All too many HS students have little to no ECs, or no track record of demonstrated aptitude or interest in ECs until their junior year. Then all of a sudden, they jump into numerous ECs or into a big EC that is out of their character.
This is all so true. Nobody believes people who make posts like this. But. KUDOS.
One other thing… Different schools are looking for different types of people. So you could get rejected from columbia and still get into yale. It’s not arbitrary though.
The biggest thing with gaining admission to any well-respected university, or even for doing well in any facet of life, is to do the most with what you have. I come from a rural, poor, majority-minority high school where we have about 9 AP classes and the top students regularly get rejected from the state flagship. Despite this, any great applicant has to do everything they possibly can, take every opportunity they are afforded, and then (and this is the important part), do something extra. Wonder why colleges seem to reward kids who start their own clubs or self study APs? It’s because that is evidence that a student has run the course of their high school but still has ambition. That’s the only way I can explain my own success, and the successes of many Ivy/elite college-bound students: we all, at one point or another, took the initiative. If you wait for awards and test scores and ECs to fall into your lap, you’re deluding yourself.
I find it amusing to see all the discussion about the academic passion students have in the weeks leading up to New Year admissions deadlines and then, the posts about slacking off in their Senior year and will it hurt their admissions begin…
We’ll see if “being myself” despite everything has worked out for me RD in a few months. It definitely didn’t SCEA to Princeton, lol.
I’m considering slacking off this semester in classes I have no interest in because there’s no reason for me to work hard and maintain my 4.0 anymore. I assume at least some of the other kids who talk about slacking off are just tired of putting time and effort into subjects they don’t like when it won’t significantly affect things anymore.
@jpm50
Actually, that is not entirely true. For most of your EC’s, all they see is the amount of years you did, a few words for leadership position, and a few more words for accomplishments.
I (and many other students) are motivated to go that extra mile in an EC to earn President or finish in the top few nationally because it looks good on a college application. I also think it makes sense to evaluate the benefit you would get in terms of college admissions when you spend time and money on an activity- it is one of the many benefits, and it makes sense to do a proper cost-benefit analysis.
However, I do agree if you start/do an EC just for college and make a half-hearted effort, adcoms will see that.
@spuding102 - Great that you felt you would be happy at any of the Ivy League schools, but I think you would be in the minority there. Brown University for example is VERY different from Harvard and closer in many ways to Vassar than any of the other Ivies. Also, some of the Ivies are in big cities, some are not, they don’t all have the same academic offerings, some have more cutthroat student competition than the others, and they each have their own separate feel. Hopefully prospective students will do some research and see which one (if any) might fit them before just deciding to apply to them all believing they would be equally happy at any of them.
that, or the serial joiners, who join a bunch of clubs one year, and then a different bunch of clubs the next. And so on …
IMO if you’re GPA is under the 50th percentile, your SAT Score should certainly be at or over the 75th percentile.
To be honest how can they even tell if you are pretending to do something? I know somebody who was in newspaper but hated it, she only told her friends. She got straight a’s, and got accepted into her dream. Harvard. All of the extracurriculars she did she hated. I honestly do not see how they can tell. Not to mention she wrote about The struggles of being Hispanic, expect the fact that she was super popular at my school.
Sincerity, passion or whatever adcoms are looking for can be faked, but what’s the point? Why waste the time, the effort, doing things that will look “good” on an application if you hate them every second of the way? How would you feel if you spent four years doing that only to get rejected? I think high school should be a time to appreciate and discover hobbies. Generally most schools or communities have enough of a variety of activities that you can find or even start a club or activity that you like. But then again, this is only my opinion and for some the end may justify the means.