So I’m really conflicted. Ill list my awards and if anyone could put them in order of most impressive (or prestigious) to least? Thank you so much for your time.
Btw I’m only a sophomore.
● MUN awards (best delegate and such)
● Honorable mention violin competition
● schools top orchestra (9-12)
● Tennis tournaments
● Varsity tennis team & captain (9-12)
● Foundation outstanding service award (9) (my school awards one of these for each grade level. I won bc I started a volunteer club and had over 100 hrs of service then)
● Achievement award in biology, precalculus, English 2 (each subject has one winner every year, so I won biology freshman year, precalc and English 2 sophomore year. Basically a teacher nominates a student per class and the school picks. In 9th grade there were about 15 winners all for different subjects)
● COSMOS cluster 7 (I went the summer after 9th grade)
● district honor orchestra (9-12th grade)
● president and founder of my schools music to heal club (9-12)
● I have over 200 community service hrs so far (I play violin for seniors and I raise money for hospitals by hosting music shows outside various stores)
●president of my schools book club (10-12) basically my schools book club was going to close so I decided to take over and now we have about 15 members
I didn’t list my grades BC I know those are of top importance. So which are impressive, which aren’t?
Uhhh. It really depends upon which of these things you care about and which you don’t. I’ve never heard of MUN and COSMOS, so I’m going to throw those towards the bottom (unless they’re some prestigious thing I’ve not heard of). President of the blook club and the music healing club looks nice, if you care about those things and that’s shown in your essay… Honorable mention sounds lame so that’s probably towards the bottom too. Achievement awards don’t seem that special either. It look like you have a lot of music stuff, so I’d lean towards stacking some of the more sig. music things at the top, Founder/Pres, Honors Orch, Violin playing for hospitals, etc. followed by other things to show your “roundness”
president and founder of my schools music to heal club (9-12)
This is interesting. Devote one of your essays to the “heal club” EC – if I’ll remember any part of your application, it will be this.
Everything else is rather scattered. Receiving “awards” is only conformation of your skills. Awards are more important for STEM stuff because it is difficult to “do” anything noteworthy in those fields. By contrast, a prospective English major can write a novel, a prospective historian can research a specific topic and then write a paper discussing his or her point of view, etc.
IMPORTANT NOTE: National, international, statewide, or specific organization awards are the major ones. School awards are relatively unimportant, mainly because the competition is usually too low.
@SadSquirrel23 MUN is a debate-ish thing. You pretend to be a delegate of a major international country, then discuss with other delegates over a major issue. And like debate, it won’t help out with college that much unless it corresponds to your other ECs in some way.
@SadSquirrel23 @1golfer1 thanks for the thoughtfulness of your replies. Btw cosmos is the science summer camp for UC schools. Like how MIT and Stanford have summer programs, that give you credit and help when you apply to that particular school
“cosmos … help when you apply to that particular school”
As expressly stated by admissions offices, college-sponsored summer programs do not improve your chances of being admitted to that particular school. The programs do demonstrate your interest in a subject but nothing more.
This is, among other things (as I already mentioned, volunteering hours), something many people believe will guarantee admission to any college but rarely (i.e. never) does.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/18291803/#Comment_18291803
don’t feel discouraged though… everyone feels the same way usually if you see the list