What should a current junior do over the next year in terms of ec's in order to stand out for HYPSM?

Applying to College
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Hey guys,

It feels so surreal that us juniors will be submitting our apps in roughly 10 months and receiving our decisions in just a little over a year. One major problem that I think many of us have is that our extracurriculars are currently a laundry list. Mine are somewhere in between a laundry list and a spike, but I have no impressive achievements. Right now, my main ec’s which I’ve been involved in the longest are robotics and math team. I also started doing some personal projects in the past month or so as well as obtained some internships and research positions. I know I’m somewhat of a latecomer and I’d like to bring my achievements up to par. My top choices are MIT and Stanford, which I know are very holistic, and I’d like to figure out what to do over the next year to stand out to them. As an Asian male, I will probably need impressive accomplishments to even be considered and I want to get to work on that ASAP and do it well.

My spike lies at the intersection of computer science and entrepreneurship. There are two major things which I hope to achieve over the next year: launching my startup and publishing research and winning STS/Siemens. I’m also becoming more involved in the hacker community and have some plans to host local hackathons. Over the next year, I should achieve amazing things, but I don’t want to seem superficial and I want to hide the whole latecomer thing. How can I perfect my ec’s and what other things could I realistically accomplish? Are there any other well-regarded competitions that I have time to participate in? ISEF is not gonna happen. Maybe I will achieve semifinals in an olympiad, but other than that IDK. My goal is to become a Regeneron STS finalist, which isn’t totally unrealistic, but it’s a crapshoot.

And yes I know extremely impressive accomplishments aren’t totally necessary, but they probably will be for me since I have a major deficit: my gpa.

Also, I know that you only get 5 spaces to list ec’s on most apps and obviously I can’t include everything. Will I need to include the mediocre things I did sophomore year just to show that I was involved in something?

I also know that LORs are crucial. My teachers love me and I usually produce great assignments, but they don’t really know too much about my ec’s. Do you think it’s necessary for me to provide them with constant updates on my ec’s? Do ec’s need to be mentioned in LORs from teachers?

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What’s your GPA? Also, the CommonApp allows you to list 10 EC’s. I think MIT only allows five. That being said, only put the most important things, not little things that you did briefly/things that don’t matter to you. Some teachers will request an EC list to help them write your recommendation, and you can always schedule a meeting with your teachers to talk about your accomplishments/ECs. Some teachers may require you to meet with them and discuss this stuff so they can write you the best letter possible. If it’s not required, just try to set up a meeting time with them before they write you recommendation if they don’t know you too well.

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The secret to good EC’s - is to only do what YOU want to do. It’s up to the school to then recognize how you will fit with their class. BTW - If you do have a major deficit in your GPA all the ECs in the world are not going to get you into HYPSM schools. So relax, enjoy your last couple of years in HS and do the ECs that you enjoy. You will find a school that will match up with your GPA and ECs.

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@janeaustenlover @nugraddad My gpa isn’t abominable, but it’s on the lower end of those admitted. My unweighted should be in the 3.6-3.7 range and my weighted should be in the 4.35-4.5 range. I’ve typically been a straight A student but I had a bad first semester junior year; however, I’m getting straight A’s this semester. My counselor might be able to vouch for me. On the other hand, my test scores are perfect - 36 ACT and 800s on SAT Math II and Physics.

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It seems as if you are going to be putting your energy into getting into some certain brand name schools rather than pursuing studies and activities that truly interest you. If you follow your curiosity and interests, and pursue excellence, your college and career will take care of themselves. An outward rather than inward orientation can’t hurt either. Best wishes to you.

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What makes you believe that you will pull out impressive accomplishments over the next 10 months? It seems a little too late in the game. You have already been given a lot of advice here. What do your parents say?

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What can you do? Stop bowing down at the mercy of gods of college admissions. Stand tall and work on being the person you want to be. The person you want to be isn’t that impressed with HYPSM or prestige because they have enough confidence in their abilities to recognize that they can achieve their goals at a multitude of great colleges, and only one lucky college will get to educate them and claim them has their alum. Be THAT cocky and fearless! The value is in the learning and the ability to learn. Learn to love the learning not the grades. Figure out things that make you happy, because if you don’t figure that out in HS, when do you expect to figure it out. Be curious and engaging without regard to how impressive you look. BE impressive don’t look impressive. YOU are the prize not the college.

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Work hard at the EC for which you have the most passion. Strive to get a leadership position (editor of the school paper or captain of a varsity team.) Be sure to add a safety school to your list. Best of luck!

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In order to “stand out” in the pool of HYPMS applicants, you need to do something exceptional, and achieving national or international recognition fits the bill. If your ECs are merely excellent, then you are in the same boat as the majority of other applicants.

My advice is to do what you love, and hope for the best. You have an honest shot at HYPMS, but don’t forget to apply to some well-considered match/safety schools, too. You’ll be fine even if you have to go to a dump like Carnegie Mellon, or even, God forbid, Michigan.

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Check out “How to be a High School Superstar” by Cal Newport.

“The basic message of the book is this: Don’t wear yourself out taking as many classes as you can and being involved in every club and sport. Instead, leave yourself enough free time to explore your interests. Cultivate one interest and make it into something special that will make you stand out among the other applicants and get you into the toughest schools, even if your grades and scores aren’t stellar. Newport calls this the “relaxed superstar approach,” and he shows you how to really do this, breaking the process down into three principles, explained and illustrated with real life examples of students who got into top schools: (1) underscheduling—making sure you have copious amounts of free time to pursue interesting things, (2) focusing on one or two pursuits instead of trying to be a “jack of all trades,” and (3) innovation—developing an interesting and important activity or project in your area of interest. This fruit yielded by this strategy, an interesting life and real, meaningful achievements, is sure to help not only with college admissions, but getting a job, starting a business, or whatever your goals.”

http://www.examiner.com/review/be-a-relaxed-high-school-superstar

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The OP is not likely to be in the same boat with a 3.6-3.7 GPA.

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@yucca10 In terms of ec’s, I’m very much on my own as my parents can’t really help with them. And I think 10 months is a reasonably solid time to do a good research paper that will do well in Siemens/STS. But will having semifinals in one of those competitions be good enough? Are there any other significant completions that I might not know about that I have time to compete in?

@BasicOhioParent

Would you say winning a major award is any better than submitting an excellent research paper as a supplementary? Without a doubt I’ll submit my research papers and other things in my maker portfolio.

And would you consider Siemens/STS semifinals significant enough to stand out?

Carnegie Mellon seems like a good choice, but it’s crazily selective for computer science, probably even on par with hypsm. I’ll apply to Michigan as well and wouldn’t mind going there, but it’s way too expensive oos and comparable to the uc’s. Other than hypsm, my top choices are the top 3 uc’s for EECS/CSE/CS. I’m not sure how much ec’s matter to them, but I’ll probably need some excellence in them to compensate for my gpa.

Does anyone have any advice for how I could realistically go about being an STS finalist (top 40)? What do they look for in the research paper and how can I make my research competitive? Is the research paper the only thing that matters? What else are they looking for?

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You don’t seem to have read or reflected on any of the thoughtful responses to your original post.

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I think Siemens shut down this year? And to be an STS finalist you need to go deep into your chosen subject area. Is it computer science? I know a guy who won ISEF by coming up with a better implementation of a part of the Python interpreter. Can you do anything on that level? By the way, he worked so much on this that he neglected his grades and eventually went to a so-so state school.

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@yucca10 Regeneron picked it up stating last year I think.

@“Prestigious Nerd” You need to keep in mind that HYPSM is the elite of the elite. To really stand out from the rest of the applicant pool at HYPSM you need top stats plus something else that is seriously impressive. How likely is it that you will achieve all these things you mention in the next few months? What have you achieved so far that makes you confident that will achieve those seriously lofty goals? By your own admission you don’t have any seriously impressive achievements so far, so while you should strive for the best that you can, you should also remain realistic.

Based on your profile up to this point (i.e. perfect scores, lower than average GPA and solid but unexceptional ECs) you are not a standout for any of the ivies and ivy-equivalents, let alone for HYPSM.

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@yucca10 I’m heartbroken about Siemens. This was a chance to gain an accolade. Well, at least there’s still Google Science fair and Regeneron STS finalist. There’s probably a few others I’m missing as well. Know of any?

But Siemens announces semifinalists the earliest. My UC apps will be done before the others announce the awards. Berkeley would also be a great school to attend and I know it’s hyper-competitive for EECS. Since they’re extremely GPA-focused, I feel like I’d need something to compensate and Siemens seemed like the best way to do it. I’m not sure if they check STS.

When you say “so-so state school,” which ones are you talking about? If you’re talking about UCB, UCLA, UCSD, or Umich, then he still got a fairly good deal. If not, I feel very sympathetic for him because that is without a doubt an impressive accomplishment. And when you say he neglected his grades, to what extent? Are you talking about a 2.0 or a 3.6? If his GPA is close to mine, then I’m actually scared. I may have neglected my grades for one semester, but I am definitely, definitely not doing this again.

As for my own project, I’m working on the development of a novel machine learning algorithm with improved efficiency at the moment. It’s a pretty good project and we’ll probably publish this summer. I’m also doing another one about cancer genomics this summer.

@Penn95 What do you consider seriously impressive for HYPSM? Do you have any suggestions for how I could turn one of my current ec’s into an impressive accomplishment? The startup is going fairly well and has a lot of potential, but it’s not abnormally impressive.

Now finalist may be a bit of a stretch, but I feel I could realistically achieve semifinalist. My plan is Siemens and/or Regeneron semifinalist, take my vex team to worlds, USACO gold, a top rank in physics bowl and/or USAPHO semifinals, and possibly an AIME qualification. I’m feeling good about USACO and physics competitions, but not so much about AIME.

And I have more than a few months. Yes, two months would be way too little, but I have almost a year. I’m going to work intensely on my two major research projects. Maybe five smaller comp sci ones as well.

Now I really want to get into MIT. They seem to be the most holistic and mention that gpa is not important and that they’d rather see the individual courses. I’m showing lots of improvement this semester. They also let you submit a maker profile and I’ll add in my ~7 projects. I know many people who’ve gotten in without impressive accomplishments and ec’s not as good as mine, but they were almost always valedictorian. Assuming I do extremely well for the rest of high school, what type of accomplishment do you think will cancel out the one blip semester seeing that I can’t do Siemens anymore?

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I wouldn’t call any of the schools you mentioned so-so. Anyway, I think he had significantly lower GPA than you. And I’m sure he’ll still have a great career in CS. But don’t make conclusions based on one anecdote. Anyway, if you’re already doing research, it’s good, but really, stop obsessing about colleges. Just do the best you can and what will happen will happen. You don’t live for college, you use college for life.

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MODERATOR’S NOTE:
One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. A corollary is asking the same question and expecting different answers. The OP has asked a variation of this question twice already, and as noted above, appears not to have reflected on those responses. Closing thread.