<p>My academics are (I think) good enough to put me in the "possible candidate" pool. Of course, after a certain point, ECs matter more than 20 points on the SAT. However, beside a couple of academic but generic EC's like quizbowl, academic team and science bowl, I have spent most of my high school career dedicating time to volunteering. I've gotten the Gold Presidential Volunteer Service Award twice, given if you complete 250+ hours of community service in a year, and will be getting it again this year. I've been volunteering at the same school for mentally disabled children for nearly 4 years now, I opened a tutoring club at my school, and I'm the president of a local non profit that raises money for the homeless. This year, I've taken the initiative to create a tutoring program for foster children, and though it's relatively new, we're making progress. </p>
<p>While other kids went and won national science awards, or qualified for USAMO, or played piano at Carnegie Hall, I volunteered throughout the weekends and some more during the week, and I did it all because I truly love community service and it's incredibly fulfilling for me. Now that college application looms over the horizon, I've begun to worry that maybe my community service- focused ECs are not enough for schools like Harvard and Princeton. Will these schools count community service as "less" than other music or academic awards/accomplishments? After all, I have nothing to show for all these hours other than the proof that I've done it.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter too much what you do so long as you excel, and it sounds like you do. Keep pursuing concrete awards and achievements and you have a profile which will garner respect anywhere, although of course there are many other factors that go into a Harvard or Princeton application.</p>
<p>You don’t have “nothing to show for it.” You have 2 Presidential Volunteer Service Awards. You have people who can write amazing letters of recommendations, speaking to what you have done for your community. Your accomplishment lies in what you have helped others to accomplish. Harvard and Princeton, and many other top schools are looking for students who will be an active participant in their community, both while in school, and as alumni.</p>
Given that you have spent so many hours devoted to community service and received the Presidential Volunteer Service Award twice, you should not only list “volunteering” in the Common App Activity List but you should also write about volunteering in an essay. Choose one event, one instance, one moment-in-time that is meaningful to you, that encapsulates your community service experience, and write an essay on that topic.</p>
<p>I was thinking of writing about how I combine my lobe for community service with my passion for academics by offering tutoring/teaching in various ways. Would that work?</p>
<p>^^ It sounds too general and not specific enough. Remember: There are thousands of students who have a passion for academics and community service, so what makes your experience different from everyone else’s that will write about the same topic? That’s they ‘key’ to writing an essay that is unique and stands out from the crowd. </p>
<p>I once heard Peter Johnson, a Senior Admissions Director at Columbia University, give this tip on essays: </p>
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That’s how specific your essay needs to be! You have to write something that only YOU could write. My kids, who applied to college about four years ago, spent months writing, re-writing, and editing their essays. And they didn’t just write on one topic, they wrote about 6 or 7 essays on different topics. It was only after reading the essays and comparing them that they were able to narrow down what they wanted to say. Good writing takes time – and it’s never too early to start. Best of luck to you!</p>
<p>I think it’s really about the overall EA not just community service/volunteering hours. The most important thing is to develop a “theme” for your application/EA</p>
<p>^^ I agree. That said, both kids didn’t have any community service on their applications – zero, zilch, none. And that didn’t hurt them from being accepted to wide range of schools, including the ivies and little ivies.</p>
<p>Yeah that essay topic sounds a bit generic and even contrived. Try it out and listen to what gibby is saying about giving yourself time to develop an essay that is really meaningful and gets beneath the surface. But I do think it is an interesting idea to bring out another side of you through the essays. For my daughter’s essay, she already had deep commitment in an EC that was obvious all over the application and in her letters, so she wrote an application that was really about something else and just mentioned the EC as a goal, but that really showed her personality and resourcefulness. So while it might be a glaring lack if you didn’t ever talk about the volunteer work somewhere in the essay sections, you might want to show another side of you, or Stanford for example, gives you a prompt where you can talk about what you do to show your ‘intellectual vitality’.</p>
<p>Yes - pick a person whose life you changed for the better, or an incident that changed your own perspective. Show that you recognize the impact volunteerism has not only on the lives of those you have served, but also the impact it has on your own outlook. What motivated you to start a tutoring club? Were you a founding member of your non-profit - and if so, what motivated you to get that involved?</p>