Ayushma Rai
Class of 2023
Reading law
Melbourne
My personal statement went through eleven drafts. I resented every one of them until the interview.
About us
Our story
A residential college in Khumaltar, Lalitpur, taking students for two years and organising everything around where they go next.
Who we are
Founded to fix the two years thatdecide everything
Lhotse International College opened in 1998 with a single observation: Nepali students were losing university places not on ability but on process — late applications, thin statements, no interview practice, no idea what funding existed.
So the college was built around those two years and nothing else. A three-person counselling office, an evening timetable that makes tuition centres unnecessary, and a hundred and ninety students living on site so the evening actually happens.
310
Students
31
Universities entered
What we stand for
Mission, visionand values
Our mission
To prepare each student, in two years, for the university place they are capable of — and to teach the process that wins it.
Our vision
A college whose name on an application tells the admissions office the student is ready.
Our values
Utthishthata jagrata — arise, awake. Write the eleventh draft. Ask the Thursday guest the hard question. Leave well.
Utthishthata Jagrata
Arise, awake
Message from management
Meet our leaders
Ability is not what loses our students their places. Process is, and process can be taught.
Principal since 2020. Read economics at Delhi and Cambridge, and taught A-Level economics here for eight years before that.
Eleven drafts of a personal statement is not cruelty. It is the interview, rehearsed.
Leads the three-person counselling office. Alumni of the last five years are reading at thirty-one universities across four continents.
Our journey
Twenty-seven years
- 1998
Forty-one students
Opened in Khumaltar with NEB Science and a single counsellor.
- 2004
A-Levels added
The Cambridge programme opens alongside NEB, taught in parallel.
- 2011
The residence
Boarding opens; the evening prep and seminar timetable begins the same year.
- 2019
The counselling office
Expanded to three full-time counsellors, one named for every student.
Our team
Tutors and counsellors
One tutor for every eight students. The people who run the two years.
Leadership
Dr Prateek Rana
Principal
Nirjala Shakya
Director of University Counselling
Academic
Bipin Karmacharya
Head of A-Level
Sangita Pradhan
Head of NEB Programme
Rajesh Maharjan
Head of Sciences
Counselling
Anjali Shrestha
University Counsellor
Residence
Tashi Gurung
Warden, the Residence
Alumni
Where ourleavers read
Four continents and thirty-one universities. A few of the alumni the college hears from most.
Nirvik Shakya
Class of 2019
Software engineer
Bengaluru
The evening prep taught me to work without anyone chasing me. That turned out to be most of the job.
Dr Pooja Tuladhar
Class of 2012
Paediatric resident
Kathmandu
My tutor read every practical write-up I handed in. Medical school felt familiar from the first week.
Samir Joshi
Class of 2016
Economist
Lalitpur
The Union taught me to lose an argument politely and win the next one properly.