<p>"From my experience, international students place the most importance on standardized test scores because the countries they come from use <em>only</em> test scores and grades to place kids into top schools. ECs and recommendations are totally disregarded."</p>
<p>Very true.</p>
<p>International here, luckily i found this site last year :)</p>
<p>geniezclone, I totally agree with you, that's why I hate my country's education so much !!! It emphasizes only grades which are based on memorization skill !!! We don't even get a chance to to MC questions, just essays after essays. And you guys will laugh really hard when you know that most of the essays that we do are about abstract, romantic literature !!! We have to learn like 20 poems (each 2 to 4 pages long, and yes, we have to remember all of them word by word !!!), 30 short and long stories (deprived from obsolete materials) That's not all, students in the same grade learn the same subjects, it's like the board of education thinks that all kids in the same age are equally smart !!! How ridiculous !!! </p>
<p>I distinctly remember those days when I had to memorize about 50 pages of Vietnamese History !!!</p>
<p>Because its very easy to <em>cheat</em> the SAT1. </p>
<p>Usually, the strongest applicants also <em>happen</em> to have high scores, but not always.</p>
<p>it's 20 poems and 30 stories in a semester !!!</p>
<p>Read up on the Academic</a> Index. Don't put much faith in the individual number - not all Ivies use the AI for non-athletes, and those that do may calculate it on a different scale. But, view this as a rough indicator of academic merit, which will be combined with other important factors - outside accomplishments, diversity or legacy status, essay brilliance, etc. Rather than a cutoff, think of a high AI as being a heavier weight on the scale. A low-AI applicant will probably need significantly more weight in other areas. A high-AI applicant may not be able to gain admission with no EC achievements, but may require less of a boost from that area.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that there is a good deal of subjectivity in the process - there's no formula that can easily weigh the respective contributions of, say, a perfect SAT/GPA applicant who has done interesting but not astounding lab research vs. a candidate who has great (but not perfect) stats but has founded a software company and is class president.</p>