Honestly, I think the book awards are mostly marketing for the colleges.
I think more than named awards themselves, college admissions is interested in achievements. Some achievements have names or awards and these are certainly nice to have. But some achievements don’t have a name, but are very notable. These should be part of the application package in some fashion and hopefully also noted by rec writers.
I’ll give one personal example. While my daughter did have many named awards, she had a notable achievement mentioned in her app materials and by rec writers, about how even though she was not elected to the Student Senate, she spearheaded the development of a new policy for her high school, over a two year period that eventually was passed by the School Board. She effected change on the school even though not elected to office. She went onto a so called “top college.”
Our high school also doesn’t give out any awards until right before graduation, and then only a few. (I’ve never heard of these book awards either.) That was true in my own high school as well. So obviously high school awards are not needed to get into top schools. Reading these comments, they seem to be just the icing on the cake of ranking every student to fuel ultra-competitivness, stress, and unhappiness.
The advice you’ll read on this site is that top colleges are more interested in higher-level awards (eg. state, national) than just something from your high school anyhow.
@TheGFG Book awards are marketing tools by local alumni clubs of “known” colleges. You may not have heard about them b/c most schools don’t have them. Which schools do? Those where an alum or the local alumni club has bought the book and handed it over to the school – all to keep the name in front of peoples’ minds. It has NOTHING to do with admissions besides marketing.
For instance, I’m a Yale alum. I could purchase this year’s Yale recommended book, ask Yale to send me a nicely printed card and then I could drop it off at my alma mater. The school will then choose which Junior is deserving. That’s it. So the student whose older sibs got 'em and whose mom was disappointed in no third book award – mom was really fretting over nothing.
Some of them are more than an actual book. Some have merit awards attached if the kid applies, is accepted and attends the college named. Of course, those are typically awards in amounts the kids probably would have been offered anyway. Some are worded that the kids who win will be in the running for certain highly competitive awards. Of course, since the Ivies don’t have merit awards, they are just the book and a certificate.
I have never heard of book awards. Of course it’s entirely possible that our local HS has them and I just didn’t know about them.
Just finished reading a FB post from a friend whose child was snubbed at the HS drama awards. Even though the child has a National award in drama and has been accepted into a highly competitive college drama program. Head scratching…
@FallGirl: again, your experience isn’t unusual. Do you think the under-resourced dozens of schools in the urban centers EVER get donated book awards? Rarely if ever.
THey only take place if an individual wants his/her alma mater’s presence kept up front at any particular high school, most likely the one he/she attended. Does Sidwell Friends have a Harvard Book Award? You bet. Probably from Amherst, Penn, Yale, Princeton and a host of others too.
Does the random Navajo reservation school or the South Side Chicago high school or 90% of other high schools have any for their honors convocations? Not very likely.
At D’s school, many of the book awards were from top LACs. She got the Wellesley Book Award. There are guidelines determined by the individual schools regarding qualifications. I believe the Wellesley requirement was you needed to be in the top 3% of your class, obv a woman, and have so many community service hours. Funny, D was rejected (or waitlisted I can’t remember) from the school lol. There were some that came with pretty hefty scholarships from the school themselves and others that guarantees of admittance (I believe St. Michaels was one of them). Kinda nice to know you have an EA during your junior year 
It doesn’t sound like the St Michael’s one guarantees admittance either.
http://www.smcvt.edu/Admissions/book-award-recipients.aspx
I thought it was St. Michaels, apparently it was another school. And I’m quite sure wherever it was had some type of qualifiers for the admission of course, so guarantee might be too strong a word.
T26E4 - I was merely pointing out that I was not familiar with book awards. I didn’t know of them at S 's school ( which sends lots of kids to top 20’s , Ivies, etc) either.
Perhaps it’s a regional thing.
My understanding about some of the book awards is you have to be nominated by your school for them. We knew a student who really wanted to attend RPI. If you received their book award, you were guaranteed $15,000 a year merit aid if accepted.
She contacted the guidance office early in her junior year to ask to be nominated.,she received the RPI book award…and went to and graduated from the school.
^I wish that would happen to our school that insists on giving the RPI key to the top STEM kid who might or might not apply to RPI as a safety. Historically, there was never a case that our top stem student went to RPI so I am not sure why they keep doing that while another student a bit down the rankings would benefit by it.
All the academic and book awards in our school go to the same 5 students which are the top 5 ranked students. So I am not sure how much they benefit but those awards as our school ranks so colleges already know that those are the tops kids.
Hi @FallGirl – I realize my tone was rather firm. I apologize. That wasn’t how it was meant to come across.
I wanted to imply that having or not having the “book awards” is not indicative of applicants’ chances at any school since many high schools never have book awards.
It’s kind of like NHS…it isn’t being inducted into NHS that is special, it is the grades and volunteering that got you there that counts.
I’m pretty sure our high school takes student interest into account. I know the kid who just got the RPI one this year and this kid has seriously considered RPI and has already visited (or made plans to visit) before receiving the award. Our counselors meet with juniors at least a couple of times in the school year for college planning, so they do have an idea of student interests.
Just wanted to thank everyone who replied. I am getting the impression that these awards don’t mean that much if anything, to admissions officials, since not every school has them. While winning one of them may have helped a tiny bit, the rest of the transcript is far more important.
Thanks again all
If an award is truly meaningful to you, and you can express that to an admissions committee, then yes, it does matter. If you are proud of your participation, if it changed you as a person, if it opened your eyes to new perspectives, and you can effectively communicate that, then it is very meaningful, and it does matter.
I would argue that a list of six or seven high school awards is less meaningful than one award or recognition that represents a transformation or learning experience in your life, as long as you can express that experience effectively.
Unfortunately, the Common App doesn’t allow much more than the name and level of the award, so the “essay” section is the best place to express the meaningfulness of your award/recognition.
Having said all that, I do agree with most of the posters above that most HS awards are not important to admissions departments. Some kids have long lists, some have short lists, make your short list shine.
I think a string of such awards can say something. A student who is, say, just outside the top 10% of the class, yet she was Cum Laude, NHS, language honor society, etc. may show high achievement in school despite a somewhat lower rank (especially if that is a result of taking more and harder courses, etc).
I too never heard of these book awards. I wonder if it’s regional.