<p>Preferbably something where i dont have to drive/fly all over kingdom come, im in ohio, a higher middle class surban area, so no big city awards.
Thank you!</p>
<p>It depends on what awards you’re qualified to receive.</p>
<p>Or you could just doing things for fun and not for the awards.</p>
<p>That would probably look much better on a college application.</p>
<p>In my experience, fun things are generally unproductive.</p>
<p>What do you consider “good colleges”? A laundry list of “awards” is pretty meaningless w/o the character/drive/creativity/initiative behind it. Awards are sometimes a natural result of BEING that, not the pursuit of awards per se.</p>
<p>you’re looking at this bass ackwards.</p>
<p>The Presidential award could be one of them.</p>
<p>This question in itself reflects a serious flaw in your personality and character. One does not SIMPLY get into college by winning a few accolades. With that mentality, you will NEVER win anything worthy to put on a college application. The people who get into competitive colleges are the ones that have passion, which will show and reflect in the application. People like you whose main goal is to just get into college to impress others will never be able to match the tenacity and passion shown on an application of a student who has a passion. Not only are you approaching the problem in a wrong way, you’re also too lazy to follow through. You say that you would rather not “fly all over kingdom come”, so basically you are stating that you just want some easy awards to impress colleges with. If getting into “good colleges” was that easy, everyone would get in. I think you need to reflect on yourself and improve your character before even thinking about college. I hope you’re aiming low when you say “good colleges”, because with that mentality, you aren’t going to get in anywhere remotely competitive. And even if you somehow manage to get into college, the fact that you are fueled solely by extrinsic motivation means that you will fall behind and never achieve anything significant in your life.</p>
<p>way to be a a** schlaag
i have a 3.9 gpa
have been doing karate and soccer and volleyball for ten years
saxophone, guitar, piano, and drums for 5 years
I am the best writer in the grade
a buttload of volunteer hours
class president
speak 3 languages
and have a ton of otherthings goin for me but im not gonna waste my time telling u about them cause u dont deserve my time</p>
<p>OK: so what’s your take away from the advice given?</p>
<p>AMC, National Merit, Intel, Siemens etc. All national academic competitions, you should start preparing early, competition is tough.</p>
<p>fix your attitude first before going for awards</p>
<p>Think you’re a good writer? There are plenty of writing and poetry competitions you can enter.</p>
<p>One of the most popular is the Scholastic Art and Writing contest. Do a search on these.</p>
<p>@op
Its great that you have all those things, really. But as T26E4 suggests, you completely missed the whole point of my rant. First of all, I doubt that you actually do all those things that you listed, because if you did, you would not be worried about getting “awards to get into college”. Secondly, with that breadth of extracurricular involvement, I highly doubt you’re specialized in any of them. Therefore, you’re probably mediocre at all of them, which does you no good. I can pick up the drums and play for a day and call myself a drummer, but its not that impressive, is it?</p>
<p>Again, “buttload of volunteer hours”? You miss the point of volunteering. Hours are not something you hoard. Its not the amount of volunteer hours you have, its the experience you get. Its not a game that you can win just buy having “a lot of hours”. This just shows that you’ve learned nothing, and are still motivated extrinsically. In other words, you’re probably volunteering to get into college, not to actually help people.</p>
<p>I also find it highly cocky that you think you’re the “best writer” in your grade. First of all, your grammar is atrocious. Even if its just a forum, capitalizing your I’s and using the right form of “a/an” is basic. Again, your motivation shows. You don’t take pride in being able to write well, you take pride in being a better writer than others. </p>
<p>And lastly, you say that you have a “ton of other things going for you” but that you weren’t going to waste your time with me because I “don’t deserve your time”. Then why is it that you specifically sent me a PM flaunting all of your extracurricular activities? You’re obviously very self-conscious about your image. So much in fact, that you try to impress people online that you don’t even know in real life.</p>
<p>The point is, your way of approaching college admissions is wrong. Colleges will see right through your “oh look, I am so much better than everyone else” attitude. This is the best advice that you will get on this topic. Stop trying to impress other people by being better than them. Stop trying to GET INTO college to impress people. Find your real interests and do things because you enjoy them, not just to write a line on your application.</p>
<p>Some people on here r being very helpful and if you were one of those people who politely said im looking at it the wrong way thank you, and if you were one of those people who anwsered the question thank you alot too. But if you were those 2 people who started this or commentated on it, you are no help and I dont know if you are one of those ****ed off parents/students who want to decrease competition for the colleges your applying to by putting people down, but you are the reason that everybody goes to yahoo anwsers, and gives us all the title of stuck up brats (the way we are viewed by the rest of the internet). I mean you are so unthoughtful and plain stupid, and there must be something wrong with you if you enter a civilized conversation like that scglaag.<br>
And to clarify:
- I did not self prounce myself as the best writer in my grade, my teachers did.
- I know I am going to get into college. It is just a matter of getting in to a better one
- I sent schlaag a PM of a right click copy of what i posted.
- I don’t know where he got the impression i have been playing those instruments for a day at, I said 5 years.
And P.S. schlaag something tells me that you’ll will have a heck of a harder time getting into college/ getting a life then me.</p>
<p>If you are the best writer in your grade, your school must be awful.</p>
<p>You generally earn awards by being REALLY good at something. So… pick the things you listed as ECs and see what the highest honors are that you can earn. Then go work until you get them. For example, can you make all state with one of your musical skills? Or athletics? Or enter the Scholastic Awards, which someone already mentioned? Or National Merit? Not sure what year you are, but if you are good as you think you are, that ought to be easy for you.</p>
<p>OK thank you (I think)
And Im a freshman who goes to the one of the top 10 best schools in ohio (6th i believe)</p>
<p>One more thing about traveling for the awards. Colleges look most favorably upon awards that are higher level – state or national level. Or against a big pool of participants. So your restriction of staying local works against your bigger goal.</p>
<p>Here is another suggestion: National History Bee. My kid is in Quiz Bowl, did this as an aside last year (it is a high school level competition), and ended up finishing near the top for our state. But only if you like and are good at history. Because you have to actually study to do well. She happens to study a lot of history anyway for Quiz Bowl, so this worked out for her. But that is true for all of these awards. You need to work your tail off to achieve them.</p>
<p>Or… science and math olympiads can be good. Again, you REALLY have to work hard to achieve success with them. My D gave a somewhat lackluster effort (self studying) on one for a couple of years, and did not manage to move on to the second level either year. If she had worked harder, she would have had something to show for it. A life lesson for her, I guess.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That explains a lot. So young and naive.</p>