students could create their own blogs on “x subject” and then...

[InquilineKea]

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Old 06-04-2005, 09:36 PM #32
EllenF
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<p>How about reading math/science books, not required by classes, to show demonstrated interest?
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Old 06-05-2005, 04:19 AM #33
Ben Golub
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<p>That’s a tough one. I’d love to say that this is just as serious an indicator of interest as participating in research projects and science contests, and for many kids it is. The trouble is that some students panic at the end of junior year, realize they don’t have any demonstrated involvement in organized math-science extracurriculars, and decide that the books they read on the side will have to do. In other words, that sort of “demonstrated interest” is often there because people have nothing better to put (and they want to put down something) — even though the reading did not take anywhere near the astronomical devotion exhibited by some applicants for their math/science extracurricular activity of choice.</p>

<p>So, out of fairness to the people who actually have something tangible to show for their effort (like tournament placements, research projects, etc.) we can’t just automatically give the same sort of deference to someone’s say-so that he read books. After all, in many cases the reported devotion to reading about science is truth-stretching. However, if the student submits exerpts from a journal or some essays – some concrete record of the reading and the student’s responses – then independent reading reaches the level of many other extracurricular activities.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that it’s easy to exaggerate about a private activity like reading, and we’re not so naive that we think people will be brutally honest to the detriment of their chances. Thus, the more concrete evidence we can see of your devotion to X, the more seriously we’ll take X as a part of your application. If the concrete evidence is 0, that is probably close to how much consideration it’ll get. (Obviously, participation in organized activities counts as concrete evidence by itself, without extra submissions, because activities require an enforced time investment.)

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<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=909027&postcount=33[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showpost.php?p=909027&postcount=33&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;