Placement FAQs

How can Gain Learning help me get acceptance?
We have developed a systematic and pragmatic method that will maximize your possibility for gaining admission into a degree program at an educational institution, be it in the U.S. or Canada. Although we CANNOT guarantee that you will be accepted, we can assure you that we will give you professional and quality service and our unwavering commitment to maximize your potential for gaining an acceptance. We begin this process by obtaining a snapshot of your educational background, desired program and anticipated semester of attendance, as well as your geographic preferences. This is done through an online questionnaire (tailored for undergraduate or graduate/Ph.D programs). We also assign you an educational counselor who will contact you to schedule a Skype face-to-face interview. During this informational virtual session, our educational counselor learns more about your academic goals and personal background and will have the information needed to launch the research process. We feel this is critical in the placement process since it personalizes the process while providing you with a piece of mind that someone who cares is committed to your successful university placement!

What if I do not have a clear idea of which field of study is good for me?
We provide educational counseling to help you narrow down your options and make a decision as to your optimal career track based on your personality and interests. This will be delivered as a combination of phone and analysis sessions with an educational counselor who will help you explore your options, crystallize your interests and reach a decision as to the best suited field of study for you! In addition, we also have available several career assessment instruments that have been tried and tested over many decades. Please check this link for more info:

https://www.gaincontact.com/gainlearning/services/placement/assessments/

If you are interested in a more scientifically-based career choice, then you may make take a career assessment test online which we will use to launch this process. Remember, “A job fills your pocket but a career fills your heart”!

What does the process of educational placement entail?
Once you decide on what career to pursue and commit to your major field of study, we will launch an extensive search of all educational institutions that match your preferences. We will recommend five educational institutions that fit your profile. Remember you cannot have everything you want! The more limitations you place on your school of choice, the harder it becomes. What is important is to have the best school for your particular academic needs, and that meets most of your stated preferences. Remember, “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try, sometimes you just might get what you need”.

What if I needed help in writing my Statement of Purpose?
Your Personal Statement is exactly what it is meant to be, very personal told in your very own voice! It is your story, your goals, your aspirations, and therefore must be told by you. What we can help with is ask you a series of questions that aim at bringing to light your thoughts. We will do so by providing you with worksheets for you to fill out and send back to us. Alternatively, if you have difficulty putting your thoughts on paper, we will obtain this information during a scheduled Skype session. Once we have your responses, you have all the necessary concepts and information needed for your personal statement. We will help with writing using your own words, editing and proofreading to insure that it projects the type of student the universities are usually looking for. All of this can be done for an additional fee of $150.

Please note: This service is only available for students who have signed for the educational placement service and paid $850 in full.

What happens after you present me with my five university options?
We will send you those five university options along with the most important information on each one of them. This includes accredited institutions by your sponsor (if applicable), location, program of interest, deadline, and requirements including minimum IELTS or TOEFL score required for admission, whether or not the GRE is required, minimum GPA etc. as well as a link to their website. At this point, it is your responsibility to do your due diligence and conduct further research on these schools to narrow them down to three options. We will be more than happy to give you our two cents and help you along this process but ultimately the burden falls on you since it may very well be one of the most important decisions in your life. You will then send us a written commitment on the three institutions you would like us to apply to and only then, the process of submitting college applications will be fully launched.

What if I change my mind half-way through the process about the three schools of choice?
Once you sign-off on the form that states your choices clearly, we cannot go back. Life is about making decisions and committing to them. This does not mean that you don’t have further options if you feel that the original decision was not totally right for you since there are also second chances in life! If you learn about another school that was not part of your final choice, let us know and we will gladly help. There is no limit to the number of universities you can apply for. However, only the first three are included in your $850 educational placement fee. Any additional university you would like to apply for can be done for an extra fee of $200 each.

How do I pay for the service?
You may pay in one of three ways:

1. Check made payable to Gain Contact Group, LLC and mailed to 17 Ames Avenue, Rutherford, NJ 07070
2. A debit or credit card (Visa, MasterCard, Discover, or AMEX) by calling it in at +1 (201) 507-1800 or +1 (201) 507-1810
3. Electronic Funds Transfer (we will send you our bank info if that is your choice)
4. Through our Active Payment Processing Portal by clicking on the Register Now button found on our website.

Bank Wire Transfers entail an extra service charge imposed by our bank of $15 per wire transfer, in addition to any fees imposed on your end. These fees need to be assumed by you.

It is important that you provide us with a physical mailing address in the U.S. for billing purposes, or an overseas address if you are still living in your home country.

Can I pay by installments?
We expect the payment in full before starting any type of service since the process of educational placement is very labor intensive and consumes many of our resources. However, we provide partial payment options only when two or more students apply for the service together and sign on at the same time. In this case, students pay in two equal installments representing 50% of the value of the service, first installment upon signing up, and the second two weeks later or before research results are provided to the student, whichever comes first. There are no exceptions to this policy.

Please note: Payment of the balance in full is expected before we send over any research regarding your prospective university.

Are College Application Fees included in the $850 fee for Educational Placement?
Students are responsible to pay in advance application fees for each and every university they decide to apply for. Such fees are made known to the student once the results of our research are provided. We expect payment of these fees before applications are submitted. Please note that there is a $10 postage charge for each university that we apply to.  There are no exceptions to this policy and the installment option DOES NOT apply to these fees!

How long does the process take?
Do not underestimate the bureaucracy of the educational system in the US or anywhere in the world for that matter! Every year, thousands of international student applicants submit their applications and the time and resources that universities spend on each one is enormous. The process of educational placement is very lengthy and you need to plan ahead and organize appropriately. Here is what we think: If you are planning to enroll in the Fall, you need to start the process in January; if you are planning to enroll in Spring, you need to start the process in June. Trying to do everything last minute while hoping for the best is not a good strategy. Early bird catches the worm holds true in this case!

Can you tell me how much time is the wait from beginning to end of the application process?
Ultimately, it is up to you! In our experience, the average wait is 3-4 months from the time you sign in UNTIL you actually receive a letter of acceptance. However, you need to know that most of the time is spent in trying to get students to secure and submit original, translated, and authenticated documents from the educational institutions they have attended in their home country. Once all documents are submitted along with the application forms, then such applications are considered complete and the wait time to get a response is anywhere from 4-6 weeks.

Should I anticipate other fees to be paid?
For international students applying for graduate study in the United States, we often find that they are required to submit their school transcripts for a course-by-course evaluation to be performed by one of the credentialed evaluation companies in North America. This would apply to you if your GPA is based on a 5.0 scale and/or if you are applying for a science, engineering or information science major. These evaluations are intended to assess how closely related are these scores to the generally accepted standards in the American educational institutions. This process by itself takes about three-four weeks and could be expedited for an additional fee if necessary.

Please note: The typical fee for this evaluation is $240 per student. This includes the regular $205 course by course evaluation fee plus our own Administration Fee ($125) for filing. This fee must be paid in full before we begin the process for submitting your transcripts for evaluation. There are no exceptions to this policy and the installment option DOES NOTapply to these fees.  Please note that each additional school costs $30 so once a student decides to apply to universities he/she will need to pay that fee x number of universities he/she would like the WES transcript to be sent to.

I don’t know how to write a resume. Can you help me?
For those of you who don’t know how to write a resume or C.V., we assign you an educational counselor who will work with you to obtain the information needed to put together a resume that is acceptable by North American standards. This process takes anywhere from 2-3 days and the fee for this service is $150. This fee must be paid in full before we begin the process for helping you with your resume. There are no exceptions to this policy and the installment option DOES NOTapply to this fee.

How can you help me if I have low GPA/TOEFL/IELTS?
For those of you with really low GPA (below 2.0)/TOEFL/IELTS (below 5.0) scores, or who have very specific requirements such as uncommon major and/or geographic limitations (such as trying to find universities for 3 people in 3 majors within the same geographical area), we may find that additional Educational Placement Counseling hours are necessary in order to identify appropriate educational institutions. In such cases, our educational counselor will give you an idea of the potential complexity of your placement once we have launched ourselves into the research process and will recommend that you purchase additional blocks of hours. Each 5-hour bundle is priced at $250 or $50 per hour.

We also offer TOEFL/IELTS Prep on-site at our learning center or via Skype.  Fees are determined based on delivery as private tutoring or group sessions.