<p>I have recently been looking at colleges and became concerned about what I would put on my application/resume. </p>
<p>I'm a straight A student and my UW GPA is about a 97 (my school doesn't use the 4.0 system). I'm in the top 5% of my class (public school) and I am enrolled in one AP course but plan to take 4 next year and 5 my senior year. I'm a white male from a middle/upper-middle class background that lives in a suburb of NYC. I got a 188 on my PSAT but I am sure that I will do better on my actual SAT since I had no idea how to approach any of the questions. I am taking two SAT2 subject tests in June. </p>
<p>As of right now my extracurricular activities include over 50 hours of community service, Key Club, DECA, a debate team, and Varsity track. I also plan to join law club next year. Over the summer I am going to take a business class at an ivy-league school. Next year I expect to be in National Honors Society and a Language Honors Society. I don't have any leadership positions right now, but I hope to become an officer in Honors Society and DECA. I am also planning on doing an internship in NYC going into my senior year, so that should help.</p>
<p>I don't think that my resume is too bad, but I would like to get into very selective schools (right now my #1 is UPENN). I would really appreciate any advice on how to improve my application. I don't have any legacy and I'm sure that I would be able to get recommendations fairly easily. I would also be willing to do early decision if I become very attached to a certain school. I'm sorry if some of my terminology is off, I'm fairly new to this. Thank you so much!</p>
<p>Don’t ask how to improve your application. Do what you want to do, in something that you want to do. Get involved, be a leader, do what you enjoy. Colleges will know if you’re just trying to make them like your extracurriculars.</p>
<p>You don’t do things to boost your chances for admission- you do what you like to the fullest. The reason a college would want you isn’t because you were pretending to be interested in things you really weren’t.</p>
<p>Have you asked your parents how they plan for you to pay for your education? Do you have a ginormous college fund sitting in the bank, do you have to pay for everything yourself with scholarship money and your own part-time job, or is it somewhere in between? Lots of parents don’t want to talk about this sort of thing, but the sooner you are all on the same page about it, the better. Pick a couple of colleges that you like (so far) and ask your parents to help you run the Net Price Calculators at their websites as well as the NPC for one of your home state public Us. That will give you a notion of what the colleges will expect your family to chip in.</p>
<p>@happymomof1- why do you do this on every thread. That’s a serious question. OP didn’t ask anything about not knowing how much his parents could pay.</p>
<p>My parents have said that I shouldn’t worry too much about paying for college considering they have already saved up a substantial amount of money. From a realistic standpoint, I think that what I receive in scholarship money will play a role in what college I ultimately go to.</p>
<p>@collegeclass2019- College costs have increased significantly since your parents’ time. Are you sure they have enough if you want to go to a school that’s 50K a year? Also if you’re counting on scholarship money, you should apply to a lot of safety/low match schools (unless you apply to schools that will meet all your need).</p>
<p>Although I agree with you, HappyMom, I don’t see how that applies to his planning his EC’s. This thread, in fact, had absolutely nothing to do with college finances, so I’m not quite sure why we’re discussing it.</p>
<p>Many responses to the type of question you have asked fall into one of two categories:</p>
<p>1) Do X, Y, and Z to look good to colleges.</p>
<p>or</p>
<p>2) Forget about what looks good and do what you love.</p>
<p>In my experience, the best approach is a combination of the above. Do what you love, preferably in a way and to an extent that will not only look good to colleges, but be extremely rewarding, too.</p>
<p>It can be very effective to narrow your focus a bit. Pick one, two, or at most three activities you love best of all. Pursue that/those activities (no matter what they are) with passion and commitment, and take it/them as far as you possibly can. Be creative and inventive in your approach; don’t just do what has already been laid out for you, but think of new ways to participate, if possible.</p>
<p>You’ll end up in a win-win situation. Having a great time AND looking great to colleges.</p>
<p>How do you suggest I get more involved in the activities I am already in? I love being in all of them, I just don’t see too many opportunities to become more involved (aside from officership, which is hard to get as a sophomore).</p>
<p>As you will see from that link, at the most selective colleges they are looking for depth more than just participation. Stanford, for example, says
</p>
<p>
Thats because you have a passive attitude; someone else needs to provide the opportunity, your job is simply to choose among what is offered. Not exactly the approach the top schools are hoping to see. </p>
<p>Remember that ECs’ importance gets magnified at the super-selective schools where lots of applicants have near-maximum stats – at other schools, your academic stats dominate the admissions picture. But you need to get near-maximum stats to even have a chance. This means get a higher SAT or ACT score, and try to raise your class rank (supposedly the chances at the super-selective schools go from small to microscopic going down from #1 to 2% or so).</p>
<p>The reason why I ask (especially with the younger posters) is because I have seen all too many “I just found out I can’t afford X” threads here. If the student doesn’t know where the money is coming from, and how much there is, the whole “what can I do to improve my application” question is moot.</p>
<p>Too many parents who haven’t been paying attention to the true costs tell their kids not to worry. Too many guidance counselors are clueless about money issues, or are forbidden to discuss them because of privacy issues. And on April 1 there will be too many HS seniors who find out that yes, indeed, they cannot afford to attend any of the places on their lists. If they are lucky, they will have viable options elsewhere. If they aren’t, they won’t be in college in the fall.</p>
<p>So yes I am a bit of a one note crank. Lots of sophomores will read this thread. If just one of them is saved from grief by being reminded to ask his or her parents about the money, my time here has been well spent.</p>
<p>Or they go to community college like a lot of students do to save money, then transfer to a four year school (usually a state university) to complete their bachelor’s degrees. This is not necessarily a bad option, although extremely advanced students may exhaust the offerings at a community college too soon.</p>