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Next Decade Admissions Advisers was founded with the goal of helping high school students and their families navigate the daunting challenge of writing their essays for college applications and selecting the school that is the best fit for them.
We work closely with students to ensure that their passions, accomplishments, and aspirations shine through their writing in ways that will leave lasting impressions on admissions committees at the most competitive private and public schools in the nation.
In addition, we counsel young people on how to choose the college or university that is best suited to achieve their goals in their own next decade in life.
Our three founders started Next Decade to fill a need that seemed underserved, which was intensive focus on crafting compelling essays that that capture a student’s true voice, talent, and contribution. We also shared a passion for working with young people and a desire to help families navigate the complexities and stress of the admissions process. Our founders have been friends since their own student days at Harvard Law School two decades ago. And so, our name has two meanings: we help young people prepare for their next decade in life. And the passion we have is something that the founders are taking on in the next decade of their friendship.
While there are many college admissions advisers, we deploy a unique committee approach. Our team consists of three graduates of Harvard Law School, each of whom also attended Ivy League and leading public institutions when they were undergraduates.
Bob Bordone is an internationally-recognized expert, author, speaker, and teacher in negotiation, conflict resolution, mediation, and facilitation.
Sarah Doktori brings a long-standing interest in education, mentoring, and supporting young people to her work at Next Decade.
David is a senior investment counsel at a leading hedge fund in New York, where he collaborates with investment professionals and external advisors.
David, an ethics lawyer at a leading professional services firm, brings his breadth of experience to the Next Decade team.
Erica Park, an accomplished opera singer and a teacher, brings her vision and her love of youth to the Next Decade team.
Next Decade Admissions Advisers offers bespoke college counseling and admissions essay coaching to high school students and families. Contact us to learn more about who we are, what we offer, and how we can help you put your best, most authentic self forward.
Because our intention is to limit the number of students we work with each year, every student who works with us will work closely with our lead counselor, Bob Bordone.
But, as with university admissions committees who make their decisions as a collective, every student’s essays will also be reviewed by every member of the Next Decade team. This will ensure that each student who works with us benefits from a diversity of reactions, approaches, and coaching. In this way, we stand apart from others who offer similar essay coaching services. This committee approach matches the actual process that colleges and universities take in admissions decision-making.
Our team of advisers themselves attended some of the nation’s most elite public and private university including Harvard, Princeton, Dartmouth, and the University of California. Bob Bordone, who leads our team, served on the full-time faculty of Harvard Law School for more than 20 years and on the Harvard Law School Admissions Committee for more than a decade. He brings a wealth of experience, having read thousands of application essays from the best students in the country.
Apart from the committee approach, Bob will invest the time to get to know each and every student as a human being. As Bob gets to know each student he works with in a real way, it helps him coach the students to find their own voice – the voice that will resonate with admissions officers looking to get to know students beyond activities, grades, and SAT scores.
We are also proud of how relatable our team is. Bob has been a recipient of the Albert Sacks/Paul Freund Teaching Award at Harvard Law School given to a single faculty member each year by the graduating class for teaching and mentoring excellence. And David and Sarah both have extensive experience working with young people in a variety of mentoring contexts. Together, we are confident that our team brings diversity, empathy, wisdom, and insight to the college application process.
Bob Bordone is an internationally-recognized expert, author, speaker, and teacher in negotiation, conflict resolution, mediation, and facilitation. A Senior Fellow at Harvard Law School, he served on the full-time faculty at Harvard Law School for more than twenty years as the Thaddeus R. Beal Clinical Professor of Law, Director, and Founder of the Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program. Bob has also been an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center and a Visiting Clinical Professor of Conflict Transformation at Boston University’s School of Theology.
Bob was a beloved teacher at Harvard Law School where he won the school’s prestigious Albert Sachs-Paul Freund Teaching Award. This award is conferred by the graduating class to the single member of the faculty who best models excellence in teaching and mentorship of students. In addition to winning the award in his first year of eligibility on the faculty, Bob went on to be a finalist for this award in subsequent years and was selected by the graduating class on three other occasions to be one of four Harvard Law School faculty members to deliver a Last Lecture to the graduating class at graduation.
Indeed, Bob has a passion for mentoring students and developing genuine relationships with them. He holds fast to the principle that, “Students excel in the presence of high standards and deep devotion” and he brings this approach to his counseling of high school students.
First and foremost, he listens and cares about truly seeing the students with whom he works. In listening and developing a genuine connection, Bob is able to help them craft essays that capture the unique essence of who they are and what they will bring to the college of their choice.
While at Harvard Law School, Bob also served on the Admissions Committee for more than a decade. During this time, he was the faculty member selected to welcome the incoming class during the Admitted Students Program. He’s read thousands of essays from the nation’s most promising candidates. As a result, he knows what works and what flops; what is compelling and what is hackneyed. He has a passion for writing and a discerning editor’s eye.
In addition to his work at Next Decade, Bob continues to mediate and teach negotiation, conflict resilience, and difficult conversations to corporate, not-for-profit, and governmental institutions around the world. His clients have included the world’s leading companies from General Motors to Microsoft. He has also worked with governments including the U.S. Embassies in conflict hot spots from Israel to Korea to Syria.
Bob has served on a variety of advisory boards that include the Dartmouth College Center for Social Impact and the Harvard Law School Mediation Program. He has served as Associate Editor of the Negotiation Journal and as a member of its Editorial Advisory Board, as well as a member of the Harvard Program on Negotiation Executive Committee, and as faculty adviser to the Harvard Mediation Program, the Harvard Negotiation Law Review, and Harvard Negotiators.
Bob currently serves on the Board of Directors for Seeds of Peace, on the Advisory Board for the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, on the Board of the Systemic Justice Project at Harvard Law School, and on the Board of Advisors for the Center for Empathy in International Affairs.
Bob received his J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School, and his A.B., summa cum laude, from Dartmouth College where he majored in Government. You can follow him on Twitter with the handle @bobbordone.
Sarah Doktori brings a long-standing interest in education, mentoring, and supporting young people to her work at Next Decade. She’s taught in a variety of contexts, including at Harvard Law School and at MIT Sloan School of Business. Having navigated college admissions from a competitive New England prep school, she has a deep appreciation of the challenges that young people from competitive backgrounds face when applying to elite colleges.
A native of Boston, Sarah attended Princeton University where she earned her undergraduate degree cum laude and the Harvard Law School where she earned her J.D., cum laude. She currently lives in New York City with her husband Daniel and their dog Charlie.
David is a senior investment counsel at a leading hedge fund in New York, where he collaborates with investment professionals and external advisors to analyze investment opportunities from a legal perspective.
He is a regular speaker at Harvard Law School on a variety of topics, such as derivatives, bankruptcy practice, and life after law school. He particularly enjoys speaking with students about the practice of law – especially about the initiative and the entrepreneurial drive that is now required to be an excellent attorney. Prior to Harvard Law School, David attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he majored in Political Science with an emphasis on political philosophy and minored in music.
David values precision and conciseness in written and oral communication and believes that a loving community, self-affirmation, deep introspection and unwavering resolve are keys to self-improvement and self-realization.
David is a lawyer on the Ethics and Compliance team at a leading professional services firm, collaborating with legal, HR an business teams around the globe to identify and address thorny issues with creative solutions. He previously served as the general counsel of an innovative consumer products company and an IP counsel for a global market research group, and has also practiced as a patent attorney.
David’s writing style and philosophy are shaped by his breadth of experience and his appreciation of the importance of tailoring a message to its intended audience to achieve maximum impact.
David has a 3rd degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and while getting his law degree at Harvard, he was the head coach of the university’s World Tae Kwon Do Federation club team. Before that, David received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in mechanical engineering.
He currently lives in New York with his wife and three children.
Erica Park, an accomplished opera singer and a teacher, brings her vision and her love of youth to the Next Decade team. She received her Bachelor of Music at Indiana University at Bloomington where she was awarded the prestigious Campus scholar’s award, and went on to receive her Master of Music at Boston University on a merit scholarship.
After graduating, Erica performed with the Santa Fe Opera as part of the company’s apprentice artist program. She then went on to become the lead conductor and teacher at the Children’s Choral Ensemble of the Children’s Orchestra Society in Manhasset, New York. While there, she created, refined and further developed the curriculum for the choral program.
In addition to the above, Erica also taught for many years as a private music instructor, teaching young students voice and piano. Whether it was in her role a choir conductor or a private teacher, her chief aim was to foster in students the love of music, rather than mere pursuit of technical proficiency.
Erica also has a passion for her community. She was a member of the Board of the Center for Food Action in Englewood, NJ which distributes food and other essentials to the underprivileged neighbors in the community. She currently serves as the Board of Trustee for the Englewood Health and Medical Center in Englewood.
As one of the founders of Next Decade, Erica will direct her efforts to ensure (i) smooth and seamless communication among the counselors, the students and the parents, (ii) that we continue to deliver our unique product offering in a way that always places the primary and central focus on the student – all with the aim of helping each student tell their own unique story in an honest and compelling way.