Manhattan has long been the epicenter of the kind of parental competitiveness that surrounds everything from getting into the best preschool through the best college, but people familiar with the landscape say many of those practices are beginning to migrate to Westchester.

"It's definitely becoming in the suburbs like it was three years ago in Manhattan," said Lisa Jacobson, chief executive of Inspirica, a company that offers tutoring, test preparation and high school, college and graduate school admissions counseling. While Inspirica is based in Manhattan, Ms. Jacobson said 20 percent of her business is now in Westchester, and it is growing, fueled by anxiety over college admissions.

"In general these parents don't know what to do," she said of her new customers. "They read about the valedictorian with the 1600's who did not get in. People are trying to at least help their kids get to the level where they're in line with everybody else. And then they go past that and try to get an edge."