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College Counseling Team

 

Karen Mason

Karen Mason_Germantown Academy_College Counseling

 

Title: Director of College Counseling

Degrees: M.A., Pennsylvania State University
B.A., Wilkes University

Biography: Karen Mason joined Germantown Academy in 2009 after serving as Director of College Guidance at Wyoming Seminary (a national co-ed boarding school in Kingston, PA) for 13 years. Mason also taught English and served as a member of the administrative team at Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, PA, and wrote a monthly column for The Times Leader. She earned her BA in English from Wilkes, and her MA in English Literature from Penn State University. At GA, she hosts an advisory as a member of Alcott Day House. Mason is Past President of the Pennsylvania Association for College Admission Counseling (PACAC) and has presented at conferences held by NACAC, PACAC, and the Middle States Mid-Atlantic Region of the College Board. Mason is married to her wife, Joan.


 

Daniel Evans
 

Daniel St. Jean

 

Title: Associate Director of College Counseling

Degree: B.A., University of Richmond

Biography: Dan Evans joined the Germantown Academy College Counseling team in 2020 with 30 years of experience working in college admissions. He has extensive experience working on the East and West Coasts at small liberal arts colleges and a large research university. He has been a senior admissions officer at Elizabethtown College, Lafayette College, the University of Puget Sound (where he served as director), and the University of Pennsylvania, where he served as an admission officer and athletic liaison. He joined the William Penn Charter School in 2004 as the Director of College Counseling and served in that position and as a member of the senior management team for 16 years.

Evans has served as a faculty member of the Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth College Colloquium and the Pennsylvania Association for College Admission Counseling (PACAC) Summer Institute. He also served as a member of the PACAC Executive Committee. He has been featured in books, newspapers and magazine articles discussing the college application process. He and his wife, Susanna, have three children; two of whom have successfully navigated the college search process and the youngest is a member of the GA Class of 2025.


 

Joaquim Hamilton

 

Titles: Associate Director of College Counseling

Degree: B.A., Franklin & Marshall

Biography: Joaquim Hamilton began his first year at GA in fall 2023. He came to Fort Washington from Westtown School where he served as the associate director of college counseling for five years. Prior to that, Hamilton was the Assistant Dean and Director of Multicultural Recruitment at Swarthmore College and served in a similar role at York College. He also worked for Philadelphia Futures as the Director of the College Connection and Young Men’s Initiative. He is proud to have reviewed thousands of applications from both sides of the desk, built an extensive professional network across various institutions of higher education, and counseled students and parents through the complex and ever-changing college application and financial aid process.

He has an extensive list of extracurricular activities, including coaching basketball, a sport that will see him on the sidelines for the Patriots’ girls junior varsity this year, and a two-year stint as the Westtown BIPOC Summer Orientation leader. He is also a member of IMPACT (Intelligent Men of Color Purposefully Accomplishing College Together) at Franklin & Marshall. He participates in a variety of professional development, including college counseling tours, the ACCIS Colloquium: Rec Writers Workshop, NAIS People of Color Conference, and served as a presenter at the 2022 NACAC Conference. His presentation was entitled “Other Duties as Assigned: The (Unofficial Yet Essential) Role of Black College Counselors in Independent Schools.” He and his wife, Intisar, have two children enrolled at GA.


 

Jonathan Na

Jonathan Na_Germantown Academy_College Counseling

 

Titles: Assistant Director of College Counseling, Director of Testing

Degree: B.A., Dickinson College
M.Div., Westminster Theological Seminary

Biography: Jonathan Na joined the College Counseling team in the 2018-19 school year as the Assistant Director of College Counseling and the Director of Testing. Na brings an interesting perspective to college counseling with a background as a pastor and youth minister. He is well versed in counseling teens as they grapple with becoming their best selves.

An undergraduate major in music history at Dickinson College where he studied abroad in England for a year, Na spent the summer prior to joining GA attending intensive college counseling training for new counselors. Charismatic with an infectious enthusiasm for life, a sharp intellect, and well-honed writing talents, Na has plunged into the GA community in this pivotal role. Na is a member of the coaching staff of volleyball, serves as an advisor in Roberts House, and is the Director of Testing. Na and his wife, Sarah, who is GA's Associate Director of Equity and Inclusion, have three children at GA.


 

Anne Leonard

Anne Leonard_Germantown Academy

 

Titles: Assistant Director of College Counseling, Director of Testing

Degrees: B.A., Rosemont College
M.A., Arcadia Univeristy
M.L.S., Kutztown University

Biography: Anne Leonard joined the Office of College Counseling in 2021 after having served as the Assistant to the Head of the Middle School at Germantown Academy for four years. Leonard previously worked in the Office of Graduate and Undergraduate Studies at Arcadia University for nine years and in college admissions at both Arcadia University and at Rosemont College for seven years. She earned her BA in English Literature from Rosemont College, her MA in English from Arcadia University and her MLS from Kutztown University.