Who are They?
PALO ALTO WEEKLY | October 10, 2008 | by MICHAEL HAMADA

When Lisa Jacobson graduated from Stanford University, little did she know she would one day take the talent she had honed in the fifth grade to help define a multi-billion-dollar industry.

Jacobson began tutoring classmates in elementary school and went on to tutor fellow students while attending Stanford, but only found her true niche in test preparation after graduating from college.

"It wasn't until one of my students approached me with questions about the SAT did I really see the opportunity to create a business out of test-prep," Jacobson said.

According to Jacobson, when she first started Inspirica, her New York-based tutoring and test-preparation company, almost nobody received tutoring for the SAT or ACT tests — making Inspirica one of the world's only test-preparation companies in 1983.

And Jacobson's position is simple. Stress is inevitable, she said.

"It's come to a time when students are coming to us for tutoring after getting 700s in each SAT section." There are too many kids applying for the same college seats and Inspirica helps sort through the intense competition, Jacobson said.

back to Inspirica in the Media