The Great Escape

Prep School Admissions
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<p>-Warning, new college confidential poster!-</p>

<p>Many probably wonder why I title my thread; The great escape, but that's what I've decided to call my pursuit of getting into a good boarding school. You see, I go to an international school in China but I don't think it pushes me to my full potential so I decided to seek an alternative that I believe would enrich my education. Pretty much I'm another high school student that has decided I would like to attend boarding school in the states and this is my thread with my questions and worries. </p>

<p>First off, what are the top tier boarding schools in the states? I've heard of Andover, Exeter, Hotchkiss, Deerfield, Milton, Groton, St Pauls ect... but there is only so much you can learn about them through their websites. I'm sure lots of people on this site know of these schools, but does anyone have experience as an international boarder at those schools? For example was it hard to fit in, and also quite importantly how did you change from the metric system to the American system? </p>

<p>Secondly, SSATs. I'll be honest here and say I have never heard of the SSAT test until about 2 or so weeks ago when I fully skimmed through the admissions process of a couple of the schools. I also asked around here but all I've gotten were blank looks and people trying to convince me it was the SATs or the PSATs I was talking about. Are there any tips I should know about the SSATs? Also, how much do the SSATs really affect your chances of getting into the boarding school? I've gotten one SSAT prep book and it's the Princeton review 2010 version and I managed to dig up a Barron's 2001 SSAT prep book as well as a 2004 Princeton review SSAT prep book, is it worth it to go through all of them or just the 2010 version as I am sure it has changed? Also, are there any questions in the SSATs that use the American U.S measurements (I've been using metric system since I started recognizing numbers).</p>

<p>Thirdly, grades. My school happens to be a IB school and uses the middle years program for grading which is quite different to the American As,Bs and Cs grading. Is there any way to compare the grades? IB grading is on a scale 1 - 7, 7 being the highest and i've heard rumors that IB is harder than most American grading. How much do grades affect your application? Unfortunately, I was one of those students who were not motivated to do their best because I thought I was never going to have to change schools and that decided they would actually start trying after 8th grade. So until about the start of 8th grade my grades were only average, (5's and 6's) until I actually found meaning and drive at the start of 8th grade which eventually led me to getting 6's and 7's. How much will my previous grades hinder me? I believe I am a relatively bright student and I don't believe that my grades actually represent who I am. I've always been good at English and was hoping that my application essays might over write my complete failure before 8th grade. </p>

<p>I also heard that ECs are a big part of applying to boarding schools, if so how much do they affect it? Plus how many of my EC's do I tell them, should I get into the itty gritty details back since 6th grade or should I just jolt down the main 3 or 4 activities that I have done? </p>

<p>Lasty, I've gone about this site reading about applications and somehow managed to always stumble across the term 'hook'. What kinds of things would be hooks and that I should include when I apply? For example, should I put I was MVP for both soccer and basketball for my school team in 8th grade, or that I've played soccer for 9 years? Or should I put that I have recently found my love of drama and attended an ISTA drama festival as well as a 4 week New york film academy summer course (If I include this, should I also include one of the short films we ended up filming and finished editing that I'm starring in)? </p>

<p>Anyways, that concludes my extremely long post and I would love to hear back from anyone with ideas of any of these things. Some might say that this post should be in the chances section, but since I'm not quite sure what I'm chancing into yet I'll leave it as a general question. Ahh, and one more thing. I'm a freshman applying for sophomore year (which is why all my EC's would be from middle school)</p>

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<p>you kind of sound like you go to ISB which was my old school</p>

<p>a) it’s not that hard to fit in there are multicultural clubs and stuff. But China has entered the boarding school game relatively later than korea and japan so the clubs are not so well organized, but it’s pretty much guaranteed you won’t be the only chinese person from china at any of the HADES schools.</p>

<p>b) Metric is not really an issue. Physics will always use metric, math will sometimes use metric, and only if you take classes like architecture will you have to use feet and inches</p>

<p>1) there are some boarding school review websites, check them out and see what floats your boat</p>

<p>2) if you looked through the book you will see the math section is pretty much a joke. the ssat vocab is the hardest part. I’d have to say that applying from a school like ISB (I will assume you go there to make it easier for me) you may or may not get compared to the ssat scores of previous applicants, or if there is a trend among the ssat scores of all applicants from a single school (and you are above, in the trend or below). The thing is the school is not so well known, so the admission officers really don’t have much to go by except your scores, and possible grades.</p>

<p>3) I don’t think they actually look at middle school grades if you apply for 10th grade. Being good at english doesn’t mean you write a good essay–a good essay is meaningful and conveys a sense of who you are, pretty much a narrative. Your sentences may be perfectly structured but your essay really doesn’t say much about you and vice versa.</p>

<p>4) ECs go by quality and not quantity. They are important in the sense that if you have none, it is a big warning sign. Otherwise, if you have the general soccer team for x years, piano for y years, etc, it isn’t really a strong point. I applied with 0 ECs and got in</p>

<p>5) hook is what you are passionate about. what is the most important thing in your life? Discovering your hook is not an easy process. It is more or less discovering what you enjoy the most, what you would like to major in, what you do for entertainment while others may do as work. it sounds like drama is your hook, so write about it</p>

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<p>I don’t go to ISB, but you can definitely say I’ve heard of the dragons and we are fierce rivals with them :wink: since your an ex ISB kid, I wear the yellow and black colors =). Would they not look at my middle school grades considering i’m a 9th grader applying for 10th grade? if I do applications this fall, I will only have my middle school grades because we get our grades sometime mid February, (thats past most schools application date)</p>

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<p>yes but they ask the schools to send grades when they’re available… I’m sure you can send your quarterly reports (do you have these?). february is not too late. decisions are made in march, you can even take the january and february ssat i think…</p>

<p>the point is that once you get into a school, you can’t slack off and not do work; they will see it and then withdraw admission.</p>