The Typical Asian Applicant - How will I stand out?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>What's the advice for the typical asian applicant? Here is (in a nutshell) my EC's.</p>

<ul>
<li>math team</li>
<li>band (clarinet)</li>
<li>piano</li>
<li>science studying (chem, phys) for olympiads</li>
<li>environmental club (treasurer)</li>
<li>fencing</li>
</ul>

<p>The only thing that stands out is fencing, which isn't normally associated with being asian. But otherwise I feel like I fall right into the category of high-scores asian with the same extracurriculars as most of the other asians applying. I want to stand out, but I don't really know how to. I suppose I could do it in my essay but I'm not so eloquent with words and my college essay might not be so good.</p>

<p>I'm not really stellar in anything, but my GPA is a solid 4.0 and I got a 2400 on my SAT's last june. </p>

<p>Here I am going into junior year. What should I do?</p>

<p>For courses, I took AP gov freshman year. I took AP chemistry and AP calc AB sophomore year. This year I'm taking AP physics C, AP lit, AP statistics, and I will self-study AP US history and AP micro if necessary.</p>

2

<p>a small thing to do is join a club involving your foreign language (spanish honors society, french whatever, you know). A bigger step would be taking an SAT 2 on your foreign language (spanish, french, german, italian, whatever)</p>

<p>hopefully you are not taking latin like a typical asian student…</p>

3

<p>French but not the french honor society.</p>

4

<p>Any volunteer, work job or intern ?
This summer, I spend more than 150 hours at the science center. It was pretty cool and I really love it.</p>

<p>ps: I’m Asian and I’m one of the ten students of AP Latin in our school.</p>

5

<p>do volunteering of course, but that won’t set you apart. but still do it because you need it</p>

6

<p>Dude, screw HYPS. You got a 2400 (as a sophomore, I might add), you’re clearly bright. Don’t sweat it; keep doing what you’re doing, and worst comes to worst you’ll easily get into UC Berkeley and you’ll be plenty happy there. If you want any advice at all, it’s not to pander to what you think college wants. Do the stuff that’s fun and if you really want to get a leg up on the Big Four, start honing your writing.</p>

7

<p>Do something weird and unique with everything related to college apps; write a weird essay (within bounds of course), and make sure you do some sort of unique activity over the summer or during the school year.</p>

<p>I recently talked to a private college counselor who said I was a generic asian student (although my scores and GPA seem a bit lower than most), and he told me to do something special over the summer. He suggested starting a series of lectures in my community focusing on the combination of western and eastern medicine for Chinese residents, becuase i was thinking of going into premed. There’s also other obscure organizations that really need volunteers and that would also help. Ever heard of the “Toothmobile”? Some kid joined the “Toothmobile” and went around poverty-struck communities helping dentists clean and check up on people’s teeths. That kid went to UCB with a 1900 SAT and 3.4 GPA.</p>

<p>Basically, just do unique activites, and write a special essay. Maybe try a third person perspective from the point-of-view of an inanimate object for your essay?</p>

8

<p>Focus on the application. It needs to be stand out and it can be done no matter what your ECs are.</p>

9

<p>

Actually, a disproportionately high percentage of competitve fencers in the USA are Asian.</p>