Donald Asher
Donald Asher is one of the nation's foremost authorities on the graduate admissions process. Hundreds of thousands of students have seen his lectures, tapes and teleconferences. He is the author of twelve books, including Graduate Admissions Essays, the best-selling guide to the graduate admissions process and The Best Scholarships for the Best Students.
He has been a keynote or featured speaker for the National Association of Graduate Admissions Professionals (NAGAP), the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS), the Ronald E. McNair Scholars National Conference in Delavan, Wis., the Penn State TRIO Training Institute (offered coast-to-coast), the SREB Compact for Faculty Diversity, MIT Office of Dean for Graduate Education (ODGE), Cornell University Office of Academic Diversity Initiatives' (OADI) Undergraduate Research Program Orientation, the University of Maryland Preview Day, the annual conference of Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS), the Maryland McNair Conference, the annual Penn State McNair Conference, the University of Puerto Rico-San Juan McNair Conference, the New McNair Directors Training Program in New Orleans, La., the Oregon Statewide Graduate School Fair, the Indiana Statewide Conference on Undergraduate Research, the Wisconsin Statewide Conference on Undergraduate Research, Virginia Tech Science Fair, University at Binghamton McNair-LSAMP Research Conference, Caltech's PhD Career Development Days, and at hundreds of colleges and universities throughout the United States. He has been the keynote presenter for over ten years for the professional development series of live teleconferences and webinars offered by the University of Tennessee, where he has four times hosted the national teleconference on graduate admissions.
He has been a contributing writer to MSN homepage, MSN Encarta, the Wall Street Journal's CareerJournal.com and CollegeJournal.com, jobstar.org, monster.com, careerbuilder.com, the Los Angeles Times'career development web site, USAirways magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner and Dow Jones, Inc.'s National Business Employment Weekly and Managing Your Career magazine. His work can also be found in professional journals, including national and regional publications of the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) and the National Association of Graduate Admissions Professionals (NAGAP).
Asher earned a PhD in human development from Fielding Graduate University in Santa Barbara, and has a master's in human and organizational systems from Fielding, a master's in human resources and organization development from the University of San Francisco and a bachelor's in philosophy-religion from Reed College.
Asher gives over 150 lectures and workshops per year.