Hi, i’m currently a freshman at a decent public high school, and i wanted to see from those with experience what i can do to improve my chances of getting into a top-tier school. Give advice as to what courses, electives, ECs, tests, etc i should take. If there’s something you wish you could’ve done, say it! I’m sure this could help other students prepare to have glowing apps! if it helps, heres some stats:
-female
-asian (chinese)
-all GT classes (above honors)
-AP bio (ap chem next year)
-interests in art, science, medicine
-in precalc for math (should i take ap calc next year?)
-take 11hrs of dance (ballet+modern) per week and have been dancing 9 years
-taking french 3 in school, chinese outside of school, interest in learning korean
is there anything i should be doing differently? anything more i should be doing?
This has got to be the stupidest thread yet. Designing yourself? Really Like a robot? Be yourself, take a passion in everything you like, as for classes take AP Calc BC, and then Calc 3 if you can. Otherwise, Have fun, get good grades, be yourself. You’ll get in…
You have shown us that you have less than a 1/1000% chance of getting into any Ivy League school. Your time/money would be better served applying to state schools, because that’s obviously where you belong.
Though I think it’s pointless to mold yourself into an ideal Ivy League candidate, these boards are meant to help you. Thus, you can do all of the following to improve your chances.
-High grades and SAT obviously
-Winning prestigious awards. (National Merits minimum)
-Innovative and significant community involvement such as designing a program that makes a significant improvement for the homeless
-Pursue a research opportunity at a presigious university and get a letter of rec from the professor
Even if you do all of them, HYPS will still be reaches because you are asian.
But is it wrong? We’re not gonna go down the philosophy route here, but there’s always some objectivity to morals and I see this falling somewhere in the middle between right and wrong. If someone wants to go to any Ivy-League school badly enough to completely change themselves, I’m frankly okay with that. But, to the OP, if you fail (and the odds are against practically all applicants), you’ll be left wondering what else you could’ve done with your high school years. Do what you want to do or what you may be interested in; if you want to go into medicine, instead of doing projects around the community that you think are boring, why not just shoot to volunteer at a few hospitals in your area? If you like art as well, why not incorporate both into works? It’s better to do something that you enjoy and actually helps develops your personal or professional interests than just doing what a school may want to see. In other words, instead of replacing your free time with other things that you don’t like, just balance your leisure activities with more concentrated ones that you actually enjoy.
The ideal Ivy candidate: Burundi refugee (not Nigerian, way too mainstream), who attends Exeter Academy because he was adopted by billionaires who happen to have either attended, or sent children to every other Ivy League school. In his freshman year he figured out how to convert fecal matter into rare Earth metals, and made millions off of that invention. He doesn’t understand the concept of an A- and the only non honors/AP classes he’s taken were over the summer at University of Wyoming (he lives in the state).
Unfortunately he found out that Phillips Exeter lacked both a cricket and big game fishing club, so he decided to start them. Over the next four years, he and his team proceeded to win the international championships for both sports, landing him a book deal from Penguin. When his ghost writer finished the tome, the Burundi refugee changed a few sections, put his name on it, and proceeded to make God jealous because suddenly this book, not the Bible, was the best selling book of all time.
With all of this going on, he almost forgot to take the SAT, but luckily spots for the September ACT and October SAT were still open. He took them, earned a perfect 36 and 2400, applied to Harvard ED, and got in.
I generally agree with what he’s saying, in that when it comes to applying to college, self-presentation is really, really important. That said, you’re only a freshman, so just find the things that you love doing and be a good student/classmate. Also write lots.