<p>Sameer, I don’t have any expertise with these particular schools since my son focused on those within an 8-20% acceptance range and had his state flagship – well-respected in his major – as a fallback. But since you PM’d me, here are my general views.</p>
<p>Your strategy – applying to schools ranging from Cornell to Emory to GATech is a good one; you will get accepted to several on your list. Your ACT is strong, your GPA might work against you at the most selective schools. But even perfect stats are not enough for the top-tier; my son had a 1/400 class rank, a 36 ACT, and dual 800 SATIIs and still got a few rejections.</p>
<p>For the most competitive schools, leadership in both ECs and community service work is important for standing out from the crowd. Beyond club president titles, which are given out like candy, you should be able to explain how you made an actual difference; even a single line on the Common App can be enough. My son, for example, led his school’s Scholastic Bowl team, but, more importantly, they improved from the previous year’s 0-16 record to win 11 of 16. He led his math team also, but won 7 competition ribbons in the process and his team overall won the “most improved” title.</p>
<p>Putting in 1000 hours into community service is admirable, but most community service work done by high schoolers is just-show-up menial tasks. To stand out from the crowd, you need to find someone willing to let you implement and test an idea of how to help. If that is not possible, then you should consider starting your own small-scale opportunity. </p>
<p>So you are definitely on the right track. Use your remaining time to focus tightly on your best opportunities to demonstrate leadership and achieve real goals. Your goal is to make a specific positive impression on an adcom who may read 1000 apps over 3 months – unusual enough that two days later he or she still remembers you as “the kid who did X.” That person then becomes your advocate in front of the committee and somewhere along the way you’ll be given a 15-second opportunity to receive the accept checkmark. If your best achievements cannot be summarized in those 15 seconds, you may well find yourself on that waitlist or the almost-made-it list. Nothing wrong with your application at all, the school just ran out of slots after cherry-picking the more interesting applicants.</p>