Many state colleges admit students by GPA and SAT scores – they don’t even look at essays, EC’s, or teacher recommendations.
At private colleges, such as Harvard, your GPA and test sores are a minimum threshold – everyone’s got to have that. Then Admissions will read your essays, teacher recommendations and EC’s and will compare them to all other applicants trying to choose students of good “character.” That’s an old fashioned word; it means the way you develop your inner qualities: intellectual passion, maturity, social conscience, concern for community, tolerance, inclusiveness and love of learning. Colleges learn of those things by comments made from your teachers and guidance counselor, as well as what your choose to write about in your essays and the “tone” and content of what you say.
To be admitted in the SCEA round – you need it all: A high GPA, great ACT/SAT scores, interesting EC’s, a thought provoking essay, stellar teacher recommendations and a good interview report. If one area is deficient, a student will be deferred so that Admissions can compare that student to a larger pool of applicants.
Have you watched this video from Amherst College: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-OLlJUXwKU
Prior to this Committee Meeting, about 8,000 applications were reviewed for transcript rigor, GPA and test scores. The top 1,000 students are then brought to the committee and students are either accepted or waitlisted. (The assumption is that the other 7,000 students who didn’t make it to committee are rejected.)
Notice the comments made by Admission Directors. Most of them are comments from teachers or guidance counselors, except at the end, where one Admissions Director says “This is a quote from his essay.”
That’s what it’s going to come down to with your application. Best of luck to you!