High school teams up with tertiary consultancy firm

Jamie Beaton of Crimson Consulting. Photo / File

A private Christchurch girls' school is teaming up with a 21-year-old entrepreneur's company to help students into tertiary education.

Crimson Consulting, the company co-founded by then-18-year-old Jamie Beaton, will be sending one of its tutors to Rangi Ruru Girls' School as a full-time "career pathway strategist".

The young Harvard graduate's business was valued at $85 million this year after acquiring numerous smaller educational consultancies.

Mr Beaton started the company in 2013 with his girlfriend Shandre Kushor, also 18 at the time, and soon attracted investment from US billionaires.

His share of the education consultancy is now worth $40.5 million.

Beaton's fellow Harvard graduate Wen Qiu will be joining the school as part of a new partnership between the college and the company.

Rangi Ruru principal Dr Sandra Hastie says this collaboration is about assisting students with career plans and "connecting them with information".

It is the first partnership of its kind between a school and a commercial enterprise in New Zealand.

Crimson Consulting is best known for its mentoring programmes aimed at young people wishing to go to top overseas universities like Harvard and Cambridge.

Dr Hastie said the purpose of the project was not just to help students apply to universities overseas, but she saw a need for some students to "look beyond local pathways".

She said students would also be assisted into New Zealand universities and vocational courses.

"Working with Crimson Consulting will provide our students with every opportunity to take the career pathway they want to. "

Dr Hastie contacted the company after a seeing interviews with Mr Beaton and looking at their results.

She started as principal in January this year, and said she wanted to take the school in a direction that was "future-focused".

Crimson will be offering its services to students across Canterbury, not just to girls at Rangi Ruru.

Mr Beaton, the CEO and co-founder of Crimson Consulting, said "not all students are leaders, not all students are going to go to Harvard".

"It will give all students the opportunity to be the best they can be at whatever they want to be," he says of the collaboration.

Mr Beaton was interested in forming a partnership with the school after seeing their "leading NCEA results" and hearing about their innovative ideas.

He said it was important to get more girls get into STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) fields, which he hoped Crimson Consulting could help with.

The company provides tutoring and mentoring packages to students from offices in New Zealand, Australia, the UK and the US.

These packages can cost up to $20,000 but Crimson also does pro bono work for some pupils.

Rangi Ruru is a Presbyterian-affiliated day and boarding school with just over 600 students in Merivale, Christchurch.