<p>Just a list, since I haven't seen any and one is really needed. I'll start:
-RSI
-ISEF
-ISTS
-AMC
-USAMO
-TASP
-MITES
-Siemens
-Start a Business
-SSP
-JSHS
The list goes on, but I'm too lazy to think of everything...Question: What are the chances of getting in without something top notch like these ECs?</p>
<p>Any EC can help someone get into the Ivies as long as it's a productive EC (not something like starting a porno club), the student pursues with with leadership, creativity, passion and independence and has some measure of success with it -- which could mean personal growth.</p>
<p>Too many students choose their ECs based on what they think will impress Ivies instead of their pursuing their natural passions and interests.</p>
<p>I agree. I don't believe in certain ECs being better than others. Of course, some may be more prestigious, but it doesn't mean that you can't get into an Ivy without the prestigious ECs.</p>
<p>I was admitted to the top 2 Ivies and don't even know what those acronyms on your list mean.</p>
<p>For example, I excelled in music at my school, and I also volunteered and played a sport. I did not do anything at the national, or even state level (unless you count our marching band, which was one of the top in the state). I had many leadership positions, but again, I didn't have these national awards or activities.</p>
<p>I agree completely with Northstarmom, so I want to reiterate... what's important is
[quote]
leadership, creativity, passion and independence and...some measure of success with it -- which could mean personal growth
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Do what YOU want, because that's what's important. I don't think people can truly be happy and achieve what they want to if they are constantly aiming to please others first.</p>
<p>Yay
I have two ECs from that list.:D
Btw i agree with what Northstarmom & celestial said. Pursue the EC with a passion.</p>
<p>I don't have a sport (well, tennis, but I'm not that great and I don't play for my school) and I've been playing the piano for 4 years and still suck...Do I have much of an option in that kind of situation? Anyway, keep the list going, this is to benefit people who have interests in specific areas of knowledge but are unsure of what they could achieve with that interest (eg. a guy wanting to do research but not knowing that he could compete in Intel, Siemens, etc). I'm inspired by my own personal story; until I came to CC, I knew nothing about anything. There are only a handful of people in my school who know anything about the potential of scientific research in the applications process.</p>
<p>Northstarmom: Aren't you being a hypocrite? I started this thread b/c of your post that listed the big things someone could do to go Ivy League. I find it quite ironic that you're now preaching against it... </p>
<p>Celestial: What year did you start college? Which Ivies? If they're Cornell/Columbia or similar, then your story makes sense. </p>
<p>Abhishiv: I'm extremely jealous, which ones?</p>
<p>"Northstarmom: Aren't you being a hypocrite? I started this thread b/c of your post that listed the big things someone could do to go Ivy League. I find it quite ironic that you're now preaching against it... :"</p>
<p>I'm not being a hypocrite. I've repeatedly said that students need to follow their own natural interests with passion, leadership, creativity, independence and results.</p>
<p>If one loves community service, but doesn't love math, one shouldn't spend all of their free time being on Mu Alpha Theta and trying to get into RSI because you think that will get you into Harvard. You would have probably upped your chances of getting into Harvard by pursuing your own natural interests with passion, leadership, creativity, independence and results such as starting a successful, major community service project.</p>
<p>What gets students into places like Ivies is: being intelligent (no way around that even for legacies), having excellent scores and grades, plus doing a good job of pursuing their own interests in the way that I mentioned before.</p>
<p>If your natural passions and talents coincide with things like RSI and TASP and you are stellar at math or the humanities, then if you go to RSI or TASP, that will definitely help your chances to Ivies since you'll have stood out as being one of the best students in the country in your passion.</p>
<p>However, if your talents and passions are in other areas, then simply pursue those interests to the best of your abiliity. Don't distort yourself to try to get into some program that you're not that interested in. Be the best you that you can be. Don't manufacture a persona to try to get into an Ivy. You're not going to stand out as much as would students who are naturally interested in and very talented in the field that you're faking an interest at.</p>
<p>My son is at an Ivy League School and the only one of those ECs I even recognize is "start your own business".</p>
<p>MomWC: Please specify which Ivy League, there's a HUGE difference between Cornell and Harvard...</p>
<p>NorthStarMom: When someone has a passion for science and math (as I do), the unfortunate truth is that the only way to be recognized for it (on an Ivy scale) is to win some huge competition/admission to some prestigious program. You can't just do some research with a professor, that's not enough, you have to get something published or compete or w/e. Math grades in school mean nothing when stacked up against the grades of the 1000s of geniuses in the country who have A's in Multivariable Calculus in the 10th grade...so, you have to show an ability for creative math thinking through AMC, USAMO etc. I don't know what to do myself, my school isn't that "up there" and participates in such things at the state level (max). It's very hard to be competitive these days and since I'm planning a career in med, I don't have any interest in starting a business. What I wonder is what that small percentage of applicants do who get into HYSPM w/o genius level competition/research/publishing or beastly sports stats. What about people who don't get into RSI/SSP/MITES/etc or win AMC/STS/ISEF/Siemens? What happens to us?...</p>
<p>If you want to be a doctor, don't you have a passion for science, medicine or helping others ? If so, why not pursue those passions?</p>
<p>Anyway, Ivies aren't the be all and end all of colleges. If you don't get into an Ivy, there are plenty of other good colleges that would gratefully accept you, and you'd also find them fulfilling.</p>
<p>The one person whom I met personally who I believe qualified for RSI was passionately interested in math and wanted to major in math. Interestingly, math was all that he cared about, and the rest of his grades were crappy (though he had very high scores), so he didn't even apply to places like Ivies, but went to a second tier public.</p>
<p>I know someone exactly like that (except he's insanely devoted to becoming a "theoretical physicist") who has exhausted hundreds of college level books and text books on the subject. And just like this person you speak of, his grades are low (3.7 GPA weighted). But, I don't want to be like him...he's quite eccentric and weird. I'm an all-rounder kind of person with a passion for two things in particular, science and speaking (neither of which I think I can take to the national level). So what do I do? I'm not resigning myself to less because there are too many geniuses out there and I have the will to get to the top, just no direction. As you can tell, I live in Princeton, NJ. I'm a semi-permanent fixture at the university campus and have fell in love with it. I don't want to go anywhere else, Princeton captivates me beyond belief. Quite a difficult predicament....</p>
<p>And as for helping others (I volunteer at the Princeton University Hospital), having an interest in science (it's huge and unexploited), and investigating medicine (not yet, but if I compete/research in anything science related, it's bound to be biomed and, I'm a part of my school's Medical Futures Club).</p>
<ul>
<li>Varsity Sport (or club/JV)</li>
<li>Debate team (policy/LD/parly)</li>
<li>Math team (many, many leagues out there)</li>
<li>Science team (olympiad/OM/etc)</li>
<li>Volunteering (must have: (a) leadership, (b) clear passion & commitment)</li>
<li>Write some novels</li>
<li>Architectural or Engineering exploits (i.e. design - or even build - something that's in your mind, maybe start a schoolwide competition along some lines)</li>
<li>MUN</li>
<li>School newspaper (or any journalistic role)</li>
<li>Musical instrument (private lessons or ensemble)</li>
</ul>
<hr>
<p>Above all, these activities are not a checklist. I could see someone doing a dozen of these things and being boring as hell and clearly just pushed into it all, and in an interview it would be clear to me that they lacked real passion based on how they talk about it and what ideas they explore.</p>
<p>It's very simple what top colleges are looking for:</p>
<p>(1) Intellectual Curiosity. Activities can be EVIDENCE of this, but one can exist without the other. When you find something interesting, do you pursue it to the ends of the earth, do outside research, get caught up in learning all sides of it?</p>
<p>(2) Initiative and leadership. Not just being the class president or newspaper E-I-C. If there is a sore lacking in your school, do you go out on your own to come up with something new (whether it's a club, an initiative, a policy change, a class, an activity...)? Can you command the respect of peers and teachers?</p>
<p>(3) Demonstrated raw intellectual horsepower, i.e. tests and grades. Even this takes a back seat to the other two.</p>
<p>The 3 are interrelated, and not easy to "fake". There's no checklist for being passionate about something. In the end, that's what matters the most. The best thing to be passionate about is obviously classwork, but if it ends there you're not a good candidate (unless you're the greatest math mind that your teachers have ever seen, which would be demonstrated by - yup! - other related activities that you pursued with a passion). Obviously being passionate about porn isn't going to get you far. But there is plenty of latitude, and it's the motivation and inspiration that jump out of the page at an admissions officer.</p>
<p>Best,
D</p>
<p>why only policy/LD/parly debate? what about public? is that not considered worthwhile?</p>
<p>
[quote]
What I wonder is what that small percentage of applicants do who get into HYSPM w/o genius level competition/research/publishing or beastly sports stats. What about people who don't get into RSI/SSP/MITES/etc or win AMC/STS/ISEF/Siemens? What happens to us?...
[/quote]
Even at MIT, where science and math competitions are looked upon pretty highly, the vast majority of admits haven't participated in the competitions and programs you name. The majority of admits haven't done research prior to entering MIT.</p>
<p>These competitions and programs are a great way to show passion for science or math, but they're not the only way to show passion, and they're certainly not an admissions requirement at top schools.</p>
<p>EDIT: To be a little more anecdotally explicit, my group of friends at MIT consists of exactly one RSI alum and exactly zero Olympiad medalists. It does consist of a lot of kids who did marching band, choir, and other school-level ECs.</p>
<p>I agree with everyone who said that "prestige" EC's are unnecessary as long as you are passionate about the EC you do have. My app had none of those high profile ECs, and my only strong EC in high school was swimming, which I never got past the state level at, never won championships in, really wasn't that good at,etc. However, it showed up everywhere on my app, it was two of my sports activities, my volunteer work, my job, my interviews, my essays (short and long answer). I thought I really overdid it with the swimming thing but apparently it made the fact that swimming was my life really get through to the admissions office, I got into Yale and Cornell without even knowing what those acronyms people listed mean, so I think as long as you are very passionate, maybe excessively so, it won't matter what it was that you actually did.</p>
<p>Some very interesting ideas here! Keep replying!</p>
<p>ooh, you're snotty :P</p>
<p>
[quote]
Celestial: What year did you start college? Which Ivies? If they're Cornell/Columbia or similar, then your story makes sense.
[/quote]
I was admitted to Harvard and Princeton for the Class of 2008. So, I started college in 2004. I suppose that I may have been on the "low" end of admits, or I may have been average... it is unlikely that I was at the top of the pool. There's no way to know for certain.</p>
<p>
[quote]
You can't just do some research with a professor, that's not enough, you have to get something published or compete or w/e.
[/quote]
Do you have proof of this? This seems unlikely. I know of many people who were admitted to Ivies without having done research, let alone being published; but they have activities in other realms (i.e. community service).</p>
<p>Denzera, I completely agree with what you said. Sure, there are some prestigious ECs in different realms and it can be informative to post them so people can get ideas, but they are not a checklist, or a list of ways to guarantee acceptance. If we keep this thread as a list of ideas for ways to get involved, it can be quite helpful.</p>
<p>However, I hope everyone will take to heart that they don't HAVE to have ECs on this list, and if they have ECs on this list, they aren't guaranteed to get into an Ivy.</p>
<p>To reiterate... do what you want to, excel, contribute, commit, and learn =]</p>
<p>Many of the things posters have mentioned here are awards, not extra curriculars. I think there is confusion about what is important in terms of extra curriculars.
What is most impressive, is to have extra curriculars that show passion over years.Yes, being selected for an attending TASP is an honor, or winning a prestigious scientific award. However, what is most impressive is when extra curriculars show passion that has come from within and been nutured over years. Admission officers are not impressed with someone just starting a business in the absence of showing other passions related to that. Many try to pick up extra curriculars like that in their junior year or going into their senior year soley to look good on the application. Admission officers at the top tier colleges are not impressed with that.
What is more impressive is where interests are developed and nutured over years. There are some applicants who will put down that they have published or written a book, and then show that they are the editor of their school paper. Even with that it is often unclear if there was real talent and passion there or if a consultant suggested it when he or she heard they could write - and these were quickly put together. What would be more impressive in that situation would be a student who began writing as a 9th grader and published some short stories in 9th grade, and then by 10th grade was writing larger pieces and entering competitions, and by 11th grade had published a story and that student had another passion. Let's say that student was passionate about the Civil War. Let's say that applicant merged his or her writing with that topic and wrote specifically about the Civil War. Now that would be interesting.
College admission officers can tell when passions are manufactured for the application and when they are real. An applicant who has parents who pay thousands of dollars so he or she can build houses in an impovershed country in the summer before senior year, and then come back and does a fundraiser for that cause, or starts a club for that - well even if legitimate it leaves them wondering where did that passion come from? However a student who studied about that country as a school project in 9th grade, and then did extensive research on that country's living conditiions in 10th grade and raised money so that he or she could fund the trip to that impoverished country, and then came back and did something related to that field of study - that would be interesting.
There are applicants who will have intellectual hooks. These are applicants who have won intell, or one of those prestigious science competitions, but they also have perfect or near perfect SAT scores. Other types of hooks besides legacies and recruited athletes and developent cases are where students have special talents - ie they have excelled in areas with great accomplishment that few have. There are people who are passionate about their extra curriculars. There is no such list of extra curriculars that help those get in.
If an applicant has true passions and interests that have been nutured and developed over years - that applicant will stand out in the applicant pool</p>
<p>celestial: This is no longer a checklist, it's just a great thread to express everyones' ideas on developing ECs in a way that will help students get admission to competitive/extremely competitive colleges. Nor should it be thought that ECs (or really good ECs) are all that's needed. As someone mentioned before, "raw intellectual horsepower" is always critical in addition to curiosity and passion. I disagree, however, that grades take a back seat to those things. Grades are the most important component on an app. Everything else is just a list, besides your essays. Anyone can write good/bad essays to express their passion and curiosity, not everyone can get amazingly high grades. I think it all comes down to the essays, that's the only place given for a student to express his/her interest in a certain EC. </p>
<p>And, though I agree that they're not the only way in, let's keep the list of prestigous competitions/programs going. Why? Because, as I expressed somewhere in the early part of this thread, many people don't know what's out there. This thread is for someone who's, say, researching something and doesn't know that he/she can compete in Intel or go to RSI. I'm not trying to encourage people to pick up things off a list, I never was. People just need to know how to expand their passion beyond the realm of scholastic achievement.</p>
<p>If anyone has personal experiences they're willing to share, by all means feel free.</p>
<p>"Many of the things posters have mentioned here are awards, not extra curriculars. I think there is confusion about what is important in terms of extra curriculars.
What is most impressive, is to have extra curriculars that show passion over years.Yes, being selected for an attending TASP is an honor, or winning a prestigious scientific award. "</p>
<p>True. At the same time, pursuing an EC with passion and skills leads to awards as well as invitations to programs such as TASP and RSI. The people who end up at TASP have a longtime passion for the humanities and social sciences. They may have taken extra courses over the summer, been involved with or even have started ECs related to their interests; developed mentoring relationships with college professors in fields that interest them; done self-directed study programs in their field even if they were doing this completely independently -- with no grades or teachers. They have actively done something to pursue their interest. That's what makes them stand out in the application pool, including being able to write the myriad essays that TASP requires.</p>
<p>People who are passionately pursuing an interest also will use search engines to find out opportunities.</p>