GUIDAVA
Sort It Out by Guidava
No scores. No rankings. No right answers.
A hands-on experience filled with unexpected ideas and surprising discoveries—helping reveal what matters before deciding what comes next.
More than a list of choices.
Each card introduces an idea, explains why it matters, and helps students picture what it could mean in their own lives.
Because the experience is physical, students can slow down, move ideas around, reconsider their choices, and see their priorities taking shape in front of them—on their own or with others.
Together, the cards make it easier to recognize what resonates, what does not, and what students may never have considered before.
How the Sort It Out deck works
See your priorities take shape.
A deck filled with ideas that can shape what comes next—some familiar, others rarely considered.
Students sort the cards into four piles:
Absolutely Yes
Nice to Have
Doesn’t Matter
Absolutely Not
As the piles take shape, patterns emerge, conversations become more specific, and students can move forward with greater clarity and confidence.
Turn insight into action.
In a fast-changing landscape, the completed sort gives students, families, and counselors a shared starting point for discussing priorities, expectations, cost, and other practical realities.
With something concrete to work from, they can understand one another better, focus the conversation, and build momentum toward what comes next.
Less guesswork. Better decisions.
Guidava helps students know what matters, what to look for, what to ask, and how to move forward. That clarity helps them ask better questions and create better prompts for the research that follows.
Better questions lead to better information. Better information leads to better decisions.
Those priorities can travel with them into campus visits, information sessions, websites, and other research—helping students and families look past impressive but irrelevant features and pay closer attention to what truly fits.
Why I Built Guidava
After decades of counseling students, I stepped back to study how AI, changing careers, rising costs, and new educational pathways were reshaping the decisions families face. Students, families, and counselors need better ways to navigate a fast-changing landscape, discover what matters most, and turn an expanding world of information and possibilities into clearer decisions. Guidava grew from both: years of listening to students and a deeper understanding of the choices they face today.
I grew up in the early days of Silicon Valley, surrounded by scientists, entrepreneurs, and investors imagining industries that did not yet exist. My father was a physicist, but what influenced me most was his boundless curiosity about people, ideas, and the world. That environment led me to earn a BA and MA in anthropology at Stanford, while also studying programming and mapping.
After working at large engineering firms in Boston, San Francisco, and Seattle, I founded a company that became part of the emerging field of geographic information systems—using technology to reveal new relationships in maps and data. I later pivoted to college counseling because I wanted to make a direct difference for students at a pivotal time in their lives.
Working with nearly 1,800 students taught me that the most useful discoveries often begin not with scores or rankings, but with a new idea, an unexpected reaction, or a better question. Guidava is the next chapter of that work—bringing together human behavior, technology, entrepreneurship, and decades of listening to help students make sense of a changing world and find a direction that feels genuinely their own.
On your own, around a table with family or friends, or with a counselor.
Students can move through the deck in many ways—independently, with family or friends, in a classroom, or as part of a larger group. However they begin, the cards invite them to explore unfamiliar ideas and look beyond the usual checklist.
For families and mentors, Guidava offers a positive, engaging way into a process that can feel daunting. It opens conversations, brings expectations into the open, and introduces the wider range of pathways, possibilities, and real-world choices shaping decisions today—giving everyone a clearer sense of where to begin and how to move forward, with greater alignment from the start.
For school counselors, independent counselors, and educators, Guidava offers a fresh, ready-to-use way to launch the process and keep it moving with each student’s priorities in view. It can be introduced at a school or community event, used with an individual student or group, or assigned for students and families to complete together. The result is a more relevant starting point, richer conversations, and students who arrive ready to take the next step.
Ready for a better place to begin?
Sort It Out by Guidava is coming soon.
Sign up for launch updates, a first look at the finished deck, and opportunities to bring Guidava to students, families, and communities.