The college counselors are AWFUL. My friend has a 4.0 GPA, valedictorian, and a high score on tbe SAT, along with solid extracurriculars and 5 leadership positions, but her counselor here only destroyed her confidence and told her that she couldn't even get into a crappy state school with a 50% acceptance rate. The counselor is clearly a snob who's not interested in helping students, only crushing their dreams and telling them to aim lower. I listened to the entire counseling session, and the she was extremely rude and bitter and all around not helpful. She just threw insults at my friend in 100 different ways. Her whole agenda is to instill fear into applicants so they'll pay her more. The counselor was genuinely one of the worst people l've ever met and it's shocking to me that she can feel good about herself. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to name drop, but she had a very pretentious name that started with a D. If this sounds like your counselor, RUN. read more

Terrible, terrible, terrible! We specifically signed our son up for a money back guarantee program which cost more, almost $4000 and our son's score only went up 10 points! They guaranteed a 1400 or we'd get our $ back. When I submitted for the refund, they denied it saying because he submitted a couple of homework assignments out of cadence, it cancelled the guarantee! So hours of classes, prep tests and studying are all negated by submitting some homework late? Oh and he was supposed to go back and refer to the welcome guide to see those details. Again he went up only 10 points from his previous score after we spent almost $ 4,000! RIP OFF do not waste your money!! read more

They are quite unorganized, for sure. I asked for a refund at some point. They switched time and location 4 times on us. They have not sent us exam packets, and for this reason they sent my son home 3 times (every time they have a practice test which he missed), because they didn't have the test materials for him. This is after talking to the principal and him personally promising on the phone that it would never happen again. UPDATE: Although we had bad initial experience, Princeton did right by us and I decided to edit my review based on our results, which were overall quite good . My son did very well on his exams, and the teacher they've provided was extremely professional and helpful (we loved the teacher) So after all is said and done, I'm changing my opinion to "four stars". read more

I worked with Kevin Keogh on the GMAT and couldn't be happier! He helped me improve my score by 100 points in under two months of working with him. He created an individualized plan for me to review/learn. He caters his teaching style to each student and is able to simplify complex math and verbal problems. I came in with almost no prior prep and Kevin was able to get me up to speed on all things GMAT in a timely and efficient manor. I cannot recommend Kevin enough! read more

Regarding GRE Online Class: I wish this company was more clear and direct that about how my online account (that has materials from my course) will expire after a certain date after the online course ends. I think the student tools material for my course should be accessable infinitely by the paying user. (If this company is afraid of customers sharing material, limit the access to one computer like Netflix streaming services). Another alternative. if the material should expire, is that the online content should expire after the student has completed all material. (The online site has this integrated and does track which materials I have completed already). The main reasons why I think student tools class materials for the class I purchased should be extended is because there are a lot extra materials students may not have time to complete during class session. Also, the package is advertised as if the materials will be accessable long term. I emailed my local office (Berkeley) to ask if my student tools can be extended. I never got a response. Both the limitation of the online class and materials and lack response from the local office is a large disappointment to me. Content wise Princeton Review GRE online course is good for learning key techniques for the GRE and offers many helpful class materials, drill, and practice exams, however your learning and experience may be lowered by the structure of accessibility to the materials. I regret choosing a service that offers the material for a limited time (not based on whether the material was accessed by student). Really, customers are paying for a set time to access the online class materials, not for use of the materials themselves -- that's a huge disadvantage for princeton review students that are also full-time students/employees/ normal busy people! I am not sure if the GRE Classroom Course actually passes out their materials. If so this accessibility issue will be resolved. At the time of my enrollment classroom courses were not offered because not enough people were interested at the time. read more

I took the Princeton Review MCAT classroom prep class. I really appreciated the quality of all the instructors I had, since they were each very knowledgeable in their respective disciplines - Nick Montano, Gabe Reyes, David Wright, Bethany Blackwell and Jessica Carroll. However, the scheduling of the course and constant rescheduling/shuffling of classes was rather strange and sometimes inconvenient. Overall, the course still helped me review a lot of the necessary material for the MCAT. read more

I took a star off, because the room that I had class in had no AC all summer. Couldnt it have been fixed or our class could have switched to one of the many empty rooms? I felt all the instructors (Kevin-verbal, Neil-gchem, Andrew-ochem, Virgina-bio) were all good and knew their stuff. Glad I took a class for structure. read more

I scheduled a GRE class and was called on the Friday before the first Tuesday class to see if two of the dates for the class could be changed as well as the location. This to me seemed very last minute. The changes did not work for my schedule. It has been extremely frustrating to be told to expect a call to discuss scheduling and not ever receive a call back. One time the person coordinating the class told me, "I really need to go so I can't talk to you anymore but I promise I will call you tomorrow". He did not call. I had to follow up four times to finally start the process to get a refund and when I did get in touch with him he always acted like I was bothering him. I must admit, I did have some changes in my life with my work schedule however I was willing to miss the two classes that conflicted with work. With the Princeton Review rescheduling I would have missed four classes, which didn't seem feasible. I was very disappointed in the process. read more

SCAM. I took an online "Career Quiz" assessment. At the end, they say to set up an account to see my results. I signed up. There are no results and no way to access such a thing. read more

I took a GRE Course and I cannot say how happy I was with it! -Great job reinforcing math skills-- from classes I had not taken in years! -Good explanation of how the test format exactly works. -Classroom space and time slots worked well with both easy access to public transit and my work schedule. -Personalized help and review on essays. -Instructor, Megan Sonya was wonderful! Both in really giving it all to being available to us, taking extra time to review our essays, offering flexible office hours. -Princeton Review Office staff was also great! Very responsive, always willing to help and very understanding. read more

This company is not accessible for people with disabilities due to the staff's lack of training in customer service and knowledge of accommodation. I was enrolled in the GRE 24Live class, and I reached out to them wanting captions added to the live video as an accommodation due to the system not being able to produce caption the videos. They refused to work with my needs, I ended up missing weeks worth of vauble informaiton because I could not process spoken word alone. This is a warning to all asstive techonlgy users, people that are Deaf or having a leanring disaiblbity. Do not sign up for a company that ignorant on how to serve people with different abilities!! read more

MCAT 105hr in-class review Basically the entire thing comes down to a single point - are your teachers worth their salt? The answer in most cases, holy jesus not even close! My Physics instructor, while intelligent, thought that the best way to teach was to speak as quickly as possible (including SPEAKING the mathematics at us) while blocking everything he wrote on the board. He would progress quickly and cover everything without truly explaining much of anything... or maybe I just don't understand supersonic speech (+1/2... but we can't show that... so 0!) The bio teacher was quality- but that's my strongest area so I'm not the best judge. (+1 to the overall score!) The Gchem was taught by a ditzy confused woman who attempt to make the subject more relatable to us via analogies that were not well thought through; which resultantly confused the hell out of her and us as she blathered on about sheep and wolves while attempting to express the underlying reasoning behind atomic deshielding... Not worth $2k (a FAT 0 to the total score). The Verbal Reasoning CANNOT be taught. It is seriously just about practice... and due to this fact -despite our instructor being quite good- 80% of the class stopped showing up after the 4th lecture (+1 to our score). Ochem was taught by a brilliant woman with TEACHING CREDENTIALS. Who knew that made the difference. She was a high school chemistry teacher who could anticipate where the student's holdups arose and could articulate -succinctly I might add- explanations easily. She was fantastic, and seeing as I SUCK at Ochem I was very very very glad to have her in the program (+1 to the score). So lets see... basically the bad and good were about equal (seeing as Physics is the MOST important subject)... the class overall continually had scheduling conflicts, teachers subbing in for each other, management generally with their thumbs up their asses. But other than that I am glad that I took the class because I DESPERATELY needed to see things before actually taking the test. *** to be fair it was basically like paying 2k for a bunch of books and practice problems that are SUPER damn helpful and the only thing that really makes a difference in the end. read more

I could not believe my luck when I won a Princeton Review GRE (Graduate Record Exam) preparation course in a prize raffle last semester in a course I audited this past year. I signed up for the GRE online course as I am not a fan of the Telegraph Avenue area in the evenings. (If I lived near the area, not a problem.) I met one of the Princeton Review representatives based out of the Berkeley office so I was delighted I could make arrangements with them. The GRE online preparation course is eight-week course meeting for three hours once a week. A week before the course, I received my required student workbook and vocabulary flash cards. The workbook is mandatory for the course. The flashcards are for the students' pleasure in their own utilization method. The online course is very interactive with a combination of elements such as instant messaging, real-time equivalents of whiteboard/blackboard of the instructor's writing, and audio. I was able to contact Princeton Review to get an extension of utilizing the online course resources before the expiration date for no cost using their guarantee. There were monetary options in getting an extension, I was fortunate to bypass all that. I was reviewing the one other Yelp! review and was surprised as to why it was not explained clearly to them. I needed the extension as it has been a long while for me interacting the mathematical elements of the GRE. I had a pleasant experience with the Princeton Review GRE preparation course. I felt the online instructor treated us as the intelligent college/university students that we are. They were able to keep us engaged and active in a professional manner with humor at the appropriate times when needed. It was a combination of real-world GRE exam situations in taking the exam utilizing scratch paper. Scratch paper is a must and is the test taker's best friend in "put your thinking onto the paper." In-between the online class, there were GRE practice tests to take in-between. The online course material was informative yet there are some parts of the math section I wish they would give the answers beside just demonstrating the steps. There was a math equation that stopped short in giving the answer on the online course material yet in the online class, it showed up again and amongst us all, we were able to solve the equation. I would recommend the Princeton Review GRE preparation course though I highly recommend taking advantage of its course-reduction sales. Yet, if one is fortunate enough to win a Princeton Review course like I did, take advantage of the windfall opportunity 100%. I know I did, you will be too! Yes, I will be taking the GRE soon, just trying to figure out as to when. read more

Completely hate it. Spent 1h30 with a tutor (Free trial + 1h 40usd) and didn't get the question answered, but I was still in the middle of it so I said "hey XXX let me buy some more time so we can finish" the tutor waited I purchase the time, and after that asked to leave......... So, I spent 80 fucking dollars, did NOT get my question answered, and to complete the shitshow THERE IS NO CUSTOMER SUPPORT. THANKS PRINCETON, YOU SUCK read more

Stay away!! My son signed up for a GMAT prep class and specifically picked Princeton Review because they offered small group instruction. He took BART to San Francisco, only to wander around and find that the class he signed up for didn't even exist. No one ever informed him of this. He called their 1-800 # waited on hold for 20 minutes and spoke with a guy that ended up saying he'd get a call back the next day. Thinking he might have the wrong venue, he took Bart back to Berkeley and went to their office. No class there either. So, no class, but they had charged my credit card. Getting our money back was just a total headache. We made 2 months worth of phone calls. At first they said full refund. Then we found they kept a significant portion saying we'd have to return class materials. But there was never a class! On the 3rd call, they said, oh these are materials we mailed to him. Well, we got them like 3 weeks later. We were told over and over the rest would be refunded, but it took a long time. These folks are completely unorganized an offer classes on their website and they don't even exist! read more

Absolutely horrible and disorganized. My son signed up for a SAT prep course in Los Gatos and they called a week prior to the start to say there weren't enough people signed up and they offered private tutoring for more $$. With no other alternative we went with it. Even the private tutoring was sub-standard and he actually scored lower on the SAT than the first time. Their money back guarantee (your scores are supposed to go up after their course) is false as they stated it doesn't apply to private tutoring and there was nothing they could do. I have never felt worse about a company and their service than this and they use the Princeton name to bring legitimacy to their program, it's all a scam. Don't let them steal money from you. read more

Dealing with the Princeton Review has been so frustrating. I registered and paid, and then nothing worked thereafter. My login stopped working on their website after 2 days. The online demo test never worked even though I had a brand new computer and the correct browser. I called and emailed periodically over 2 weeks with no responses. When I called I was put on hold for 20 minutes, then transferred to a voicemail stating they will be out of the office. I was not allowed to get a refund because I needed to return my course materials first. I never received the course materials via UPS, and I was blamed for that even though it was not my fault the UPS guy never showed up. This company is clearly out to take your money and not provide the services they provide. Save your money and your study time, and go elsewhere. read more

I'm taking course on Monday/Wednesdays @ moment. I was supposed to take Live - but they switched to online only due to lack of participants. POOR connection. I have the highest level of internet - instructor's voice cuts out every few minutes - difficult to follow. Instructor does not explain wrong answers and does not allow ample time for in class exercise / time to answer. Instructor speaks extremely fast & inability to absorb information. Or even ask questions. She basically reads off slides. They promised interaction by continuing to use them even though they had to switch to online. read more

I signed up for the Princeton Review MCAT classroom prep class, because as a student I was looking to incorporate more structure into my MCAT studying. It was convenient that the class was on campus and I could treat it as another course during Winter Quarter. Although students who enroll should still budget 5-10 hours or more to do work outside of the class. The lectures are predominantly review with strategies for how to approach the different types of MCAT questions and some problem solving. The majority of your studying will still be done on your own time. I was impressed with the instructors (especially Andrew Huang-GChem & OChem, Jessica Carroll -Verbal, and David Wright - Physics). I even reached out to Andrew for advice on applying to medical school after the class. I would say the greatest benefits are the office hours each instructors provides where you can get more personalized help, the studying schedule which rotates between all the subjects, and the online material that helped me acclimate to testing on a computer. read more

Course: I recently took the Ultimate MCAT course from Princeton Review which included daily lectures (M-F), an insurmountable amount of online material, and tons of great books. I was initially studying on my own, but after a month realized that I didn't have the discipline to study on my own. I was hesitant to spend money on a course but TPR was so worth it! This is going to be one of the most important test of my life so I didn't want to regret not having taken a course. Overall, the course is very structured with required homework and practice tests. If you were studying on your own, it would be difficult to push yourself so I'm glad the course already does that for you! The Science Work Book and the Verbal Work books are great! Science one especially because there is SO SO much in there. The passages are difficult, but they really prepare you for the actual exam. Instructors: If there was just one thing I loved about my course, it would definitely be the instructors! The Physics instructor was SO awesome! Not only did he teach really well, he was very down to earth, easy to approach, and brought candy all the time to share! :)) As for Verbal, I had Jessica who was so lively and knowledgeable. The Bio, Ochem, and Chem Instructors were all also very well trained. The only fault was the location! It had no AC during the summer and the atmosphere was also a little weird. The class was at 10 am so, I would always be stuck in traffic which sucked. But overall, TPR prepares you REALLY well for the MCAT. You just have to do your part and keep up with the homework, review daily, and take those practice test. read more

I learned a lot within the time of the course. Gordy was a great instructor, and shared various detailed test taking strategies. The review material was incredibly helpful, and made it engaging for us to learn. I'd highly recommend Princeton Review services. read more

I was quite amazed with the quality of customer i recieved from the berkeley princton review office. They were so helpful and understanding towards the challenged i was facing when signing up for the course. Very nice and soft spoken staff that absolutely made my day. I hope the course itself is as great as the people working at the office. Thanks again read more

They hire realy young teachers who just took MCATs themselves. They go straight by the book! The only good teacher was Kevin Keogh, verbal guy who would try super hard. The office and administration is terrible. If you signed up for the classs, it doesn't mean the class won't be cancelled. And they will notify you a week before the classes were supposed to start. This completely messed up my schedule. Not to mention that they overchaged my credit card (I signed up for 500$ payments, but since the class got cancelled, they tried to get the full 2000$ out of my account) This really didn't look good in my credit score. :( Try Kaplan, or just buy books. You'll be able to get more out of it if you just study by yourself read more

This review is for the 105 hour MCAT prep. My General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry instructor Neil Lim was excellent. He simplified the material so it was easy to understand and interesting to learn. His teaching method is superb because he always starts with an outline, and as he teaches, he gives really great examples so you can apply what you've just learned and solidify your understanding. I did really well on the physical portion on my real MCAT largely thanks to Neil. He was the best instructor! My verbal instructor Kevin Keogh was also really great. He teaches helpful verbal tips and as a bonus, has a great sense of humor. My verbal score improved probably at least 2 points from practicing and applying his tips. The way he explains why certain verbal choices are better than others is helpful because it allowed me to rethink the way I took verbal exams. If all the Princeton Review teachers were as good as Neil and Kevin, I'd be happy to give PR 5 stars. Unfortunately, my biology and physics teachers were boring and unhelpful. These classes were a waste of time and basically nobody in my class showed up to them. Overall: TPR is great for online resources, and verbal and chemistry if you get the instructors I mentioned above. I would recommend it. read more

If you are looking for endless amounts of pain, frustration, and overall expression of "WTF" then i encourage you, by all means, to sign up for Princeton Review. I helped my sister, who is currently in high school and preparing to take the SAT, sign up for a prep course. We had a couple of options to look at but due to a recommendation from one of my mom's friends we decided on Princeton Review. I wish that we hadn't. We signed up for a course and had the materials delivered to us and everything was fine and dandy. However, after a couple of weeks before my sister's course was about to start we got a call from them saying that there was low enrollment. So the only option that they gave us was to switch to a different course, that was supposedly an "upgrade." When i called the people there they gave off this attitude of superiority, long and unnecessary moments of "ummmmm" and silence, but alas we switched to the "upgraded" course. Then after a couple days, this time, we get ANOTHER call say that once again due to the low turn out, the course was cancelled. Dude, i haven't even taking the course with this facility and i am already getting a headache and very tired of all these useless mind games! The ever old faithful expression of "we can always upgrade and switch you to a different course," was in use. But there are so many course that we actually can sign up for that it was getting a little ridiculous. So in the end, we decided to just get our money back. When i called again the person on the phone was slow, unhelpful, and kept on asking "if i understood." OF COURSE I UNDERSTAND what bad service you people provide!!! Then they told me to return the materials they mailed out to me within 10 days, for inventory purposes, to actually get a full refund. How dare you cause me all this frustration and pain to in the end give me a deadline to return the materials that didn't even help my sister!! Bottom line: DO NOT sign up for Princeton Review and save yourselves from all this useless headaches. In the end my sister signed up for Kaplan and the service there was much easier and we made sure that their course would not be cancelled. read more

Took the MCAT course here. It was great for providing structure to your studies. Instructor quality was mixed, but overall helpful. Two were actual medical students, and all instructors were required to score well in their subject. The administrative staff however were rather uncoordinated so don't expect to easily make up classes that you miss. read more

This company is very disorganized and misleading. My daughter signed up for a free SAT prep class which we then learned from another student has been cancelled (but we got no word from the company directly) -- and then signed up for a free mock SAT test and actually went all the way across town, only to be refused entry because she isn't a student at that high school. I had called to verify that she was registered, and the two different people I spoke with did not bother to tell me about the limitation. I would never pay for any of their services. read more

I would rate this company 100 STARS if that were an option. Check out this score improvement: My daughter took the PSAT as a sophomore and scored a 192. She took the SAT as a Junior and scored 1790. We were super concerned. We decided to look to the best. We hired PR's best individual tutor, Krissi Taylor Leslie. We bought 10 hours of private tutoring over about two weeks. MY DAUGHTER THEN TOOK THE ACT AND SCORED A 33. Seriously now, while translating from an SAT score to an ACT score is tough, my calcs show this to be almost a 20% improvement ...... Can't beat that, now can you ........ read more

Took LSAT course here back in 2006, and thought it was great. The course improved my score 10+ which makes a huge difference.

I took an MCAT classroom prep class and thought that my instructors were great! (Neil Lim, Virginia Lieu, Kevin Keogh, Andrew Huang, and David Bauer). They were very helpful and extremely knowledgeable in their subjects. The only problem I ran into was with the website, which often had some glitches. But overall, I thought the course was very helpful and would recommend it for MCAT prep. read more

DO NOT TAKE THIS COURSE IT IS A COMPLETE WASTE OF MONEY!! This course is a very expensive course at $1,400 for 8 sessions. The Princeton review does not care about the scores of the student it is all about the money for them. I was in a private tutoring course with two other people which turns out that the Princeton review had never set aside a room for us to meet up in so it was a constant struggle to find an empty classroom for us to use in the college that the course was in. When I added it up the time we had wasted over 2.5 hours of class time just trying to find a room, which should have been done prior because of the amount of money that you pay. We only had 8 classes to meet and we basically were only able to meet for 7 because of that time. When I called to talk about this issue with the Princeton review it didn't seem like much of a concern for them and i had to constantly call to make sure it got figured out. When it all came down to it and I took the GRE my scores did not improve at all. I got the same exact score I had received the first time I took the exam. Upon calling the Princeton review to talk about a refund for the time that was missed of our class time, and to talk about the fact that my scores did not improve I had to constantly call. No one would ever get back to me and I had to keep reaching out for weeks on end. I would call during business hours and would never get an answer. It was very aggravating to have to keep leaving messages and emails just to have to follow up the next week for an answer. Finally at the end they told me there was no way they could give any type of refund even for though the class time that was wasted looking for a classroom added up to more than $275 from the $1,400 originally paid. Also when I called about that money they tried to blame the fact that they did not have a room on me saying that they did not know about it until class 5, which is a lie because I called and talked to a secretary there on class 3 to notify them of the problem. That problem should have been handled by the teacher and in no way shape or form should have been blamed on me, the student. The person that I spoke to was extremely rude basically telling me I can keep calling but I will not get any type of refund. I did everything that was assigned by the teacher and they still refused to give any refund. They are money hungry and do not care about helping the student. This program is a complete scam. It is a waste of money and for the amount of money that you do pay, they should be much more organized. I suggest studying on your own do not take this course!!!! read more

I wouldnt recommend PR instruction. Its so disorganized and usually uneffective! My SAT scores barely went up. Im sure my scores would have gone up just as much if I studied on my own, but i would have saved a lot of money. I wish I just bought their prep books and not the crappy service : ( read more

Princeton Review was very helpful for giving me that extra boost that I needed for the score I wanted. I had previously taken a prep class, and Princeton Review reinforced my skills the summer right before the October SAT 1, and helped me touch up my skills and just get a really good feel for how the actual SAT was. The classroom setting was relaxed and there was just enough homework every week. Princeton Review also has a good system of teaching vocabulary that helped a lot. read more

I have to admit I was disappointed at first that they (the Berkeley office) cancelled the SAT prep class we signed my daughter up for due to low enrollment (seems to be a consistent issue) but they offered us the choice of a refund, or putting the money towards discounted private tutoring, which we decided to try. Our tutor (thank you ADAM!!!) has been amazing - after the first two sessions my daughter remarked she had learned more in those few hours than in the last couple years of school math, and is substantially regaining her confidence in her math abilities after an unfortunate run of negative experiences with math teachers in grades 7-10. Other reviewers have remarked on difficulties with communication/rescheduling etc. but that has not been our experience = great customer service from the office, speedy set-up with a tutor who has been flexible and reliable about finding times to come to our house (and tolerant of being mobbed by our over0friendly dogs :) This is my first Yelp review ever - I really don´t write many, but after reading all the negatives I thought I would add my positive 2 cents. The only caveat is that my daughter is still a sophomore, so we aren't in a big hurry, and are really just focusing on math, so this worked out great for us - I can imagine if you were urgently needing intensive prep with a test date looming it might be a bummer to have classes can elled due to low enrollment. read more