The tagline for New Vision Learning is “Helping Students Realize Their Dreams.” This is what I do for myself and what I help others do in their own lives.
Gabrielle Glancy has been an entrepreneur since the age of four when she sold stickballs for ten cents less than cost back to the boys who had hit them onto her grandfather’s roof in Sea Gate, Coney Island, where she grew up.
Just before founding New Vision Learning, at the height of the dot com boom, Ms. Glancy invented Facebook (before there was a such a thing) and called it Townsquare.com. The founder of Ebay, whose daughter she had helped get into Williams, told her it was a brilliant idea, but that to generate revenue, she would need to sell ads. Selling ads seemed like selling out, and so she founded New Vision Learning instead.
As a teacher, educational consultant and college counselor, for nearly thirty years, Gabrielle Glancy has been in the business of helping students find and realize their dreams. Not only has she helped countless students find a way to harness their strengths to overcome their challenges — to learn how to learn — but as Director of New Vision Learning, she has helped thousands of students — all over the Bay Area, New York City, Los Angeles, across the U.S., and all over the world, locate and get into the colleges of their dreams.
Over the course of her career, she has worked in admissions three separate times at three different and highly respected colleges and universities. She knows exactly what it takes to get in and that helps her every day as she guides students through the college application process.
She has taught at some of the most prestigious secondary schools, colleges and universities in the world including The University of San Francisco, New College, Lang College, The New School for Social Research, Saint Ann’s School for Gifted and Talented in New York City, Crystal Springs Uplands School in Hillsborough, California, The American-International School of Israel, The American School in London, and Villanova Prep, where she helped foreign and American students abroad (including boys from Eton and St. Paul’s in London) prepare for the SATs and apply to college.
For the past several years, she has been Series Editor of Best College Essays 2014, 2016 and 2018. And she has authored THE book on writing college essays called The Art of the College Essay, one of the bestselling books on the subject. Her next book, UNSTUCK, which helps students free themselves from writer’s block, will be released this September.
Gabrielle Glancy has been awarded Teacher of the Year by the National Association for Teachers of the ARTS, and won the European Council of Independent School’s prize for educational writing. Her essay, “The Best You Know How to Be” was published in their journal.
She is also a widely published writer. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review and The American Poetry Review. She has been featured on NPR and in USA Today.
Where did the idea for New Vision Learning come from?
I was always working outside the box — a little like Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society – trying to help students find their stories and their voices in an unformulaic, organic way. In fact, I often felt I was helping them unlearn what they had been taught. I describe this process in detail in my forthcoming new book UNSTUCK.
One day I realized I could leave the world of institutional education – the system – and create my own unique path to helping students thrive.
I was determined to make this new vision a reality – and that’s when (20+ years ago), I founded New Vision Learning.
What does your typical day look like and how do you make it productive?
I’m lucky to have a lot of flexibility. I don’t start my one-on-one work with students until they get out of school and are available to meet me. In the mornings, I often have sessions with students in another time zone who live in New York, Seattle, Hong Kong. I love my work. I live and breathe what I do. Confucius is reputed to have said: “If you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life.” That’s how I feel. I found my calling and I’m in the business of helping students find theirs.
I also love to be out in nature – walking, swimming, star-gazing – and my schedule allows me to do this, often.
I’m always writing – either novels, poetry or essays.
Most recently, I just finished a book about what I do best – helping kids who are applying to college get unstuck.
How do you bring ideas to life?
I’m a big manifestor. I’ve always been this way. I go with the flow of my own ideas. Force, no. Flow, go. Once an idea congeals for me, I do this kind of inner whirling dervish thing – I wouldn’t know how else to describe it – in which I envision, as if it’s happening, what I want to bring into being. I don’t dwell on it. To put it another way, I dilate my very being and hop on the jetstream of energy that’s already out there, all the while holding the vision of what I want to create. My channel must be exceedingly clear because almost instantaneously, the phone rings, I get an email . . . things happen.
The tagline for New Vision Learning is “Helping Students Realize Their Dreams.” This is what I do for myself and what I help others do in their own lives.
What’s one trend that excites you?
“Making” culture really excites me – and global collaboration. I’m working on an idea for a global think tank in which lay persons from all over the world work on problems they know nothing about – curing AIDS, mitigating the impact of global warming – as a way to bypass business and academic competition and utilize excellent minds that are not limited by the knowledge they already have. I call this think tank – ShareThatThought.com. I hope one day to make this dream a reality.
What is one habit of yours that makes you more productive as an entrepreneur?
I keep my eye on the prize and don’t let the demons in the underworld creep into my vision. I also stoke the fuel of my intuition. And I keep physically healthy so that I can live long enough to do all that I imagine possible to reach my fullest potential and do my part to help the world.
What advice would you give your younger self?
As my dad always told me but I never did: No matter how much money you make, save a little bit of your paycheck each month. You might need that money in the future.
And don’t buy a motorcycle.
Tell us something that’s true that almost nobody agrees with you on.
Everybody knows everything, if they can access the knowledge within them.
As an entrepreneur, what is the one thing you do over and over and recommend everyone else do?
I don’t waste a breath. I don’t suffer fools. I’m super-fast and energetic, and I only put energy into something that I know has a good ROI, even if it’s swimming laps in my pool.
What is one strategy that has helped you grow your business?
Writing books and speaking engagements are probably the two most important catalysts for growth in my business. My next steps will involve creating online courses and videos. I am also in the process of creating a Writing Coach Academy to train people to do what I do.
What is one failure you had as an entrepreneur, and how did you overcome it?
I probably still suffer from the same fatal flaw I’ve always had – I’m the central driving force and big kahuna of my business. It really can’t run without me. One day I’d like to scale it so that I can take a nap in the afternoon!
What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?
I think ShareThatThought is a brilliant idea.
What is the best $100 you recently spent? What and why?
I bought silicon molds for my almond Keto fat bombs.
More seriously, I hired an amazing PR person to help me promote my new book UNSTUCK.
What is one piece of software or a web service that helps you be productive?
I use Convert Flow and Drip for my website CTA’s (Calls to Action). I also really like DRIFT, which is a very handy and slick online chat App.
What is the one book that you recommend our community should read and why?
Oh . . . that’s a tough one. I read a lot of non-fiction. There was a time at the very end of my teaching career in which I realized that there was no merit in poverty – and that if I set my mind to it – my intuitive mind, that is – I could blow the ceiling off any limitations I had with regards to earning money. Pedaling on my stationary bike, I read everything on the power of positive thinking that I could get my hands on. This included Norman Vincent Peale’s eponymous book as well as The Secret, The Abraham Hicks books, Eckhart Tolle, Byron Katie. I didn’t know how I was going to get where I wanted to go, I just believed I would get there. The path revealed itself to me. It was as if a new piece of the path was created each time I needed to take another step.
What is your favorite quote?
The obstacle is the path – a zen proverb. What makes you stuck can lead you to enlightenment.
I also love, “If ye have faith, nothing is impossible onto ye.” Emphasis on the faith and the Ye’s! ;-). Mark 9:23
Key Learnings:
- Dream big
- Follow your heart and trust your intuition
- Force, no. Flow, go.
- Keep your eye on the prize
Connect:
Company’s Website: www.newvisionlearning.org
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Carlyn runs the day-to-day publishing operation here at ideamensch and interacts with our awesome customers and entrepreneurs. She is likely editing this with a cat on her lap.