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College Admissions Consulting
Strategic college list development, application positioning, activity planning, essay guidance, and comprehensive application review.
Purpose. Strategy. Success.
Helping students move forward with clarity, confidence, and purpose.
Ikigai Consulting LLC provides personalized educational strategy, college admissions guidance, and executive function coaching grounded in each student's strengths, goals, and story.
About Ikigai
Strategy that starts with the whole student.
Ikigai Consulting helps students and families make thoughtful, informed decisions about academic planning, college admissions, and personal development.
Our work is student-centered, strengths-based, and systems-driven—combining individualized coaching with clear structure, honest feedback, and practical next steps.
Meet the Founder
Tamy-Fée Meneide understands both sides of the admissions desk.
As a former Assistant Director of Admissions at both MIT and Dartmouth College, she read and evaluated more than 6,000 applications, giving her firsthand insight into how selective institutions assess academic achievement, intellectual engagement, extracurricular distinction, personal context, and the story that emerges from a complete file. Since 2014, she has brought that insight to families as Director of the College Practice at Solomon Admissions Consulting, and now offers her own independent practice, Ikigai Consulting LLC, to students and families across the North Shore and around the world.
Tamy-Fée specializes in helping students develop authentic, differentiated application narratives. Rather than manufacturing a “brand,” she helps students find the intellectual and personal through-line connecting their academics, extracurriculars, research, leadership, and lived experience, then makes sure that story comes through clearly across every part of the application. She is especially skilled with high-achieving students whose interests span multiple areas, helping them move from an impressive list of accomplishments to a coherent, memorable story.
Her approach extends well beyond essays: academic planning, extracurricular strategy, summer opportunities, college-list development, ED/EA strategy, recommendation positioning, activities and honors presentation, supplemental essays, and interviews.
As a certified Executive Function Coach, Tamy-Fée also brings a distinctive perspective to her work. Since 2014, she has trained and mentored more than 150 educational consultants and advised 4 successful educational consulting firms, developing practical systems for helping students plan, prioritize, and follow through on a demanding process. In 2026, she formalized this experience into the Ikigai Regulation Model, a framework built around three pillars, Regulation, Clarity, and Consistency, now used by the consultants she has trained as well as the families she works with directly. This combination of admissions strategy and executive-function coaching means she doesn’t just know what a strong strategy looks like; she has the expertise to help students actually execute it.
Tamy-Fée holds a B.A. in Communication and an M.A. in Higher Education Administration, both from Boston College. She brings additional expertise in DEIB consulting and facilitation, and leads workshops and webinars for students, families, educators, and professional audiences on selective admissions strategy, application storytelling, executive functioning, and student development.
Colleges Clients Most Recently Accepted to in the 2025-2026 Application Season
- Brown
- Caltech
- Carnegie Mellon
- Columbia
- Cornell
- Dartmouth
- Harvard
- MIT
- Northwestern
- Princeton
- Stanford
- UC Berkeley
- UCLA
- University of Chicago
- University of Michigan
- University of Pennsylvania
- Vanderbilt
- Yale
A North Shore parent herself, Tamy-Fée understands the pressures families face today. Her mission is simple: help students move forward with purpose, not just performance.
6,000+
Applications evaluated at MIT & Dartmouth
150+
Educational consultants trained
Certified
Executive Function Coach
B.A. & M.A.
Boston College
Our Name
The Meaning Behind Ikigai
Ikigai 生き甲斐 is built from two Japanese words: iki, meaning life or living, and gai, meaning worth or value. Together, they point to something simpler and more grounded than the phrase is often given credit for: a reason for being, or the sense that one's life has value.
The word gai carries an unexpected history. Its kanji combines a character for shell with a character meaning ornately patterned, tracing back to the Heian period, when Japanese aristocrats played a matching game called kai-awase, using pairs of hand-painted shells that were treasured for how perfectly they fit together. That image, of something valued because it fits, because it belongs, sits at the root of what ikigai has meant in Japan for centuries.
In 1966, the Japanese psychiatrist Mieko Kamiya wrote one of the first serious studies of ikigai-kan, the felt sense of having a reason to live. Her work described it not as a single grand purpose to be discovered once, but as something built from ordinary sources: relationships, daily roles, small rituals, a sense of connection to others and to one's community. In Japan, ikigai is rarely about a perfect career or a singular calling. It is plural. It can be found in a morning routine, in tending something over time, in showing up for the people who depend on you.
Why I Named My Practice After It
I named this practice Ikigai Consulting because that is the version of purpose I want for the students and families I work with, not a single grand answer, but a life built from things that genuinely fit: the daily habits that create stability, the relationships that hold a student up, the small, repeatable wins that add up to real confidence. My own framework, the Ikigai Regulation Model, built around Regulation, Clarity, and Consistency, comes directly from this idea. It is not about finding the one perfect path. It is about helping a student build a life, and an application, that is genuinely theirs, one steady day at a time.
Services
Personalized support for every stage of the journey.
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Executive Function Coaching
Personalized systems for planning, organization, time management, task initiation, follow-through, and self-advocacy.
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Academic & Student Strategy
Course planning, enrichment strategy, summer planning, extracurricular development, and long-term student positioning.
Our Approach
Clarity before action. Purpose before performance.
Student-Centered
Every recommendation begins with the student's values, interests, needs, and authentic goals.
Strengths-Based
We identify what is already working and build a strategy that amplifies each student's distinctive capabilities.
Systems-Driven
Clear plans, milestones, and accountability structures turn ambitious goals into consistent progress.
Get to Know Me
Not sure where to start? Watch a few minutes of me in action before we talk.
Webinars & Free Trainings
From Chaos to Clarity: How to Help Your Teen Get Sh*t Done
A practical session with EssayQuest's Barak Rosenbloom on helping overwhelmed teens (and their parents) move from chaos to a workable plan.
How to Help Your Teen Handle Their Sh*t (Without Losing Yours)
A follow-up conversation with Barak Rosenbloom on staying grounded while supporting a teen through a demanding process.
Podcast
No One Else's Life
My podcast, co-hosted with Barak Rosenbloom (Founder of EssayQuest), where we discuss living a life with agency.
New episodes released regularlyTestimonials
What families and colleagues say.
5.0
(7 Google Reviews)
Posted on GoogleSatish A.
Google ReviewWorking with Tamy-Fee over the past several months has been an incredibly positive experience for our family. She brings deep expertise in college admissions, and her years of experience show in the way she approaches every conversation with clarity, structure, and purpose. She is consistently professional, always on time, and remarkably responsive, qualities that make the entire process feel organized and manageable. What truly sets Tamy-Fee apart is how thoughtfully she gets to know the student. She takes the time to understand interests, motivations, and long-term goals, and then builds a strategy that feels both authentic and achievable. Her analysis is exceptionally thorough, and her guidance is always grounded in what will genuinely benefit the student. She has a rare ability to balance parental expectations with the student's own voice, creating a collaborative environment where everyone feels heard and supported. Her strategic planning has been invaluable, from shaping the admissions narrative to identifying meaningful activities and outlining clear follow-ups. She brings a wealth of resources, a calm presence, and a genuine commitment to the student's success. If you're looking for a consultant who is knowledgeable, thoughtful, and truly invested in helping students grow, Tamy-Fee is an exceptional partner.
Dejanea D.
Google ReviewI had an amazing experience working with Tamy-Fee Meneide. From the very beginning, she was knowledgeable, supportive, and genuinely invested in helping me succeed. She was able to take everything my parents wanted for me and apply that without ever making me feel unheard or like I didn't have a say. She took the time to understand my goals, answered all of my questions, and guided me through every step of the college application process with patience and professionalism. Her advice on selecting schools, strengthening my application, and preparing my materials gave me so much confidence and credibility. She was always responsive, encouraging, and willing to go the extra mile to make sure I felt supported, never told me what I wanted to hear but what I needed to hear. Thank you Tamy-Fee for making what could have been such a stressful process into such a positive and rewarding experience!
Joyce R.
Google ReviewTamy-Fee has been a fantastic mentor to me as a new college admissions consultant. Her experience and knowledge of all things college admissions is vast and I am grateful to have her support in this new endeavor.
Molly A.
Google ReviewExceptionally skilled and professional. Tamy-Fee has been insightful, creative and approachable, with excellent outcomes. Absolutely highly recommend.
Lindsey P.
Google ReviewTamy is so knowledgeable about what makes a college-bound student's application stand out and how to best share their individual story! I highly recommend her services to help your child shine as bright on paper as they are in person!
Start the Conversation
Let's build a strategy that feels purposeful, practical, and personal.
ikigai.consulting.coaching@gmail.com