<p>As a high school senior, I want to give advice to what is rumored to be the hardest class to apply for college.</p>
<p>Tips:</p>
<li><p>Apply to back up schools that you would be as happy as attending as your first choice school. </p></li>
<li><p>Take your SAT subject tests and ACTs, but not more than 3 times. Your scores begin to peak.</p></li>
<li><p>Apply to a good amount of universities, which would be around 10-20. Make sure you have enough back up schools and reaches.</p></li>
<li><p>Start your essays months in advance. I wrote all of my essays last minute, so I was in a rush to have good quality essays for my first choice universities.</p></li>
<li><p>Finally, don’t take rejection personally. It does take a while to get over rejection, but remember that there is still the possibility to transfer to the colleges that did not accept you. Also, attending summer session at one of your first choices might also be another option.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>If any of you have more tips, post them in this thread.</p>
<p>apply to match-reaches along with reaches! i applied to safeties and matches, and then jumped right to HIGH reaches, of which i got into zero! there is a difference!</p>
<p>
[quote]
1. Apply to back up schools that you would be as happy as attending as your first choice school.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>At the same time, don't apply to too many safeties, which is what I and a lot of others did. Go for some reaches, but also don't apply to the entire Ivy League and more. It's all about balance. :P</p>
<p>athenegoddess, that is something that is good to take up with your guidance counselor. usually, it is based on stats and the selectivity of the college, although ECs, etc play a role
example:<br>
i have a 3.7 gpa, 31 ACT and great ECs
-university of wisconsin-madison was a match (similar test scores, gpa for average accepted student, moderate acceptance rate)<br>
-iowa state was a safety (lower test scores, gpa for avg accepted student, very high acceptance rate)</p>
<p>also good to note is that many were not accepted to matches even this year as it is getting so competitive. reaches are becoming higher reaches. next year will be even crazier!</p>
<p>Have a plan and implement it early. Start now so you are ready to go. I would also start the application process early. Find out what essays and sups are needed. It takes time and is can be tiresome.</p>
<p>Get a job and apply to as many scholarships as you can. It helps to consult your high school's counseling office to see if there are any local scholarships--those are a lot easier to win.</p>
<ol>
<li>Take SAT's at the latest in March of Jr. year. That will allow time for retests and SAT 2's.</li>
<li>Take at least 1 SAT 2 before fall of Sr. year.</li>
<li>Start your essays, including supplemental essays, during the summer, you won't believe how stressful Sr. year is and how much school work you have.</li>
<li>Have an English teacher read your essays before you submit them.</li>
<li>Ask your teachers to write you recommendations early, before they become swamped.</li>
</ol>
<p>
[quote]
This might sound silly, but get one of those accordion folders and organize everything. It can get a little overwhelming.
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i second that advice, altho i used a binder with different folders in it for each college instead of an accordion folder. basically, stay organized</p>
<p>athenegoddess, you are welcome. and:
a lot of schools still have their applications posted from last year and in the next few months they will begin releasing the applications for next year so you can start looking at those. they will be on teh school websites and on the common app website. one great one to start on right now is the major one for the common app (check if the schools you are applying to are members first of course). there is no specific prompt you must go with so you can write about anything.</p>
<p>I think it's difficult to know how many schools to apply to. I picked 11, of which two were high reaches that I didn't really want to attend in the first place/sort of involved a "why not?" mentality. Those two are the only ones I was rejected from. In retrospect I wish I hadn't applied, but I think a lot of people want to try their hand at HYPS. I applied to a wide variety of LACs, which was the type of school I wanted to go to, and I now have a lot of options. I also applied to a university in case I decided against the liberal arts route, and I applied to a school I knew I would get into and expected to receive merit aid from. I think I was really fortunate. I probably shouldn't have underestimated my chances so much--I could have applied to three top LACs instead of seven--but it's really nice to have a wide variety of options, and if you think you'll need financial aid, it helps to have some packages to compare. I also think my application strategy would have allowed for me to drastically change the direction I wanted to go in if April saw me second-guessing.</p>
<p>I think it's really important to try to identify something unique about yourself and communicate it to the colleges. For those of us who aren't fortunate enough to come from interesting ethnic backgrounds or have access to amazing opportunities, this can be as simple as identifying a unique perspective you think you have. I would also recommend sending in supplemental material. This does not necessarily mean drowning the adcomms in a deluge, but I think that my sending in an additional recommendation letter and a letter about how an English class I'd taken had helped me to learn more about myself and the kind of education I wanted (for example) is what moved me from the deferred EDII pool at Swarthmore to the accepted RD grouping. Friends who have sent in art or athletic supplements echo impressions of similar advantages.</p>
<p>I suppose what I'm trying to say is that you should try to make your application stand out as much as possible. There are a LOT of strong, intelligent, interesting applicants, but it isn't really enough to have good grades and stellar EC's and form recommendation letters from teachers who care. Your application should have personality.</p>