<p>So I'm a white, male, high school junior from Rapid City, South Dakota and I plan on applying to Stanford next fall. And was wondering if I should bring up me being gay in the application or just let my academics and extra curriculars speak for themselves. I honestly feel that a school like Stanford would welcome this diversity but I'd like some input. Should I mention it or not? Here's my stats:</p>
<p>-4.2 (weighted), 3.967 (unweighted),
-i've taken the hardest course load available at my school
-ranked 4/150 at South Dakota's top public school
-will have completed seven AP courses by graduation (I got a 5 on Chem, currently enrolled in three, will take three next year)
-ACT score of 32 but retook and hoping for 33+ (taking SAT in May)
-class president for three years and hopefully next year
-NHS
-Spanish Honor Society Treasurer
-2 years varsity tennis, will be captain next year
-2 years varsity cross country
-Red Cross Officer
-tons of work experience (sophmore year i worked 30+ hours a week and was an Assistant Manager)
-business internship (research based)
-medical internship
-tutoring
-teach tennis lessons to underprivileged children
-volunteer with Colorado AIDS Project</p>
<p>Other things:
-I serve on the district student gov and help plan out the district calendar as well as work with student faculty-relations (i worked with district counselors to reconstruct the counseling departments at two high schools). we also do charity projects such as throwing a Ball for Senior Citizens every year
-I single handedly created an annual dance at my school in which all profits go to charity
-I build houses for the poor annually in mexico</p>
<p>Any comments or suggestions would be great! Thanks</p>
<p>if it is an important part of who you are, then there is no reason not to.</p>
<p>(being that you are a middle-class white male, it might make you stand out some)</p>
<p>however, some of your E.C.s are pretty impressive, and you may want to give essay space to them too... see if you can integrate the 2 (maybe being a sexual minority has influenced some way you approach those fancy comm. service ECs?)</p>
<p>I think you should only mention it if you feel that your sexual orientation has influenced the way you perceive the world and how it has affected the choices you have made (i.e. personal decisions, activities, community service). As you write your essays, consider how important it is to you that you mention it. For example, if you loved teaching kids to play tennis because you love to share knowledge and be around cute, high-energy kids who are eager to learn, it may be that being gay is not necessarily relevant to this activity or experience. However, if you plan to write about working with an AIDS project and your sexual orientation has made you particularly passionate about this issue, it may be relevant. I hope this helps, and best wishes in the application process!</p>
<p>I considered writing about it, but decided not to. (I'm gay).</p>
<p>I came to the conclusion that it might appear like I'm trying to get an advantage as if I was some kind of URM. I wasn't convinced that I could write about it an eloquent enough way to get above the fact that I was writing about something that might, on a meta level, be perceived as desperate. I also decided that I refuse to sell my soul to a college admissions council - no writing about things that I wouldn't tell a stranger. And my emotional issues with sexual orientation are definitely something that I would never tell a stranger.</p>
<p>One exception, though, was the Michigan "discuss an issue of local or national concern" essay. I wrote about gay affairs/non-discrimination in high schools.</p>
<p>I will say, though, that anyone who read my application "got the message" that I was either gay or the best d*mn ally on the planet. My activity sheet included work with our GSA and with Broadway Cares, and all of my essays had at least one sentence that said something like "I care about gay rights". (My common app essay was a somewhat humorous comparison of lifestyle in Virginia, where I was born, and Detroit, where I live now. There was a sentence that said something to the effect of "I'm the only GSA member who cares about Larry the Cable Guy" or an equivalently dumb idea. A modified version of this was what I used for the Stanford app).</p>
<p>I agree with the others that your list of EC's is very impressive, but don't feel like you absolutely HAVE to write about them. My extracurriculars were probably the strongest part of my application, but I decided that my resume was sufficient for that, and so I wrote my essays on something totally unrelated to anything else on my application.</p>
<p>Feel free to PM me if you want to discuss this more.</p>
<p>Okay thanks everybody for the good advice. ReninDetroit, you mentioned that you applied to Stanford and Michigan. Did you end up going to Michigan? And how was/is the college experience as far as being gay, wherever you went/go?</p>