Hello!
I am worried that I do not have anything that helps me stand out on my college apps. I am interested in UCLA, Dartmouth, Duke, and Johns Hopkins.
My unweighted GPA is a 3.9 and weighted GPA is a 4.1. But that is only my freshman GPA because I am only a sophomore at the moment. But I think by the time I apply to college my unweighted will be around a 3.8-4.0 and my unweighted will be a 4.2-4.3. For the SAT and ACT, I am hoping to get perfect marks although I of course know the difficulty of that.
I will also be taking a total of 13 AP classes by the time I graduate high school.
In terms of EC’s, I do research and will be doing summer research next summer, I also did a college summer program last summer. In addition, I did wind ensemble freshman year and sophomore year although I am planning on dropping band and taking more elective AP classes. I also will have done 3 years of varsity cheerleading from sophomore year to senior year. For clubs I am in english honor society, science honor society, math honor society, social studies honor society, and art honor society. I am also doing science olympiad for three years. I am hoping to do extensive volunteer and community service this summer. I hope to volunteer at my local hospital. I also wish to open up a medical club in my school junior year.
I am worried that I am too normal and don’t have any hooks in my application. I am considering either starting up a charity or become really involved in a charity. But I don’t have any super meaningful work that I do that I am invested in completely. I need help finding out what are some unique “hooks” that I can put on my application to make myself stand out.
Much thanks!
Hooks are things that make you wanted by the school - top tennis player, legacy (although becoming less of one at most schools because there are so many), famous parent, science award winner. Hooks usually come because of your doing something you are very interested in and become very good at (tennis, sports, music, art).
Start a charity if that’s what you want to do, but don’t do it because you think it will be a hook. All the things you listed are what elite schools expect from their applicants - top scores, good gpa, activities, community service. Just keep plugging along.