Here Are Five Reasons Why You Should Become a Student Consultant
Whether you’re a business student, an engineer, or someone looking to apply your skills beyond the classroom, student consulting offers a way to gain real-world experience.
- Make an impact
Student consultants don’t just write reports: they design real solutions that change organizations and lives. You’ll collaborate with non-profits, start-ups, and small businesses on projects whose whole purpose is positive impact. For example, past projects have supported organizations like Heal, which helps immigrants and asylum seekers have access to healthcare and support to rebuild their lives, and Netwomening, a non-profit dedicated to protecting, educating, and empowering refugee girls and young women.
When you join a university consultancy, you can choose the organizations and causes that resonate with you. The work that you do doesn’t just stay on a paper because it is designed to be practical, actionable, and implemented by the organizations you support.
- Build Practical and Transferable skills
As a student consultant, you’ll strengthen both soft skills and hard skills that are valuable in not just your future career, but also in your life. On the soft skills side, you’ll practice teamwork, communication, problem-solving, and presentation skills. Each project brings together a team of 5–9 consultants, where you’ll collaborate to design solutions and present your ideas directly to the client. You’ll work closely with your team and also directly with the organizations through weekly meetings with your team and biweekly client meetings.
On the hard skills side, you’ll gain hands-on experience with tools and techniques such as social media strategy design, market research, data analysis, impact measurement, and other project-specific methodologies. These skills help you deliver value to the organisations but also prepare you for success in future internships, jobs, and leadership opportunities.
- Explore careers in consulting or social impact
Whether you’re interested in management consulting, social enterprise, or finance, student consulting gives you a real taste of professional life. You’ll work directly with clients, manage deadlines, and design strategies in different areas.
For example, a team from the University of Edinburgh’s 180DC branch spent 200+ hours with HEAL, holding nine strategy sessions and seven client meetings. They helped grow HEAL’s social media presence, strengthen partnerships, and improve communications. Over the 8 week project duration, the consulting team managed to raise over $10,000 in just nine weeks and left a sustainable roadmap for the future.
- Work on diverse real world projects
No two projects are alike. As a student consultant, in one term, you might help a charity improve its fundraising strategy, analyze the sustainability of a product line, or conduct market research for a new service. Projects can span both industries and geographies: from KOWANJ in Australia, focused on youth empowerment, to Sol y Luna in Peru, supporting education and community development in rural areas. This diversity of clients, by country and by focus, means you’ll gain exposure to a wide range of challenges, sectors, and cultural contexts.
5. Join a Supportive, Like-Minded Community
Student consulting attracts driven, curious people who care about creating change. You’ll be surrounded by peers who challenge and inspire you. You’ll likely walk away with friends as well as skills.
Joining isn’t automatic: most branches recruit every semester through a competitive process that includes a written application, group interview, and individual interview. The focus is on teamwork, problem-solving, and social impact commitment. For example, At the 180 Degrees consulting branch in the University of Edinburgh, over 270 students applied for only 60 spots in one semester. This selectivity means you’ll be part of a motivated and supportive community where everyone is eager to learn and make an impact.
Don’t get discouraged if you aren’t selected the first time, the reality is that most of the best consultants applied more than once. Each recruitment cycle is a new opportunity, and what matters most is your willingness to learn, grow, and contribute to something bigger than yourself.
Author: Catalina Rincon
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