of time they
spend studying. For students aiming for elite scores (30+ on the ACT and
1350+ on the SAT) it is important to note that the competition is studying
about 10-15 hours per week for about 3+ months before each test they take.
There is no reason why dedicated students can’t post elite scores as long as
they are willing to practice and make it happen.

Our objective is simple - to give every student all of the training and support
they need to do their best on the tests and help them exceed their personal
goals– regardless of what score that might be.





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Our Courses


Test Prep Fundamentals

Recommended students:
Freshman or sophomores prepping for the PSAT.

Course length:
10 hours

Content:

Test prep strategy: analyzing and de-coding questions, common tricks and
traps, pacing and developing a personal test taking strategy.

Math: English into math, exponents, quadratics, coordinate geometry (lines),
geometry and awkward algebra.

English/Writing: sentences, commas, fluff, pronouns and verbs and logical
construction.

Reading comp: identifying question types, keys to finding evidence in the
reading and fast reading strategies.



ACT/SAT Success

Recommended students:
Sophomores who have taken Test Prep Fundamentals, Juniors and Seniors.

**Note: ACT/SAT Success is designed to build on the skills developed in Test
Prep Fundamentals. While some of the material is the same, the course goes
into far more advanced territory on all knowledge areas, question analysis and
test strategies. While the class can be taken as a stand-alone class, it will
provide the most value for students who have taken the fundamentals class.

Course length:
20 hours

Content:

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Test prep strategy: advanced question analysis and decoding of standardized
test language, pacing and refining a personal test taking strategy.

Math: English into math, flipping equations, functions, quadratics, coordinate
geometry (lines, parabolas and circles), geometry, probability, imaginary
numbers, number properties, trig and advanced arithmetic and non-calculator
techniques.

English/writing: sentences, fragments, commas, fluff, gerunds, verbs,
prepositional phrases, pronouns, parallel construction, modifiers/comparisons,
awkward phrases, idioms, logical construction.

Reading comp: question types; advanced reading techniques, literary
passages, science/social science passages, hard passages, fast reading
strategies.

Science: question types, locating evidence, data analysis, chart reading and
fast analysis strategies.

Math Blast - Intensive Math Review

Recommended students:
Students who have taken the SAT/ACT and want to focus on improving their
math score. The class will provide a review of the basics and reinforce and
provide lots of practice for advanced techniques and question types.

Course length:
10 hours

Content:

English into math and advanced word questions, exponents, parabolas and
coordinate geometry shape recognition, trig, number properties, geometry,
advanced functions.

** Note: This class can be tailored to fit the needs of the small group. For
example, if there is a group that is simply struggling with the math the class
could be a more basic review designed to bring mediocre scores up to
good/very good scores.


Reading Rockstar - Intensive Reading Comp Review

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Recommended students:
Students who have taken the SAT/ACT and want to focus on improving their
reading comp scores. This class will provide a review of the basics and
reinforce and provide lots of practice for advanced techniques and question
types.

Course length:
5 hours

Content:

Question types, literary reading, science/social science reading, finding
evidence and advanced fast reading techniques.


Grammar Master – Intensive Grammar / English Review

Recommended students:
Students who have taken the SAT/ACT and want to focus on improving their
writing/English scores. This class will provide a review of the basics and
reinforce and provide lots of practice for advanced techniques and question
types.

Course length:
5 hours

Content:

Sentences, fragments, commas, fluff, gerunds, verbs, prepositional phrases,
pronouns, parallel construction, modifiers/comparisons, awkward phrases,
idioms, logical construction.

Science Superstar – Intensive Science Review

Recommended students:
Students who have taken the ACT and want to focus on improving their
science score. This class will provide a review of the basics and reinforce and
provide lots of practice for advanced techniques and question types.

Course length:
5 hours

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Content:

Question types, locating evidence, data analysis, chart reading and fast
analysis strategies.


Essay Sensei ACT

Recommended students:
Anyone planning on writing the ACT essay.

Course length:
2.5 hours

Content:

Essay question analysis, outlining and hallmarks of a high scoring essay.
Students will also write several essays and receive feedback.

Essay Sensei SAT

Recommended students:
Anyone planning on writing the SAT essay.

Course length:
2.5 hours

Content:

Essay question analysis and frankly what the heck it is they want you to do.
This is NOT a traditional essay assignment. Identifying and analyzing the
argument techniques. Incorporating “in order to” into your essay. Students
will write several essays and receive feedback.



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Small Groups


Teaching ACT/SAT prep in a large classroom presents some significant
difficulties. The sheer breadth of the math, reading and grammar that needs
to be covered in a pretty condensed timeline always makes prepping students
a challenge. When you add to that a class of 20-30 students with different
skill levels needing help in different areas, the weaknesses of a large class
approach is not hard to see. Some kids do find success in large classes; they
tend to be the minority. For most kids, the lack of individual attention and
lack of flexibility in the curriculum tends to lead to mediocre results. At a
cost of about $800 (about $45 per hour for a 16 hour class) from the leading
test prep firms, large class test prep is frequently not the best choice for
families who really want their children to excel on the tests.

The obvious alternative to large classes is a private tutor. Private tutors can
work extremely well. A good private tutor can lift ACT scores 10 – 15 points
and SAT scores 300+ points. The downside is cost. Good tutors charge
between $100 and $200 per hour. And frankly, you have no idea who you are
going to get when you hire a tutor from Craigslist or through another
channel.

There is a third alternative – small groups of no more than 5 students.
When done well, small groups can match results that private tutors achieve
at a cost that is only marginally more than large classes. The benefits of
small groups aren’t difficult to understand. In small groups, teachers can
literally look into the eyes of each student and see if they are really getting
it or if there are questions hidden just behind that slightly bewildered smile.
Also, all students take turns doing problems and being called on. The
environment is engaging and interactive. Because the group is so small and
standardized tests are so non-intuitive for everyone, a bond tends to form
between the students and they create a little support group. In fact, many
end up studying together.

Well-designed materials taught by a properly trained teacher can be flexible
to meet the specific needs of specific groups. Some groups, for example, are
just much more comfortable with math so there is opportunity to dive into
advanced math skills and also spend more time on reading comp, etc.

It’s important to note that just splitting kids into small groups and teaching
them test prep stuff isn’t enough to make small groups effective. The
materials must be designed correctly and specifically for small groups and the

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teacher has to be trained to make the most out of the small group format.
When those elements come together, the results are excellent.

College Cafe’s expertise is in small groups. It is our primary focus. The
materials we use are exclusive to College Café and have been developed by
Bruce Hanson (one of our founders) in conjunction with UCLA (where Bruce is
a test prep instructor and curriculum designer) specifically for small groups.
Bruce has spent countless hours teaching test prep in small groups and he
personally trains all of the teachers and monitors the classes.


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Our Team


Lonnie Yancsurak, Ed.D. | Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer

Lonnie is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of College Cafe, as well as a
test prep instructor at UCLA. He holds BA and MA degrees in Economics, as
well as a Doctorate in Education. He began his education career 15 years ago
as a math and physics teacher in inner-city Los Angeles.

After serving as a classroom teacher for 3 years, Lonnie left the classroom to
serve on the founding leadership team for Triumph Charter Academy in the
San Fernando Valley. In his five years as the principal of Triumph Charter
Academy, state test scores rose over 200 points, ultimately leading to the
school’s classification as a high performing school and earning a 10 out of 10
on the similar schools ranking in California. After a successful run at
Triumph Charter Academy, Lonnie served as the founding director for Coastal
Montessori Charter School (CCMS) in Pawleys Island, SC. In its first year of
operation, CCMS scored a “B” on the South Carolina state test, far exceeding
expectations for a new school. Lonnie moved on to develop and open several
schools throughout Southern California. His experience spans grades K-12, as
well as public, private, and charter schools.

Outside of work, Lonnie is a rabid college football fan and can be seen sitting
on his couch in the fall cheering on his Buckeyes. He married his college
sweetheart Shannan, and they have three young children, Bodie(8),
Beckett(6), and Evie(4). He also enjoys spending weekends exploring all of
the great places that California has to offer.

Bruce Hanson | Co-Founder & Chief Academic Officer

Bruce is Co-Founder and Chief Academic Officer of College Cafe. He has a
BA in political science from Grinnell College where he earned his teaching
certificate, an MBA from Wharton and is a test prep instructor at UCLA.

Given his emphasis on education in college, he naturally pursued a career in
music after graduation. He became a successful musician, fronted a number
of bands and launched a record label in New York. Finding that life in a tour
van was less romantic after he turned 30, Bruce pursued his MBA and
graduated from Wharton in 2002. He followed a traditional post business
school career path which included marketing for General Mills and working as
a marketing and financial strategist for several successful and very innovate

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start-ups in Silicon Valley.

Eager to launch his own business and return to his first passion - teaching -
Bruce founded First Choice Admissions, a boutique test prep
business. Combining his analytical and innovation skills, Bruce spent untold
hours breaking down and analyzing the SAT and ACT to create his own
rigorous test prep system designed to significantly raise students'
scores. Not surprisingly, his strong teaching background combined with his
relentlessly analytical approach to improving scores led to a track record of
success. 250+ point increases on the SAT and 10+ point increases on the ACT
were not uncommon outcomes for his students.

Anne Cochran | College Choice Consultant

Anne Cochran is the founding director of iLEAD School’s North Hollywood
campus (iLEAD NoHo), serving learners in grades 9-12. NoHo’s first graduating
class (2016) has now matriculated at a wide array of top colleges and
universities throughout the United States, including Georgetown University,
Bryn Mawr College, Wellesley College, Brown University, Dartmouth College,
UCLA, New York University, Reed College, Pomona College, and many others.

Anne was the founding Head of School at Valley International Prep South
(grades 9-12) — the guiding force in creating the school’s programs and spirit
that encompassed VIP’s mission/vision, which was dedicated to helping each
student discover and achieve optimal higher-education. VIP South later
become iLEAD North Hollywood when it joined the charter management
organization iLEAD Schools.

Prior to beginning her current high school leadership role, Anne created and
launched the college counseling program at Charter High School of the Arts-
Multimedia & Performing (CHAMPS) in Van Nuys, CA, where she carried forth
a unique-to-public-education plan largely modeled after those found in top-
tier private high schools. Under Anne’s leadership as director of college
counseling, CHAMPS graduates now attend college at a large selection of
four-year institutions including Yale, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Brown, Duke,
Vassar, NYU, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, and many others. Under Anne’s
leadership, CHAMPS students were winners of national-level merit- and need-
based scholarships from the Posse Foundation, Coca-Cola Scholars,
QuestBridge, and The Gates Millennium Scholars Program.

Anne was named a San Fernando Valley Business Journal’s Woman In Business
Award nominee, and is a frequent speaker at professional college conferences,

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most recently as a guest speaker at College Board’s Destination Equity
Conference. She has also recently addressed the Western Association of
College Admission Counseling, as well as the International Education
Consultants’ Association. Anne is the recipient of the “Yale Educator” Award,
“Colleges That Change Lives” Counselor Award, the Coca-Cola Scholars
Foundation’s “Educator of Distinction” Award, and CHAMPS’ 2013 “Educator of
the Year” Award. She was also the in-house college blogger and on-air
commentator for KTTV's MyFOXLA Parents.

Anne believes that higher education is a vital tool for achieving happiness and
success in life. Moreover, there are viable four-year college choices for
students of every ability, interest, socioeconomic and achievement level, thus
it is the job of any worthy high school to give its student/parent populations
the keys to open those doors. After experiencing her own two children
receiving top-level, results-oriented college counseling at Harvard-Westlake
School in Los Angeles, she realized her life’s mission is to bring those learned
lessons to teenagers who would otherwise never receive equivalent guidance,
but in ways that effectively communicate the needed motivation and
information to them, no matter what learning challenges or
socioeconomic/cultural barriers exist.

Prior to entering the secondary education Gield, Anne was a Hollywood-based
marketing executive in Gilm and television for 17 years. She directed motion
picture release publicity/promotion campaigns at such companies as 20th
Century Fox, Warner Bros., and Cineplex Odeon Films; and on the agency side
at her own boutique Girm Jones Cochran and Associates as well as in a senior
vice president role at the national p.r. Girm Bender, Goldman and Helper,
where she spearheaded corporate communications campaigns in Los Angeles,
New York and Miami for such clients as Universal Studios, Paramount
Television, Disney Consumer Products, Game Show Network, Iwerks
Entertainment, and 20th Century Fox International Television.

Anne holds a professional certificate from UCLA’s College Counseling program;
an M.A. degree from The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; and a B.S.
degree from Southern Illinois University. She has been married for over 40
years to Chuck Cochran, creator and namesake of “Chuck Cochran’s Music
Lab” at iLEAD NoHo.

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