Education Admissions Expert Network Aristotle Circle Acquires Peer2Peer Tutors, Country's Largest Peer Tutoring Company

NEW YORK, Jan. 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Aristotle Circle, Inc., the leading national expert network for school admissions, today announced its acquisition of Peer2Peer Tutors, Inc., the largest peer tutoring company in the country.  The merger of the two companies will make Aristotle Circle the largest educational consulting company of its kind – combining a highly specialized network of professional experts with a league of high-school and college top performers who tutor students on a variety of subjects.

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Aristotle Circle will expand Peer2Peer's tutoring model to new markets including New York City's tri-state area and Boston, creating local youth jobs.

"Aristotle Circle now has the widest possible breadth and depth of educational consulting services," said Suzanne Rheault, CEO and Founder of Aristotle Circle.  "The school admissions process is more competitive than ever, and families require a wide range of services to give their children the best possible advantage.

"This is about fostering a culture of learning – whether it's insights from our circle of close to 300 experts who are proven in their field, be it admissions, financial aid or international advice or the nation's top performing students being rigorously trained to help their peers.  We believe that every child has the potential to do something great; our mission is to help unlock that passion and power."

Aristotle Circle leverages a matchmaking model with a highly successful expert network to connect families to admissions experts.  By creating a marketplace for expertise, Aristotle Circle enables families to obtain much needed guidance to successfully navigate all aspects of the education and admissions processes.

Peer2Peer Tutors, started by Erik Kimel when he was a high school student, employs the largest network of pre-screened, vetted and reliable high school and college tutors.  The company also has proprietary technology that includes a recommendation engine for matching peer tutors with students.  Since its founding in 2004 in the Washington, DC area, Peer2Peer has provided more than 100,000 hours of tutoring, serving over 5,000 families.  Since 2011 alone, Peer2Peer has created 500 youth jobs.

"Peer2Peer's approach has a high standard of accepting only the top seven percent of academic performers in each school district. This acquisition allows us to apply this model to New York City and additional markets, and we hope to create as many youth job opportunities as possible," said Rheault. "Different children have different learning needs, and sometimes tutoring by a peer is received better by a child than a session with a grown-up.  We now have the opportunity to offer families more choices for the services they need, individually tailored for each child."

"Aristotle Circle is doing an amazing job applying the power of expert networks to admissions and education," said Erik Kimel, founder of Peer2Peer.  "We believe that the addition of a peer to peer tutoring service can add tremendous value, serve families across a wide range of socio-economic backgrounds, create exponentially more youth jobs, and augment the services Aristotle Circle provides."

Educational expert Jerry Weast, Institute for Educational Leadership board member, and former Superintendent of Montgomery County Public Schools said: "The Peer2Peer model stands for what works in education. It creates jobs for top high school students, serves families with quality services, augments the work of teachers, and cultivates stronger communities.  It's a win-win for everyone involved."

Unlike other services that offer tutoring and education advice and leave it up to families to find and try out tutors or educational consultants, both Aristotle Circle and Peer2Peer distinguish themselves by their highly customized matchmaking, pre-screening and vetting of the experts and tutors, and personalized and local attention and flexibility:

Customized matchmaking

Both Aristotle Circle and Peer2Peer put utmost importance on finding the right person to help a child, with Aristotle Circle using insightful customer service to match families to experts, and Peer2Peer using local education advisors that match students with tutors.

Professional vetting

All Aristotle Circle experts are successful veterans who are proven in their field, be it admissions, financial aid or international advice, and vetted and pre-screened.  Each Peer2Peer tutor's school credentials and exam scores are independently checked, and the tutor must pass a rigorous training course as well as attend regular brush-up training.

Personalized and local services

Despite its size, Aristotle Circle remains flexible and local, tailoring the services to the needs of an individual family. For example, it can draw on experts who specialize in New York City private school kindergarten admissions, or California public universities financial aid.  Every client gets a choice of how and when to meet with the experts, with as little as a one-hour consultation available.  Peer2Peer has hyper-local educational consultants servicing specific counties, towns, neighborhoods or schools.

About Aristotle Circle

Aristotle Circle is an innovative advisory service that unlocks the power and passion of students by delivering personal, actionable and superior guidance and educational support.  Helping children succeed is core to Aristotle Circle's business. The company offers services ranging from pre-K to graduate school.  Aristotle Circle's network of more than 250 elite experts currently serves over 1000 clients in 30 states and 15 countries and includes top admissions professionals, guidance counselors, school administrators, financial aid advisors, and child development experts in their fields. Aristotle Circle's goal is to take the stress and frustration out of the process by giving students and families a clear path through successful school admissions.  For more information, visit: www.aristotlecircle.com.

About Peer2Peer Tutors

Peer2Peer was founded in 2004 by high school junior Erik Kimel.  Since then, Peer2Peer has provided more than 100,000 hours of tutoring services to 5,000 students in the northeast. Peer2Peer has created more than 5,000 youth jobs. Peer2Peer's tutors have a minimum GPA average of 3.8, and an average SAT score of 2100.  Twenty-five percent of all tutors are national merit scholars.  Eighty-five percent of all Peer2Peer tutors were admitted to their top choice college.  For more information, visit www.peer2peertutors.com

Contact:  Rubenstein Communications, Inc.
Iva Benson, 212-843-8271, [email protected]

SOURCE Aristotle Circle, Inc.