<p>1234d - she’s just finished J1, and she’ll be applying for universities for Fall 2010, after her A Levels at the end of this year. Took me a while to figure out as well.</p>
<p>Yeah - how’d you get such SAT scores?</p>
<p>I wouldn’t be worried about the academic side - if you haven’t had any problems with the transition to JC, you should have no problems come A Levels. You’ll be applying based on your prelim results and predicted grades though, so don’t slack off or anything. But you knew that.</p>
<p>Your ECs do look weak. Did you change CCA after moving from RGS to RJ (I assume that’s where you are now)? What was your CCA at RGS, and did you hold any leadership positions? Any competitions or SYF? All that goes in your application as well, not just your JC stuff.</p>
<p>150 hours of volunteer work is on the high side for Singapore (whether adcoms know that is another matter, but nvm). Since it’s essentially 75 hours a year over three years, I’ll assume it’s a long-term commitment to a particular organisation, which would actually be a fairly substantial line on your resume. What volunteer work is this?</p>
<p>The one that’s slightly less substantial is the vice-pres of Current Affairs Society. If you’ve contributed a great deal in your capacity as vice-pres, it would be good to get your teacher i/c to write a recommendation for you, because there’s no doubt you can “do the work” and it’s the other areas of your application that are lacking, as you’ve noted. It would also lend more weight to the EC - at my school, for instance, the teacher i/c of the Philosophy Society said outright that they don’t do anything and it’s just something that looks impressive on a Harvard app, and then asked if any of us wanted him to add our names to the club register - don’t shortchange yourself if it’s a genuine CCA and you’ve put a lot of work into it.</p>
<p>You still have a year, even though it’s going to be a very busy one. If you’re worried about your CCA record, ask your teachers for their assessment of your chances - they’ll be able to give you specific examples of seniors who were in the same situation and what they did to beef up their application. If you’ve got any areas that you’re interested in or are passionate about but that aren’t going to be reflected in your application at this rate, take the next step and do something with it. One (or more? not sure) of your seniors, for instance, teamed up with some students from TJ to start [url=<a href=“http://www.refugeesea.org/]RefugeeSEA[/url”>http://www.refugeesea.org/]RefugeeSEA[/url</a>] - just because it isn’t within the CCA framework of your school doesn’t mean you can’t do something like this and count it as an EC. You have options.</p>
<p>HOWEVER, try to do this - it’s going to be difficult, I realise - as a matter of personal fulfillment, not resume-padding. If you don’t already have the drive for this sort of thing, it will only make your A Level year miserable, and the lack of sincerity will still show through, so there’s no point.</p>
<p>[/fine line]</p>
<p>On another note - why aren’t your promo results out yet? Knowing how much groundwork you’ve done in J1 would help us (the Singaporeans, at least) assess how much time you can afford to spend on ECs this year. If you get something like DDES or whatever (which I doubt, by the looks of your academic record) you’re going to be spending a lot more time studying than if you’ve got AABB. Are you taking any H3s? Which teachers are you planning to ask for recommendations, and why?</p>
<p>Are you planning on applying to other schools, as well? You should know that with your record and with the resources at your disposal in terms of how much your teachers can help you, you’ll definitely get into a number of good universities.</p>