I am new to this forum and see a lot of references to having a “hook”. What is a hook? Is it different from school to school? Here are some things about my daughter, are any of these hooks?
Asian
Adopted by a single mother
Pre-professional ballet dancer at the highest level at a company ballet school
Scholarship to ABT and SAB ballet summer intensives
Selected for a very competitive STEM summer internship in genomics
Attends an art school that has a rigorous college prep program
Was in foster care for the first year of life
There are many posts about this on CC and I suggest you use the search function to find them. You can also google “hook in college admissions.” But in short I define a hook as something a particular individual has that fulfills an institutional need/desire of a college. Some examples of hooks include being a recruited athlete (ex. a quarterback for the football team), the child of a big donor (as the school would hope to get additional large donations), someone who the school feels would bring positive press (ex. Malala). Very few people have hooks.
From what I see you have very well developed talents/interests (often called spikes on CC) and an interesting back-story but no hook. Use your application to showcase your many achievements.
IMO things like first generation, URM may be a help in terms of admissions to certain colleges but I don’t consider them to be a “hook” because multiple applicants will have those traits. I think of a hook as something that is a specific relationship between an individual and a college. For example a person being recruited to play football could have a hook for College A (who is recruiting that particular player) but not College B. (who may want a different player).
But the answer is not totally “cut and dry” so different people may have different opinions.
She is Asian female interested in STEM. A school like Kenyon appears to have a low Asian population, so I am thinking there it may not be an anti-hook. Of course if she was going to continue in dance everything would be in her favor, STEM, not so much.
Being Asian is a hook at many LACS (where there are not many Asians.)
In many cases, the hook is imposed on the admissions office. Athletics (recruit), development (legacy/donor), and other “institutional priorities” which may include increasing first gen students or racial diversity, etc.
Your D looks like she has a story to tell that could make her application memorable. If she is applying to a school that has a ballet company that gives its director a couple of “picks”, her ballet could be a hook. Likewise, at many LACS (especially in flyover states), being Asian could be a hook (if she is happy being in a small minority.)
As you may have gathered, having a hook helps if you want to go to that school. The issue is that where you may have a hook and where you want to go to school may not match. In all likelihood, your D will not have a hook…
We are just hitting the tour circuit this summer, so I am not sure what type of school she will like. I am from Ohio and we have family there, so we are starting with Case Western, Oberlin, Kenyon, Wooster, then going from there.
A “hook” is some quality or attribute by virtue of which an applicant has clear value to a school above and beyond basic abilities and talents, and which therefore gives those applicants some kind of edge in the admissions process. That edge can vary from near-automatic admission to a signicant percentage improvement in their likelihood of admission, depending on the school, the type of hook, and the degree. Some examples:
Being a URM is a hook at most schools, but certainly does not guarantee admission, even for qualified applicants. At some schools, some URM status may confer a significant advantage (e.g., Native American status at Dartmouth). Being a 1st generation applicant is becoming a minor hook.
Being the child of a major donor (usually involving tens of millions of dollars) is a hook. The school wants to keep such donors happy. Minor donors generally don't count.
Being an NCAA recruited athlete, especially in a lucrative sport, is a hook. The more accomplished the athlete is, the greater the hook. NCAA sports bring in lots of money and publicity to a university. Olympic athletes or highly pried recruits are golden. Consider someone like Katie Ledecky at Stanford. The hook may be minimal at Division III schools. A marginal recruit is going to have less of a hook, as is one in a less influential sport. We're essentially talking about the coach giving input to the admissions committee; the coach may have enormous influence, or very little. If Mike Krzyzewski wants an athlete at Duke, they're pretty much in. If the coach at MIT wants a basketball plaer, it may have very little impact.
Having (positive) national/ointernational notoriety or recongition is a strong hook. Someone like Malia Obama or Malala Yousafzai brings tremendous publicity and attention to a school.
In the past, being the child of an alumna often had some amount of "hook" effect, especially if the parents were donors. That is less and less of a factor as the application numbers skyrocket. At some schools there may be a minor benefit, but often that is limited to the ED round.
Regarding the OP’s clearly very talented daughter:
Asian - definitely NOT a hook.
Adopted by a single mother - possibly a compelling essay story, but not a hook.
Was in foster care for the first year of life - same as above.
Pre-professional ballet dancer at the highest level at a company ballet school. A great EC and a high skill level which should help her application, but not a hook.
Scholarship to ABT and SAB ballet summer intensives. See above.
Selected for a very competitive STEM summer internship in genomics - about the same as the ballet. Having 2 areas of achievement in different areas (ballet and STEM) will make the OP's daughter a potentially strong applicant, but it won't give her any edge going into the adcom evaluation process.
Attends an art school that has a rigorous college prep program - not a hook.
It’s not a fair process. URMs have a hook because they have traditionally been underprivileged, so admitting qualified URMs enhances a school’s diversity profile. A wealthy URM can benefit from this as well. My younger son was a special needs adoption from China, spent 3 years in an institutional orphanage, has physical disabilities that he has overcome completely, and almost certainly would be a 1st generation applicant from his (unknown) birth family; but he will have no hook whatsoever as an Asian male applicant.
A hook is probably a unique trait that connects the individual with the department and school. I think in your daughter’s case, being an Asian ballet dancer with a passion for genomics could be a good hook. However, as mentioned before, how well will the hook work depends on where she is applying and also on how good she is at science.(considering that she is already a good dancer as proven by her scholarships and internship)
I think of a “hook” as something that at least in part is an accident of birth and that you can’t just decide to develop. In other words, a URM, a recruitable athlete, a first-gen applicant, someone from Montana, a faculty brat, the child of a mega donor and Malia Obama are all hooked, but they wouldn’t be if it weren’t for who their parents are or their genetic inheritance. They might independently be strong candidates, have superb stats, ECs, etc., but they didn’t/couldn’t make themselves hooked (although the athlete needs to work hard to maximize the talent she was born with). If everyone could make themselves hooked, the hook would decrease in importance given the resulting oversupply in hooked candidates.
I’m an agreement. To me, the hook, with very limited exceptions, is established the moment one is pushed out of the womb. One is either born with insane athletic ability/as a URM/into a family that has legacy and/or donates a lot of money to the school and/or are celebrities.
I agree with all the replies except I would make one tweak. I believe that first generation isn’t just a minor hook but is a major hook de jour if you listen to admissions officers statements. I heard a Stanford admissions officer tout that last year they admitted 18% first gens this year. There is a national ranking of greatest mobility that is used by several colleges in their promotion. With colleges struggling with being race blind in admission first gen has grown in importance. I also agree that having one from each state is a significant hook that seems to be regularly repeated by many AO’s, so being from South Dakota is a huge boost.
In practice, a hook is a bucket or cohort the school would set aside for applicants whose certain attributes meet school’s institutional priorities. For example, first generation students would be compared to each other in the bucket created for meeting a goal of reaching 18-20% of the freshman class (at some elite colleges). Athletes, URM, legacy, development all have their own buckets. As far as I am aware there is no bucket for geography, art talents or math wiz etc in most college admissions, thus those cannot be called hooks.
I agree with deepblue and the moderator that you should know whether you have a hook or not by eighth grade. Its unlikely someone would blossom into a DivI athlete without showing any promise by middle school.
The only scenario I can see that will create a hook in high school is a parent marrying an alumnus/alumna. Most colleges would consider stepparents as legacy. But then again that person better be an active member of local chapter who would have spent countless hours of interviewing and been on first name basis with AOs, or a major donor.
As a parent of two recruited athletes, I strongly disagree. Neither of my kids were “pushed out of the womb” with “insane athletic ability”, nor were they blessed with unusual size or particularly muscular physiques. If you were to look at my son’s senior year team, you’d probably be surprised to learn that any of them were athletes at all, much less the NCAA Champions that they in fact were.
To a large extent, recruitable athletes aren’t born as such, but become so by virtue of years of training, discipline, dedication, coaching, and parental support.