SnapShoT of the college admissions process
Every year, more than 1 million high school students and their families from around the globe spend countless frantic hours preparing their applications to colleges in the US. While these applications are culminations of years of hard work and meticulous preparation for some families, they are quite dreaded by others who often wonder what colleges look for.
Academics - Admission officers are increasingly looking for two particular traits in regards to academics, vitality and curiosity. Vitality refers to whether or not the student is doing well academically for the particular college in question, in other words has at least the 50th percentile GPA or better for the said college (accessible here, https://commondataset.org/#DOWNLOADS). Curiosity on the other hand refers to displaying beyond doubt that the student has read books, completed online courses, and participated in summer programs to further develop niche specialization in their field of interest that they plan to major in. Roughly speaking, academics accounts for about 25-30% of a student’s applicant profile.
Extracurriculars - Admission officers look for applicants that have a coherent profile and have participated in a wide range of extracurriculars. The different classes of extracurriculars that make for a winning profile are the 4 A’s: Academic (olympiads, research papers etc…), Athletic (school and club team participations, regional and national teams), Artistic (linguistic and musical abilities), and Altruistic (volunteering). While breadth is important to aim for here, due attention needs to be paid to the cohesiveness of the extracurriculars and how they come together as a whole to portray the student. A key trait that admission officers look for when reviewing a student’s activity list is leadership. Keeping this in mind, it is advisable for students to conduct their extracurriculars in group settings as of their freshman or sophomore years of high school and build relationships that will later on catapult them to leadership positions during their junior year fall at the latest. Roughly speaking, extracurriculars account for 15-20% of a student’s applicant profile.
Standardized testing - Admission officers often struggle on how to equally weigh applicants from different corners of the world. Standardized tests offer a much needed levelling of the field explaining why they are and will still be quite important in the admissions process. Their importance can’t be stressed enough especially for international students who are not doing the more common curriculums like the IBDP, A-levels, AP, etc… that admission officers are familiar with. The two more common standardized tests are the SAT and ACT, with the earlier often preferred by students who are stronger in math and are not native English speakers. ACT on the other hand, is preferred by those students who are slightly stronger in English as compared to math. To get a clear sense of which test suits them better, it is advisable for students to take both SAT and ACT diagnostic tests and compare their results in terms of percentile points. Roughly speaking, standardized testing accounts for 10-15% of a student’s applicant profile.
