<p>I'm planning to apply to top tier schools like MIT, Caltech, Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and so on.
For those kinds of schools, how important is EC to them?? Espeically with winning awards or something like that?</p>
<p>My EC isn't much or good as everybody else here. I didn't win any awards so far, but I'm planning to do an original, independent research under a professor this summer, either in University of Iowa or Los Alamos National Laboratory. Is doing research b4 going to colleges a something good enough to make up for doing some few clubs and activities I'm in? I'm also planning to volunteer locally this fall, after this summer research.</p>