One of the many highly regarded aspects of Pace Academy is the school’s college counseling office, which just became even stronger. Effective next school year, Amy Ruff will be joining Director of College Counseling Jonathan Ferrell along with Associate Directors Pam Ambler and Ben Wescott as Pace’s fourth college counselor. When asked what prompted this addition, Mr. Ferrell said that there are “opportunities where I think we can do better work, but need another set of hands to be able to do it.”
Mr. Ferrell is looking forward to the skills and expertise that Ms. Ruff can bring to the table as she has a wide range of experience, having previously worked at Florida State University, Emory University and the University of Michigan. At Florida State, Ms. Ruff held multiple roles within the university’s office of admissions over the course of four years.
During her time at Emory, Ms. Ruff was associate director of admissions for the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing. Most recently, Ms. Ruff served as regional recruitment coordinator in the Office of Undergraduate Admissions at Michigan.
“I have always said that I believe that we have the best college counseling team around, and I think that our kids deserve that,” said Mr. Ferrell. “When I think of the best people in our business, I think that she is among them. I also know how she feels about Pace students because we’ve talked about that for years, as she has helped them navigate this process.”
In addition to hiring an experienced and qualified counselor, Pace was looking “to build a team for the long haul,” said Mr. Ferrell. “I know she is rooted in Atlanta and I know she loves Pace Academy. Because she loves the work she does and the place that she’s going to be working, that says to me that she can be here for a long, long time. That’s important to me for the kind of team that I want.”
Although Ms. Ruff will be joining the college counseling team this upcoming school year, the Class of 2022 does not have to worry about any drastic changes. Everyone in the current junior class will remain paired with the counselor with whom they have already begun the college process. “That would be really disruptive, to take kids who have already started to make relationships with their college counselor and then go pluck them out and give them to a new person,” Mr. Ferrell said. Despite not being paired up with students from the Class of 2022, Ms. Ruff will still help out in areas such as interview prep.
When the Class of 2023 begins the college process, Ms. Ruff will be assigned to students, thereby splitting the grade into four groups for college counselor pairings. “This strategic addition to our already robust team will not only provide increased services for our students and families by lowering the student-to-counselor ratio, but, more importantly, will allow our team to grow and expand its work on behalf of Pace and our students,” Head of School Fred Assaf wrote in an email to the Pace community.