Built by someone
who lived it.

I'm Jordan Samuels, a first-generation college graduate originally from Cape Town, South Africa. I came to the United States at sixteen years old with a dream and the kind of hope that only comes from knowing you've been given an opportunity most people never get. I was determined to make the most of it.

But the truth is, I struggled. Nobody told me that grocery shopping at Whole Foods instead of Aldi would drain my budget in a week. Nobody explained how phone plans worked, or how to stretch a dollar on the basics that American students never have to think twice about. I attended The Hill School and loved my prep school experience, but when it came time to figure out what was next — college applications, financial aid, and the entire U.S. education system — I was on my own. Not because people didn't care, but because nobody around me fully understood what an international student actually needs to hear.

I ended up at a college I hadn't originally planned on attending. And honestly? It became one of the best things that ever happened to me. I graduated from Franklin & Marshall College in 2026 with majors in Economics and Government, built relationships that changed my life, and seized every opportunity I could find. But as I went into my final year, reality hit hard. Despite a world-class education, despite doing everything I was told to do, I couldn't find employment. The career advice that worked for American students didn't work for me. The visa questions, the sponsorship conversations, and the cultural gaps in how I presented myself — none of it was addressed.

I kept asking myself: how do I explain to my family back home that a $500,000 investment from prep school to graduation has gotten me nowhere? That question is the reason ClearPath USA exists.

This isn't the first thing I've built. ClearPath USA is my fourth company, and alongside it, I'm the Founder and CEO of Fuel For Thought, a nonprofit fighting childhood hunger by bringing essential nutrition to underprivileged schoolchildren in Cape Town, South Africa. We raised $30,000 at our first fundraising event to launch the work and built a plan to scale it sustainably. The throughline in everything I do is simple: when people are given the right support at the right moment, their whole future changes.

I built ClearPath for the student I was at sixteen — wide-eyed, ambitious, and completely unprepared for how much I didn't know. I built it for every international student who has ever felt lost in a system that wasn't designed with them in mind. And I built it because no student should ever have to figure out the basics alone when the stakes are this high.

ClearPath USA is the guide I wish I had, and now we're building it for you.