really? cuz in my school, being captain of a sports team seemed to be a real hook, or deciding factor w/ already smart people. like if two ppl have virtually the same test scores and activities and stuff, and one has, say, allstate music, and the other one had just a high school varsity sport, the one w/ the sport would get in. of course u could argue that essays and everyone are important, and they are, but this is just the prevalent trend in our school. maybe, though it’s cuz we’re all asian, and playing violin is just too stereotypical.
^yea, a smart person who is captain of a varsity team (especially if its not tennis or something) is rarer than a smart person that can play an instrument (unless its a rare instrument)
haha. whats wrong with tennis? and whats a rare instrument
theres nothing wrong with tennis, nothing at all. but just think about it, a disproportionate amount of very smart asian kids play tennis, making it more common and less desirable to colleges. its the same problem with playing an instrument like the violin or the piano. for example, say you have two applicants and they both have the exact same gpa, sat scores, and very nice ec’s. except one of them plays varsity tennis, and the other plays varsity basketball or varsity football. who do you think the college will take?
I’d like to bring up ecneics’s inquiry: how good is getting published - first/second author - on a scientific paper in a good journal (maybe not nature/science, but still professional)?
Also, I know people have brought up the scholastic art and writing award, but what about the NCTE writing award? A little less (5ish)?
if it’s a good journal, I’d imagine it’d HAVE to be pretty damn impressive. To me personally, if not to adcoms, that’s more impressive than anything anyone else has mentioned…Presidential Scholar, USAMO, you name it; a publication in a good journal impresses me more.
However, it is not impossible for an Asian boy with violin and tennis to get into a top school. But yes, it might be a disadvantage, but if you’re truly good at one of them, that’s a plus no matter what.
Hmm… What if you got a TASP interview but ended up getting rejected by the actual program? Although I guess you couldn’t really put that on your apps.
Does anyone else live in Texas? What about UIL academics/music?
this sucks. I have nothing above a 6. 
*sigh .
Someone who’s really bored and knows how to code should take the giant list of awards and implement something like [url=<a href=“http://alt.org/nethack/itemvote/standings.php]this[/url”>alt.org - NetHack Item Vote - Current Standings]this[/url</a>].
(Basically, the idea is the computer gives you three awards at random and you pick the one you like the best. Averaged over many votes this should give you an idea of which awards CCers see as most “prestigious.”)
There are no humanities awards under 10, that should be revised. Davidson Fellow is definitely a 10.
what about those ayn rand essay contests?
would winning 1st or 2nd place be impressive to colleges? how many people submit essays for those contests?
…or would it be bad because they would think you must be selfish or something?
oh, and i am going to throw “champion of teen jeopardy” out there as a prestigious award…! 
one girl who graduated from my school a couple years ago went on teen jeopardy and she ended up going to harvard…but then again, it’s not like teen jeopardy was the only thing on her apps!
National Merit Finalist…?
Why is that in 6? I would say it’s more of a 3. It’s not that selective, as around 15,000 kids get it.
Also, where would you place publishing a book? 7? I mean like an actual novel, not some count and color newspages.
I just wanna point out that the rankings are stacked towards science/math competitions. Obviously doing well at them will get you into a good college…but doing well at others things will too. How about getting to nationals in AAU (Amateur Athletic Union) over the summer? Or doing exceptionally well in a relatively obscure activity? I’ve seen people get into hypms on these boards with the latter.
Now on to hypocrisy…two years ago i got a gold medal for an ALTERNATE event at science olympiad nationals. How much weight does this pull? (it was still out of 30 teams…and it was nationals…) Any ideas?
^ I’d say 3-4. I might be biased though–I dislike Science Olympiad in general.
Marimare- publishing a book would have to look pretty impressive to colleges…
did you write a book?!
ahh does getting a high score in AIME count? cuz i missed to get in to USAMO by one question… shuckssss.
Not sure how to phrase this but, do you honestly think that some of the things listed close to the top of the chart (say from the 7 to 9 range) matter significantly to colleges when making decisions? I know on CC a lot of people tend to put focus on some of these things quite a bit, but if you (based on some of these scales) have about a 50 on this scale (in the 6 to 10 rankings alone), is your chance of admission really significantly higher?
I’m sorry if this question comes across as stupid, but I was wondering if anyone knows how much impact they actually have, minus hype.