<p>Does anybody know anything about this award? I was recently awarded with it at school, and the little information pamphlet that came with it said it is given to 2000 students around the world by the Harvard Alumni Association who "display excellence in scholarship and high character, combined with achievement in other fields", but this description is a little to vague for my satisfaction. Has anybody else received this award? Does anybody know anything about it?</p>
<p>The award is given out by your state Alumni Association to promote the college. See: [Harvard</a> Book Award - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=âhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Book_Award]Harvardâ>Harvard Book Award - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>âThe Harvard Book Award is an award given out by the alumni of Harvard University to the top-performing student(s) in 11th/12th grade reading classes in 1,900 âselectedâ high schools. The award is handed out at traditional graduation ceremonies. Students with the highest grade point averages (GPAs) are chosen to be given the award.â</p>
<p>Also see: <a href=âHarvard Alumni Association Clubs and Sigsâ>Harvard Alumni Association Clubs and Sigs;
<p>The award does not guarantee admissions to Harvard College, but it is a nice regional award to highlight on the Common App and especially on your resume, since regional awards are better than school awards and may heighten your chances to win more impressive state, national or international awards. In my area, only 2 students out of about 25 juniors who were awarded the Harvard Prize Book awad last year were admitted to the Harvard Class of 2016 this year. Both students had achieved significant national academic honors (and Iâm not not talking about test based awards like National Merit or AP Scholar honors).</p>
<p>Thatâs âawardâ, not âawadâ as a New Englander might pronounce it. LOL!</p>
<p>Local alumni associations wish to maintain good standing w/select high schools. They deliver the âbook awardâ to the school and often, allow the school officials to choose the winner. Youâll note that the various âbook awardsâ will always be spread out among the top juniors, etc. Why? because the college namesakes often have little or nothing to do with choosing the actual winners. (OK, folks. Joey gets the Harvard award, Mimi gets the Princeton one, Frank gets the RPI medal, and Sophie gets the GTech award â did we leave anyone out? No? Good)</p>
<p>Itâs nice to be chosen but itâs not earth shattering whatsoever. think about it: how many schools NEVER will see any Ivy book awardee? Itâs all marketing.</p>
<p>Congrats though. Your school must think highly of you. But it has no bearing on any eventual Harvard application. Good luck to you.</p>
<p>Gee, I thought the Harvard Book Award was a raggedy, old copy of The Unofficial Guide bronzed with scrapings from the toe of the John Harvard statue.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for answering! I knew it wasnt an amazing award or anything but I wanted to know a little more about it.</p>
<p>List it on your resume, scholarship apps, and Common App because it is a regional award, which is more meaningful than a school award. A successful Harvard applicant I worked with this year did just that. It added to his numerous small awards, which helped him win some state awards and then some national awards. Understand?</p>
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<p>Exactly how it worked in the one school where I used to teach that offered a Harvard College Book Prize.</p>
<p>And itâs really not a regional award. Itâs a school award. Only members of the junior class at your school were eligible to receive the Harvard College Book Prize awarded at your school.</p>
<p>Braniac, congratulations on winning the award. Yes, list it under awards and honors on your application. It will emphasize that the faculty of your high school think youâre one of the top students in your class. But as others have said, it doesnât have any real bearing on what happens in Cambridge, Mass. If you are eventually admitted to Harvard, both your admission and your Harvard College Book Prize will be attributable to your being one of the top students in your class, but the admission will not be attributable to your having won the Book Prize.</p>
<p>In my area (multiple cities), it most definitely is! Why? The Harvard Club in my area brings all the Prize Book winners along with all the newly admitted Harvard students together for a 2 hour luncheon with all of the Harvard alumni in the area. At this luncheon they individually read the bios of the PB winners and newly admitted Harvard students. Parents and school officials are invited to attend this publicized affair. And the kid I worked with listed the Harvard Prize Book Award as a âRegional Awardâ on his Common App, and Harvard and Stanford along with a slew of other elite colleges admitted him without thinking he exaggerated the âregionalâ aspects of the award. Maybe in your area, Sikorsky, they just dump off the award at the front door of the school. 
Iâm just saying, you donât know how every Harvard alumini group regards this award.</p>
<p>Spelling correction: âalumni,â not âalumini.â</p>
<p>Dascholar, thatâs all nice, but I donât think it makes the award a regional prize. The winner is selected from among a pool of candidates in a single school. I think that more properly, what you attended was a regional reception for area winners of school-based prizes. </p>
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<p>And Iâm just saying it doesnât matter how your local Harvard Club, or mine, regards this award. And itâs of no consequence what âa kid [you] worked withâ called it. I could call my Honda a Porsche, but that wouldnât make it so. What matters is what admissions officers in Cambridge (or New Haven, or Palo Alto, or Evanston, or wherever) make of it. And the answer is, not nothing, but not all that much either.</p>
<p>dascholar: I think the argument favors Sikorsky. The fact is that the book award recipients have one commonality: they are a top Junior student in a handful of targeted high schools in your area. The top junior at some inner city, blighted school ever gets considered even if he/she is the top student in the history of that school. Why? b/c the alumni club has no means of recognizing that diamond in the rough b/c that HS is not on the list of targeted schools.</p>
<p>In this way, the book award is a marketing tool. A very nice one indeed â your alumni club should be commended. But its recipients are not from a regional âpoolâ but from a very select pool.</p>
<p>Please correct me if Iâm wrong (Iâd love to be)</p>
<p>Many alumni chapters from various universities give out books to promote their college. My daughter, a Harvard student, âwonâ the Wellesley College Book Award her junior year. She put it down as a regional award on her college app, but never applied to Wellesley. I donât think it helped her in anyway gain admission to Harvard or to her other schools, as every Admissions Office is aware of how students are selected for these type of awards.</p>
<p>And I see both of your arguments. Yes, in my region of the country, the HPB award is not awarded individually at a recipientâs school, but instead it is awarded at a group setting with all the winners in the area present, and it is considered a big regional deal since that it is how it is presented. Principals, parents, and a number of Harvard alumni are present. And yes, the winners have been selected by the individual schools, so in that sense it is definitely a school award. But the fact that a limited number of students receive the award in this region and that it is not presented in an individual school setting, gives the recipient justification for classifying it as a âRegional Awardâ on his or Common App. And the fact that my student was not penalized for labeling it as such validates the classification. However, I grant you this part of your argument: Not every student should be so quick to classify the HPB as a âRegional Award.â Cool? :)</p>
<p>Congrats on winning the award like every one mentioned above the award does not gaurantee admission in Harvard but it as pretty cool acheivement on your resume for CommonApp. Congrats once again! :)</p>
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<p>So much consternation over a fairly run-of-the-mill academic awardâŠ</p>
<p>When I was conducting interviews (a few years ago), Iâd see the Harvard Book Prize/Award listed on the studentâs app and think: âThis just means that: (1) the student is one of the top academic performers at his/her school, (2) his/her high school has a strong academic reputation, and (3) a chapter of the Harvard Alumni Assoc. exists in the region.â In general, active chapters of the Harvard Alumni Assoc. have a presence in major metropolitan areas.</p>
<p>As others have mentioned, itâs not a big deal at all. The OP can choose to list it however he wants on the Common App. Officers on the Harvard Admissions Committee know how selection for the award (and others like it) is carried out. I would think that admissions officers at other colleges would have this knowledge as well.</p>
<p>Bartleby007, (and this will be my last comment on the subject) my point is that the HPB is a more significant award to list on the Common App than listing, for example, oneâs membership in their schoolâs National Honor Society, and that it should not be dismissed by the OP since every small honor or award can lead to a bigger honor or award (state, national, or international), for which the adcoms truly notice. Thatâs been my experience in helping a number of students gain admissions to the Harvards and Stanfords of the world. You interview them; I help them craft winning apps! :)</p>
<p>[head scratch]</p>
<p>I certainly agree that winning the Harvard College Book Award at your school is better than NHS. Thereâs only one recipient per year.</p>
<p>But I donât get how it leads to any state or national recognition.</p>
<p>[/head scratch]</p>
<p>Sent from my DROIDX using CC</p>
<p>At least in the Washington, DC area, individual members of the local Harvard Club can choose to sponsor and pay for a book award at the high school of their choice. As noted by others, the school then selects the winner each year. As long as someone sponsors the award for the particular school in question, the award will be made from the juniors at that school.</p>
<p>Thus, itâs strictly a school-level award.</p>
<p>If the Harvard folks in a particular region like to gather up all the individual school winners and throw a party for them, that would be regional celebration of the award, not a regional award.</p>