<p>no no it'll be my senior year (that's why i'm applying this fall.. ??!) lol i thought you would have deduced that. oh yea, i think i'll be put into the junior class but maybe the senior due to my "rigorous" course load in the american school. but there are many more advantages as i know to going into the junior year at a german high school for a cultural exchange. besides, the senior year at a german high school is mainly to prepare for the college entrance exam right? so it would be much more demanding in work load rather than to a get a full taste of german life =)</p>
<p>Being an atypical Asian will definitely be a plus. I consider myself an atypical Asian (2 varsity sports, poor at math/science, no music ECs, hardcore english NERD) and I was admitted. I also live overseas, though I'm a U.S. citizen. I think living internationally is unique.. it gives you so many life experiences that most high school students don't have the opportunity to have.</p>
<p>Maximize your strengths but <em>don't</em> try to tailor or sell yourself in a way that doesn't show who you really are just because you think the admissions officers are looking for a certain type of student.</p>
<p>At the same time, they do admit students who are 'typical' asians - ones who are very science-oriented. But of course, they won prizes in ISEF, Intel, etc. and got 800s on everything, so yeah...</p>
<p>i like to call myself an 'atypical' asian too. i'm an artist, and i'm NOT into science. english and history are my forte. i dream of getting into harvard, but dont think i stand a chance against all the competition. well, the thing is, i'm an indian citizen, and somehow i get the feeling that this doesnt help. i'm taking my SATs on june 3rd, and i really don't know what to expect.
we dont have GPA's at our high school. the whole system is completely different. we dont have the option of taking APs, etc, but the curriculum that my school follows is generally considered pretty challenging. i took the following courses in my junior year and will continue taking them in my senior year as well;
indian & world history
political science
english literature
art I,II, and III
business math
economics
environmental studies</p>
<p>i take more subjects than most students in my year. i play the guitar and do karate, and am co-editor of the school newspaper. however, what i'm really passionate about is art, and i've had my artwork featured in a couple or more mini-exhibitions. i'm also really into music, although not of the classical type. mostly indie stuff actually, but i dont think THAT would really count on my college application.lol. and i speak two languages fluently, english being one of them.
i spent a month in boston as part of a student exchange programme not too long ago. and i have been chosen to represent our school at an international student conference on democratic education in sydney. i'm not sure i will go, but i think it might help if i do. i'm not really what people would call an 'academic over-achiever' , but my grades are mostly above average. i could work harder to improve my grades further, but i fear it might be too late, since i have barely a year of school left. suggestions, anyone?</p>
<p>If you were a typical asian you would have said you were an "atypical" asian but then this sentence makes no sense.</p>
<p>Yay for us language lovers!</p>
<p>There's some illogic here, because Harvard being need-blind (willing to offer financial aid) to international applicants is precisely what makes those international applications HIGHLY competitive. All the best students in the world, even from the poorest countries in the world, could be vying to get into Harvard. Domestic American applicants have it easy by comparison--they don't have to be quite as outstanding--not that anyone really has it easy to get into Harvard or into its few peer institutions.</p>
<p>
[quote]
All the best students in the world, even from the poorest countries in the world, could be vying to get into Harvard. Domestic American applicants have it easy by comparison--they don't have to be quite as outstanding--
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Given the much greater number of American applicants who apply to Harvard, wouldn't it all come out in the wash? To slightly tweak your comment, all the best students in the U.S., even from the poorest communities, could be vying to get into Harvard.</p>
<p>hey does anyone have admissions statistics about harvard EA? I mean like how many ppl from Germany, or wherever, applied, how many from China, etc... and of course how many of those got accepted? that would be kinda cool to kno</p>
<p>But the American domestic applicants are applying into a larger percentage of the entering class that will be made up of American domestic applicants, so the competitiveness is still greater among the international applicants. MIT is more explicit about saying this, but it works the same way at Harvard. It's great (in my opinion) that foreign nationals have a chance to apply to the best privately operated United States universities, because that improves the educational quality at those universities for all students, but it's simply a fact that the foreign nationals are up against some stiff competition from one another. </p>
<p>Good luck on your applications.</p>