AIGAC Board

AIGAC Officers and Directors

  • Adam Markus — President & Communication Committee Chair
  • Scott Edinburgh — Treasurer
  • Candy Lee Laballe — Director and Conference Committee Co-Chair
  • Eric Lucrezia — Director and Conference Committee Co-Chair
  • Prashant Tibrewal — Director & Membership Committee Co-Chair
  • Thomas Kalandranis — Director & Membership Committee Co-Chair
  • Preeti Wadekar — Treasurer Elect
  • Amit Kapur — General Director
  • Chris Aitken — Past President & Sponsorship Committee Chair
  • Faye Mackenzie — Executive Director

Adam Markus, President & Communication Committee Chair

Adam believes in the power of education to transform lives. Adam has worked in the education industry since 1995 as corporate English trainer in Japan, a program marketer at University of California Berkeley and Kaplan, and since 2001 as a graduate admissions consultant where he works with clients worldwide. Adam joined AIGAC shortly after founding his own business in 2007. He has been writing a blog on graduate admissions since 2007.

He is a 2016 graduate of INSEAD’s Executive Masters in Consulting and Coaching for Change program. His Master’s thesis was on MBA admissions interviews. He has a BA from the University of California, Santa Cruz and an MA from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Originally from Los Angeles, Adam has been based in Japan since 2001.

Scott Edinburgh, Treasurer

Scott earned his BS in Management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his MBA from The Wharton School at The University of Pennsylvania. Scott began his career in management consulting with Deloitte and has run internal strategy teams and worked in corporate development across financial services and travel and hospitality.

Scott founded Personal MBA Coach in 2008 to offer a boutique and personalized approach to MBA and graduate school application consulting. Scott is a speaker at events worldwide on MBA application strategies, and his firm has advised hundreds of applicants throughout the process. His commitment to AIGAC has been increasing in recent years, and he is excited for what is to come with the annual survey presented to admissions directors and AIGAC members.

Candy Lee LaBalle, Director and Conference Committee Co-Chair

Founder of LaBalle Admissions (previously mbaSpain, founded in 2005), Candy is an expert in the educational admissions consulting industry. In addition to her current term on the Board, Candy served as a Board Member in 2012 and 2013. She has chaired or co-chaired several AIGAC conferences including those taking place at Harvard, MIT, Columbia, Cornell, Yale SOM, NYU Stern, Kellogg, Chicago Booth, London Business School, INSEAD, HEC Paris, and IESE. Candy is regularly featured in publications about the MBA application process and was voted in 2022 as the number one admissions consultant in the world by Poets&Quants. Candy has a degree in Anthropology and worked as a researcher and travel writer for years. She lives in Madrid.

Eric Lucrezia, Director and Conference Committee Co-Chair

With 20+ years experience in admissions consulting, career coaching, education, and recruitment, Eric Lucrezia has supported candidates from all over the world to make the next leap in their education and careers. Beginning with his first role in undergraduate admissions in the US in 2000, up until his most recent role as the Director of Recruitment for MBA Programs at ESSEC Business School, in Paris and Singapore, Eric has developed a global and multi-level perspective on what gives MBA applicants a competitive profile in the eyes of admissions committees. 

The various professional experience throughout Eric’s career that have been formative in becoming an MBA Admissions Consultant include teaching English in several countries, including at the prestigious French Ecole de Guerre, working in sales and marketing as a real estate agent in New York, and participating in conference or events where he presents numerous topics, including Interviewing in English, Personal Branding, Using LinkedIn like a Pro, and Networking with Class.

You can find Eric every week, streaming live as the host of weekly vidcast, MBA Waves, every Tuesday on LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube, where you can get loads of brilliant free tips from the guests he hosts, including many other fantastic coaches and consultants from the AIGAC community.

He is also the author of the growing DIY guide book series, “Getting into an MBA”. These are country-specific DIY admissions playbooks, kind of like the Lonely Planet Travel Guides but for business school, that take you on the admissions journey from A to Z.

Since 2010, Eric has lived in Paris, France.

Prashant Tibrewal, Director & Membership Committee Co-Chair

Prashant is an alum of ESSEC Business School, France (2010) and MIT Sloan School of Management, USA (2021). He is an edupreneur with a specific interest in the international education landscape. Through his admissions consulting ventures AdmitSquare Consulting and ISBmantra, he has personally mentored 1000+ applicants to top-ranked global universities. He is also the founder of GIC Academy, which facilitates in-person short-term programs at international universities, and Alum-n-i, which is an experience-sharing platform between international alumni and applicants.

At AIGAC, Prashant has enjoyed volunteering with the Conference Committee and held the position of Conference Committee Chair for the AIGAC 2022 Conference. Prashant is also trained in Martial Arts, loves playing sports such as Cricket, Tennis, and Table Tennis, and has won Poker games in six countries.

Thomas Kalandranis, Director & Membership Committee Co-Chair

Thomas began his university studies as an aspiring Chemical Engineer, eventually switching to Business Studies, culminating in his MBA from Seattle University (1996). Professionally, Thomas enjoyed a successful corporate career as Regional Sales manager, in the USA and Greece. His
meanderings took him across Latin America, most of Europe, and the Middle East, managing the distribution network of various medical equipment companies.

In 2012, together with his spouse, Dia Gerontoudi, he co-founded the Dia Gerontoudi Prep Center in Athens, a GMAT/GRE prep school, where he took on the role of Head of Admissions Consulting. With scores of successful applicants in the top European and American universities, both in Master and MBA programs, Thomas has established himself as the go-to person for bespoke application consulting and expert interview coaching.

In his spare time, Thomas continues his involvement in sports and fitness, always looking for opportunities to enjoy his definition of heaven: basking in the sun at some forgotten beach on a Greek island.

Preeti Wadekar, Treasurer Elect

Preeti Wadekar is a global higher education consultant and holds an MBA from Columbia Business School. She is also a certified Career, Executive & Life Coach. She brings over 17 years of corporate and international business experience, working with brands such as EY,
Siemens and KPMG in business areas of governance, enterprise risk management, statutory audit, accounting, human resources, project management, behavioural change management & communications, talent management and leadership development.

She also leads the MBA Admissions Consulting team at The Red Pen working with high potential entry-level executives around the world for admissions to competitive global business schools. As a Board member of the Association of Graduate Admissions Consultants, she has unique insights to enable students to make informed choices about global education opportunities, while providing holistic guidance to navigate complex admissions processes.

She has studied and lived in the USA for over 9 years as well as travelled to, worked in and led teams across 25 countries including the UK, Germany, Singapore, Malaysia, China, Hong Kong, France, South Africa, Chile, Brazil and more, enabling her to work seamlessly with culturally diverse clientele and global organisations.

Amit Kapur,  General Director

Amit is a veteran of Wall Street, large-cap technology companies, and 10+ years at Sparrey Consulting coaching next-generation business leaders into business school, Amit joined SCG full-time in 2018. In his role, Amit is expanding coaching programs, managing alumni relationships, and helping launch new products to supplement SCG’s coaching services. In the meantime, Amit still coaches a cross-section of clients directly, provides a sounding board for other coaches, and celebrates every client’s success with a mixture of fist-bumps and emojis. In his spare time, Amit volunteers at local schools,& loves games, whiskey and creating learning opportunities for his two daughters.

Chris Aitken, Past President & Sponsorship Committee Chair

Chris is a co-founder of MBA Prep School. He is also the immediate Past President of AIGAC and chair of the Sponsorship Committee.

Chris has 20+ years of experience in top-tier management consulting as a partner, managing director, and executive vice president. More recently, he has been focused on helping to fund and grow promising early-stage companies applying artificial intelligence and machine learning to help address health, safety, and environmental issues in heavy industries.

Chris enjoys hiking with his wife and sons or sharing a good glass of Australian red wine.

AIGAC Board – Get Involved!

Each year we solicit nominations for Board of Director candidates to run for three seats with a three-year term. Learn more.

Minimum Qualifications for Nominees

  • AIGAC Individual Consultant or Business Organization member in good standing.
  • At least three years of experience as an admissions consultant.
  • At least six months of participation on an AIGAC committee.
  • Only one person per company or consultancy may serve on the AIGAC Board of Directors at any given time.

The first step towards a board position is to volunteer for one of our committees or suggest a new one if you have great plans or ideas that don’t fit into our current structure. Our current committees (and current chairs in parentheses) are:

  • Conference (Candy Lee Laballe & Eric Lucrezia)
  • Communications (Adam Markus)
  • Governance (appointed per AIGAC policies and procedures)
  • Membership (Prashant Tibrewal & Thomas Kalandranis)
  • Sponsorship (Chris Aitken)
  • Survey (Scott Edinburgh)

Please get in touch with the committee chairs if you’d like to get involved!

Get Involved!

Put your talents and great ideas to work (not to mention bolster your resume) by joining an AIGAC Committee or the Board! Please note, this is open only to current AIGAC members.

Please provide the following information and one of our team will be in touch shortly to explore how you can get involved with AIGAC!

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