<p>What ECs, grades, and activities did you focus on to get to the schools you applied for? Especially Cornell? When did you know you wanted to go to Cornell?</p>
<p>I’ll reply to this thread too because I’m bored (I have too much free time), but keep in mind that I’m probably not a model example in this department.</p>
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My grades were good. And my standardized test scores. But that’s about it. I did pretty noncompetitive cross country for 4 years (never made varsity), and I went to a programming contest once. Erm…yeah. A couple other little things here and there but nothing major.</p>
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When I made a list of schools I thought would get me the education I was looking for, and I realized I probably wouldn’t be able to get into any of them without better ECs. So I looked at acceptance rates and decided my best chance of getting into any one of these schools was by applying ED to Cornell. It worked!</p>
<p>I got all A’s but my standardized test scores were pretty weak (sat 2030, 1410 m+cr). None of my ec’s actually relate to engineering (which is what I’m going into but my school really doesn’t offer any… needless to say i went to a smallish public school with not many options) but i had 4 years of band and drama, 1 year of swimming, and 2 years of NHS. I also did Cornell’s Women in Engineering weekend (Other schools probably have similar overnight hosting/information sessions)</p>
<p>I knew I wanted to go to Cornell after I visited it on Spring break in my sophomore year. And I applied ED.</p>
<p>I decided to apply to Cornell as a sort of “why not?” after seeing the “This is” video and being really impressed by the curriculum offered in my major.</p>
<p>I would say that the most important thing for admission to Cornell is demonstrating that you are passionate about what you want to study. With the different colleges there are varying admissions standards, so you can’t really compare each case to another. Overall, keep your grades good and just do the types of activities that you think will interest you; you should find some that you like more than others, start to develop what you are passionate about, and pursue those passions however possible.</p>
<p>As for deciding that Cornell was the school for me, that happened after I was admitted and visited Cornell and another (public) school back to back. It’s hard to describe, but Cornell just felt right for me. The way that people talked about their interests, their school work, and their social lives was simply unlike what I had heard at any other school.</p>