Lindsey Myers/Courtesy photo
After graduating from Middle Park High School in 2004, Lindsey Myers began a path to give back to students and help them achieve their post-grad goals. This year, she traveled to 25 universities across the country, to earn the designation of Certified Educational Planner.
“Only 400 college counselors in the U.S. have this certification, so it’s pretty exclusive and prestigious to get this award,” she said in an interview with Sky-Hi News.
Myers’ dog, Zephyr, accompanied her on the road trip, which kicked off in Texas. The pair then visited students on campuses in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. For the second leg of the trip, Zephyr and Myers visited Knoxville and Nashville, Tennessee, then went north to Missouri, finally concluding in Kansas.
Making the leap from Middle Park High School to adulthood
Myers’ love for educational consulting didn’t begin in high school, but the path that started at Middle Park eventually led her to this career.
While a junior at Middle Park, Myers began looking towards colleges. At that time, she planned to play volleyball at the collegiate level. Her coach encouraged her to apply at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, and Myers earned an athletic scholarship to play there.
Three college opportunities got her involved with helping kids succeed. First, she coached volleyball for a club she’d been a part of in high school.
“I really got a lot of exposure, and fell in love with working with youth during that time,” she said.
Secondly, her favorite extracurricular was the Student Athlete Advisory Committee, which engaged student athletes on campus to volunteer and fundraise for nonprofits throughout the Colorado Springs area.
“I fell in love with giving back and working with nonprofits during that time,” she recounted.
Lastly, her college job was working at the Broadmoor hotel in their childcare department, where she babysat for guests and helped with the kids camp program.
After getting her four-year degree, Myers pursued a master’s in nonprofit management and was an assistant coach for volleyball. As a coach, she helped recruit student athletes to play for UCCS. She also spent time as a head coach, strengthening her mentorship role for student athletes.
After earning her master’s, she got a fellowship with the El Pomar Foundation, which is associated with the Broadmoor Hotel.
“They have a fellowship program there that launches young college graduates into the professional world by having us do some leadership training and manage some of their programs,” she said. “One of the programs that I managed was called the student leadership experience.”
In this program, she facilitated scholarships for students attending the 11 colleges on the Front Range. She would meet with the deans, presidents and chancellors of these schools, then select four students from each campus to receive the El Pomar Foundation scholarships.
“I would do nonprofit management training with them, and that’s really where my eyes were opened to the scholarship world and the college world,” she said.
After Myers worked at this fellowship for a year, the program helped with her placement in a nonprofit job. She chose the Vail Valley Foundation, which provides assistance to residents in Vail and the surrounding areas. Since Myers loves the Rocky Mountains, she wanted a job close to her childhood home of Winter Park.
At the Vail Valley Foundation, she continued to pursue her passion for working with youngsters through the nonprofit’s educational branch. She managed programs for preschool age kids all the way up to college scholarships.
When the foundation merged with another youth serving organization, Myers had the opportunity to work with only high school and college students, which was the age group she enjoyed helping the most. She now led the Eagle River Scholarship Collaborative, which provided 18 scholarships for Eagle County students.
“I really kind of learned the whole ins and outs of the scholarship world,” she said of the job.
In this role, she’d help students with their applications, review their essays and interview them. She would then suggest what amounts to award and disperse the scholarship funds to the colleges.
“While I was doing that, I noticed there were kind of some gaps in our community, because our school counselors are very overworked and understaffed, and they have to do a lot of things,” she said. “Usually college prep work falls to the back burner, and that’s really what I see going on at Middle Park High School.”
This sparked an idea — she’d pursue a career as an educational consultant, to help kids in rural Colorado move on to higher education.
Becoming an educational consultant
Myers has had an independent practice as an educational consultant since 2017, where she serves students in Grand, Routt and Eagle counties. As a college and career consultant, she provides a connection between students, their parents, and staff such as counselors, deans and college admissions officers.
“I target students in rural Colorado. That’s really my bread and butter, because I grew up in rural Colorado,” Myers explained.
She credits her Middle Park and collegiate volleyball coaches for helping her make the jump from high school to university, where she blossomed as a volleyball player at UCCS. Without the coaches’ guidance, she might have been lost.
“I wouldn’t have known what was out there if it wasn’t for my coaches to open up my eyes to the world of volleyball,” she explained. “I want to do the same for students who I work with, and I love working with athletes, because that’s what I was through the process.”
Myers feels like Middle Park does a great job with athletics. As an education consultant, she can help prepare these athletes for their college and career goals. For many, like herself, it’s the sport the students play that launches them into adulthood.
Myers helps students focus not just on short term goals like signing on to play sports or win a college scholarship, but also their end goal of securing a job after college. For many students, college is what directly leads to the career path they take for the rest of their lives. For rural students in particular — who might not have had the same professional opportunities as urban students — college truly opens the door to career advancement.
“Really, I love working with students who are a small mountain town kiddo, like myself. I want to help students that are similar to me,” Myers added.
In order to become a college and career counselor to help these aspiring students, Myers took several certifications. First, she earned her Certificate in Career Development Facilitation from Colorado Mountain College in Edwards. There, she learned “how to help high school students with the career pipeline.”
She then received a certificate in college counseling from the University of California-Los Angeles, which fully launched her into the profession of her dreams. Lastly, she received her designation as a Certified Educational Planner after undergoing a rigorous application.
In a news release, Chris Bell, Chair of the American Institute of Certified Educational Planners, wrote he was proud of Myers achieving this new role.
“This certification sets the standard for professional educational planners in knowledge, experience and ongoing professional development,” he noted. “There is no higher mark of distinction in the profession.”
To become a CEP, consultants must be at least five years into their practice, then have visited at least 50 schools before they can apply.
“Certified educational consultants and counselors are remarkable,” Bell added. “This group of professionals have demonstrated a high level of commitment to ongoing professional learning.”
Cross country college visits
Myers is also part of a few associations of college counselors, including the Independent Educational Consultants Association. For this association, she needs to visit 30 schools every five years. Also, in order to maintain her CEP designation, she must visit at least 70 colleges in five years.
That may be a lot of schools, but Myers loves this part of the job. She takes the journey with little Zephyr, who has already been to about 80 college campuses throughout the country.
“We visited 25 schools on this trip so I can expand my knowledge about colleges to help provide the best services to high school students,” she said. ” … The intention of the campus tours is for me to see the campuses, see the surrounding areas, so that I can make recommendations to my students based on the criteria that they want.”
Myers added that Zephyr’s companionship is a fun element to these tours. On her website, Zephyr’s furry face is one of her logos, and she has a plethora of photos of him at the different colleges.
Her dog’s namesake is the Zephyr lift at Winter Park Resort, which was taken down the year he was born to make way for the Gondola.
“When I go on the campuses and people walk around with me, or I introduce him to some of the staff, they’re like ‘he’s the best dog,’ and they love having him on campus,” she said. “He’s kind of my unofficial mascot, like the colleges have their mascot.”
Now that Myers has 25 new school visits under her belt, she can give students in Grand County and throughout the Western Slope a personalized description of these colleges. As a Certified Education Planner, she has 45 more school visits planned to give students an even bigger view of how many institutions of higher learning await them.
“It’s a growing profession; it was a pretty big honor to be able to pass this test and get this certification,” she said of becoming a CEP.
The collegiate world can be difficult to navigate, but students and parents can benefit from her expertise as she guides them through the process. Myers is available for students of Middle Park and West Grand high schools, especially juniors and seniors who are ready to dive into post-secondary education and career goals.
Myers Educational Consulting provides comprehensive college and career guidance to students and student-athletes throughout rural Colorado. For more information about Lindsey’s services and to follow Zephyr’s journey to college, visit MyersEducationalConsulting.com or email Lindsey at lmyers@myerseducationalconsulting.com.