<p>What gets to me is you get one Asian posting about his/her own believes, and all of a sudden that becomes Asian cultural. Americans (white people I mean) know one or two Asians (not even friends), and they become experts on what Asians are like (never mind that Chinese are nothing like Japanese or Indians or…).</p>
<p>True that, Oldfort. We are after all very different from each other within the Asian community, but if non- Asians don’t know many of us, we become stereotypes. I think as Asians we understand that non- Asians “don’t all look alike”, but that courtesy has not been reciprocated.</p>
<p>How about how caucasian are all the same. Forget we come from different countries with different religions and languages. Why would it matter anymore where an Asian comes from than it is for a caucasin?</p>
<p>Germans are nothing like Italians or the English but we don’t go around talking about it either. Asians don’t seem to notice the difference between a Greek person and an Irish person?</p>
<p>All things being equal (being talented, showing initiative or leadership, following one’s genuine interests), there is probably also huge value in standing out from the pack from deviating from a set of stereotypes. That isn’t about stereotypes so much as about being intriguing and memorable: someone one is excited to meet. That might be the kid with a Chinese last name who plays superior violin but also is a leader singer in a heavy metal band or…the white female cheerleader who is also a Physics Olympiad…or the vegan artist and poet who also runs the business and investment club.</p>
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<p>What a lot of hogwash. I’m sorry but I’m surrounded by extremely successful and happy people and not one thinks this way or acts this way. In my field such people are just considered political jerks and most are too clueless to realize how much they are avoided.</p>
<p>momof3greatgirls wrote:
This is not true. Please give your backup info.
Many Asian kids in my area including my D did all of those. Sometimes I went to the hospital to pick up my D I saw most of the coming in, coming out kids were Asian. I actually had not seen a non-Asian volunteer at that hospital (although I was there only couple times). This was a one of the major hospitals in the area.</p>
<p>^ Agree with coolweather. Granted our region of the city is predominantly Chinese, but most of the volunteering is done kids of Chinese decent.</p>
<p>I think the OP is just being ■■■■■ like.</p>
<p>What is yours? You picked up your dd a couple of times. Volunteering a couple of times at a place is not even worthy of putting on an application imo. Btw what was your dd doing at the hospital? I have not worked at a hospital for years but don’t ever recall kids ever really volunteering at the hospital and I was there for several years. Maybe things have changed.
I am not saying that Asians never volunteer. I am saying I have never seen any of them doing the volunteering at these places that I have been or my children have been involved with volunteering.</p>
<p>^ You have trouble with reading and understanding. I picked up my D couple times does not mean my D only volunteered a couple times. For the record, she spent almost 2 and a half years volunteering in 2 hospitals. Kids don’t volunteer at hospitals? What are you talking about? If you don’t know then don’t make a blanket statement. I consider this prejudice.</p>
<p>I don’t know about you, but I think any reasonably intelligent adult in this country knows the difference between a person of Greek or German descent. Please don’t assume that we do what whites do. . . i.e., lump all people of one race together and leave it at that.</p>
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Bingo. (But I’d take out American.) How is it so hard for some to understand that top schools (other than the afore-mentioned conservatories and other trade schools) demand</p>
<p>1) a certain level of awareness of the needs of others and
2) some action on that awareness? </p>
<p>You really want to know the best EC for any top school for any kid? I have said it many times on cc - “See a problem. Fix a problem.” It ain’t that hard to understand. Selfish prigs need not apply, no matter how objectively “brilliant”.</p>
<p>Social awareness.
Iniative.
Imagination.
Creativity.
Effort.
For the benefit of others.</p>
<p>If a kid ain’t remotely interested in any of that, look to the parents. And don’t give me any of that cultural crap. Selfish people come from every culture. IMO, that’s just a sorry excuse for poor parenting.</p>
<p>What did she do is what I am asking? I am just curious about what she did that is all because they were not allowed when I worked at the hospital. Also very glad to see that she was committed to her volunteering. Far too many of the kids volunteer just a few hours and act like they really changed the world. </p>
<p>Also the op acted like volunteering is not of any worth to colleges. BTW I not saying volunteering is the only way to make one interesting to colleges either.</p>
<p>It’s true that volunteering should not be done sporadically if one hopes to consider it a significant EC, and yet I’ve seen kids do this all the time. In fact, in my experience I’ve seen many parents arrange Mexico house building trips for their kids where the kids spent a week doing next to nothing productive, but it looked great on the college app. I hope admissions officers have caught on to this trick by now.</p>
<p>My kid did most everything her summer between junior and senior year at a hospital. Probably 500 hours. Pushed guerneys solo from surgical ICU, ran tests from floor to floor, did whatever they asked her to do. Learned a lot. Had fun. Made a difference. They trained the high school volunteers, then let’em loose. ;)</p>
<p>^ I don’t know all the details what she did. I think in the first hostpital, she ran errands, helped moving patients,… In the second hospital, I was required to attend the orientation section and sign agreement to allow her to volunteer. This second one was more organized. It had a big volunteer staff. The volunteers had to act like representatives of the hospital. My D learned a lot about people skills in this second one. She continued the volunteer work until last week.</p>
<p>Bea… I think they have already.</p>
<p>One of the requirements for IB diploma was CAS hours. Before and long after the hours required where done my dd kept doing the volunteering. In fact, she is still volunteering at our church upto she leaves for college. She had to quit her other volunteer job this summer because she had to go to work. Made her very sad and she misses the volunteering at the theraputic horse farm. She never thought she miss picking horses feet and picking up poo in the bad weather. She is also still volunteering to help little kids learn to swim. </p>
<p>She was a three sport varsity player, team captain on one of them and played several instruments. She didn’t do it for the application. She did the sports and instruments because she loved doing it. She in fact changed instruments several times and even won a small scholarship for her playing the tenor saxophone. She actually plays the viola and piano too. </p>
<p>We never ever had plans for the big schools. Local state college is where she is going and the only type of schools she applied too. She is happy to go and never ever really wanted the big name schools. </p>
<p>You got to find your joy. Life is way too short.</p>
<p>I think people are not getting the understanding that elite colleges want as much variety as they can get—and with the virtual avalanche of applications they receive each admissions cycle, they can pretty much have it. The problem is not with seemingly geeky, one dimensional kids. It’s with too many of the same type of seemingly geeky, one dimensional kid—(or quirky, artsy, outgoing type for that matter). There are plenty of math and science wonks in America’s elite colleges. Some of them are even Asian. And It’s also okay if your kid is an introspective, reticent, socially awkward type, but he/she had better be compellingly good in some other manner, and not be up against too many others who look on paper exactly the same. Elite schools are academic microcosms. It really does take all kinds to make it an interesting and vibrant learning environment—at least that’s what the admissions committees believe, and so far, what they believe is the only thing that matters when it comes to getting in. They read upwards of 20 thousand applications during any given cycle, and it can be tedious and boring, with relatively high stats bleeding into one another such that one applicant can be difficult to discern from the next. That’s why they look for variables that stand out. The goal is to stand out. Competition is stiff. You won’t believe how many others potentially look just like you do. </p>
<p>If you can manage to stand out by honestly being yourself, and displaying an unusual passion or talent, or outlook on life, so much the better. Otherwise, you might have to sculpt a profile that will make an adcom officer sit up and take notice. If you’re intent on admission to an elite institution, especially HYSP, understand that they don’t owe you a spot in the upcoming freshman class, not when there are literally thousands of other worthy and talented applicants vying for the same few spots. Only if you can convince them that they will be missing out if they don’t have the unique individual that is you, can you be assured admission.</p>
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<p>Aka resume padding? Whatever happened to just being yourself, which has served me very well in the USA?</p>