Why I do this work

If you're a parent or student trying to find your way through college, graduate, or medical-school admissions, I wrote this for you. I know how loud and confusing this process can be, and how much is riding on it for your family. Before anything else, I want you to know: you don't have to navigate it alone.

I grew up in Brownsville, in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas — a first-generation college student in a community where type 2 diabetes touches almost every family, including mine. No one in my house had done this before. I learned the path the hard way, by walking it without a map. That's exactly why I do this work now.

That path took me further than I once imagined. My education was fully funded at every stage — college, graduate school, and medical school, and my research carried me from UT Brownsville to Weill Cornell, a PhD at Harvard, and labs at UT Health San Antonio and UT Southwestern. I started medical school at UT Southwestern and then made the hard decision to leave after my clinical years, to focus on research and the people I most want to help. (I wrote about that here.)

Along the way I've seen this process from nearly every side — as the applicant figuring it out alone, as a researcher and mentor guiding students through their own work, and as a former Harvard College alumni interviewer who listened to how applicants tell their stories. That's why I can usually tell what reads as credible and compelling, and what doesn't.

Here's what I believe: your child is the author of their own story, and my job is to help them tell it clearly and honestly — never to invent it, inflate it, or hand it to a machine. I'll tell you the truth about what matters and what doesn't, even when it isn't what you hoped to hear. I don't promise admissions outcomes. I promise clarity, honesty, and real preparation.

I care most about the families doing this without an inherited roadmap — first-generation, bilingual, or simply outside the networks that make all this look easy. I was that student. I'll meet your family in English or Spanish, so everyone can follow along — not just the applicant.

If that's the kind of guide you're looking for, I'd be glad to help, and I'll treat your child's future with the care I'd want for my own. You can see how I work with students and families, or reach out directly — I read every message myself.

— Ivan

More: Research · Publications · CV. My biotech and life-science strategy work lives separately, under Valdez BioStrategy (site coming soon).