Yale Admissions

Colleges & Universities A-Z Yale University
1

Hey! My name is Quinn, and I have wanted to go to Yale for as long as I can remember. Since the age of 6, I have been school obsessed. I have done the clubs, the advanced classes, you name it (I actually will name it in a second!) I have maintained a GPA of 4.0 all throughout Jr. High, and as this is my first year of high school, I plan to continue that trend. Lately, though, I have been extremely ridden with self-doubt, as I feel I simply am not good enough to actually make it into Yale. I would love some advice on classes to take, ways to set myself apart from other applicants, etc. Thank you so much, and below I will have all of my clubs, academic achievements, community service, and interests!

Clubs-

Gender-Sexuality Alliance (started it at my school)
Mathcounts- Came in 11th place for my district
Literary Magazine
HOSA
Coding club
HOPE Squad (nomination from peers)
HARBOR Club at Weber State University

Academic Achievements-
3 year graduate at an advanced STEM summer school at Weber State University
Observer (hopefully competing this year!) at the 2018 ISEF science fair
Top 10 in the You Be The Chemist competition for Utah 2018
Nominated for 2 Utah Highschool Musical Theater Awards (best lighting design)
Competed for costume design at the Utah Shakespeare Festival
I have other school-based awards, but I doubt those actually matter. They were for Stage Crew and recognition as the top student in our English department while I was in eighth grade. (I also got the biggest overachiever but I like to pretend that never happened)

Community service- 50+ hours working at a professional community theater

Interests- Lighting Design
Premed
Biomedical Engineering
English
STEM
Coding

There is so much more for each category, but I really don’t know what does and doesn’t matter, so I’ll just leave it at that. Thank you so much!

2

You may get into Yale one day. Continue to work hard in school, but remember that you’re only a teenager once, so have some fun too.

If you want to spend some meaningful time thinking about colleges, write down the reasons you like Yale so much. Try to include factors you can use to evaluate other schools, like location, environment/weather, school size, academics (majors, curriculum, class sizes, etc.), and social vibe (party scene, clubs, sports scene, cost, etc. Include things that are important to you.

The aim to all of this is to find other schools you like, schools that would fit you well. The goal of that is to put yourself in a position in which, when it’s time to apply, you will have a list of schools that you’d be happy to attend and which are affordable. Make sure at least one of those is a safety, and you’ll be in good shape for a happy college application outcome. Do not jeopardize your studies or fun activities to do this, though – do this when you would otherwise be bored, or in place of an hour of video games. hehe