<p>My observation from the results achieved by kids I know in this past season is that the number one thing the tippy-top places want is grades. Sure, your courses have to be challenging, but if your GPA is 97 and that of a person who took an even more challenging courseload is 94, you will get in and they won’t. You also have to have good scores, but again, if the person with the 95 has higher scores, you get in and they don’t. All of this stuff about how they reject val/sals in favor of more interesting kids who have demonstrated true intellectual passion is, in my experience, hogwash. Sure, they won’t take a drone. But they will take a dedicated grade grubber who projects an “I’m a winner” aura.</p>