Tag: College Applications

Planning for College – Winter
Planning for College – Winter

How does it happen so fast? Here we are in December; for many students, it is already halfway through the academic year! Whether in Grades 9, 10, 11, or 12, it’s time to take stock of what you have achieved in recent months and plan for the critical months ahead. While there is no ‘right’ way to prepare for applying to college, the pointers in this blog should help you keep on track.

Grade 9 and 10/ Freshman and Sophomore.

The winter break is a good point for taking stock of what you have been doing over the last few months and ensuring you are prepared for the rest of the academic year. However, it is also time to make some longer-term plans.

If you have received or are about to receive an end-of-semester report, try not to look at it as teachers handing out marks. Instead, try to draw satisfaction from the things that have gone well and learn where they haven’t. If you are struggling, ask your teachers where your gaps in understanding are and put a plan in place to go over those topics again.

Many students find the move from Grade 8 to 9 a challenge, particularly managing to keep on track and up to date with their work. If this sounds like you, I encourage you to use a planner to help you use your time more effectively. At Ivy Central, we like using the free downloadable templates from Passion Planner.

Keep playing an active part in lessons; remember, you don’t want to be the one sitting at the back, not contributing until you are asked.

If you need help, ask!

If you are in Grade 10, you should consider what subjects to do in Grades 11 and 12. Take the time to research the options you are interested in; does the coursework interest you? Will it be helpful for what you want to online study at college or university? Are there any specific subject requirements for any career you might be interested in?

December is the month when many competitive summer programs open for applications. Spending your summer participating in one of these programs can help build your application profile, so consider spending a few weeks deep diving into a topic that interests you or perhaps working on a research project alongside a Ph.D. student.

Continue with extra-curricular activities you are involved with; are there new things you would like to try?

Grade 11/Junior Year.

In many ways, this is when your application season begins. Grade 12 have just about finished their applications, so teachers and counselors switch their focus toward those in Grade 11.

If you still need to build a college list, now is the time to start. You can begin by creating a long list of colleges you would consider applying to. These may be ones you have heard about; perhaps a relative went there or is there now. Then, you can use respected sources on the internet to help you explore them in more detail.

Talk to your family about any considerations they would like you to consider when looking at colleges. For example, they may want you to focus your college search on particular parts of the US or insights into what type of college will best fit you.

One area that can be more difficult to discuss with parents is how your college will be funded. Attending college is expensive, around $40,000 to $60,000, depending on the college, so having a clear understanding of what your family can afford at the beginning of your search can save you time and heartache.

As with students in Grades 9 and 10, now is the time to apply for a competitive summer program.

Grade 11 is when most of our students will sit an SAT or ACT test. If you didn’t do the test during the first few months of Grade 11, then the next sitting of the SAT will be in March and will be the first of the ‘new’ style SATs. If you have not done so, download the online SAT Bluebook, which has four complete practice tests to help you prepare. The next ACT test will be in early February.

Grade 12/Senior Year

Crunch time! If you applied early to any colleges, you should have heard back from them by the middle of December; if you have been accepted, congratulations, you are going to college. On the other hand, if you didn’t apply, have been rejected, or were deferred from your early applications, it’s all to play for.

The end of December sees the start of the Regular Decision (RD) round of applications. Before you submit your application go over it again. If you were rejected from your early applications, can you see why? Consider your college list. If you were not accepted in the early round, ensure that all the colleges you apply to RD are not of a similar level, and ensure you have a safety or two.

If you have been deferred from the early round, don’t let that stop you from applying to other colleges in the hope that your deferment will convert into an acceptance. Instead, send a Letter of Continued Interest (LCI) to your deferred college in January, letting them know that you still want to go there and updating them with the great things you have achieved since your initial application.

Keep motivated. Once all your college applications have been submitted, you can ease off a little on the school work, but try to avoid it. Colleges can and do withdraw offers of places from students who don’t perform as well as expected in their final assessments. Evidence suggests that students whose final grades are lower than expected are more likely to drop out of college.

Working with study abroad consultants, overseas education consultants or as more commonly known, college counselors can help you plan ahead and make those high school years count. Ivy Central offers exceptional focus to help you prepare for college admissions throughout the high-schooling years. Start today!
December 8, 2022
Applying to the UK? How to write your UCAS Personal Statement

In a recent blog, I introduced readers to the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, or UCAS for short. In the article, I went over the elements that made up a UCAS application and briefly described the Personal Essay students need to write. In this blog, I will go into more detail about the essay, what it is and how to write it.

In a nutshell…

Your UCAS Personal Statement (PS) is the one opportunity to discuss why you want to study a particular degree. It is your chance to demonstrate your drive, ambitions, skills, and achievements, making you an excellent choice for the universities to which you have applied. Unfortunately, you only have a limited amount of room to sell yourself, 4,000 characters, spaces, and 47 lines, roughly one page of A4. This limitation means that you must express yourself clearly and succinctly, leaving little room for filler.

Making a start

Often the most challenging part, so don’t sit down with a blank document in front of you; writing your PS should start well before you write your first word. Take some time to understand the courses you are applying to by researching not just what the course studies but how you would study and how you can tailor your time at university to meet your needs.

Using your research, use a mind map or spider diagram to make notes answering these questions.

·      What inspired you to study this subject? Perhaps there was a specific time when you decided that this was an area you wanted to understand better, or maybe you read a book or watched a TED Talk; if so, make a note of it.

·      What evidence can you provide that supports your interest and shows that it is more than superficial? An excellent personal statement will provide evidence of more extensive reading or participation in activities that support and extend your knowledge and understanding of the course you have picked.

·      How can you show that you have the skills and attributes to enable you to do well in the course? You will hopefully have some examples to share inside and outside the classroom.

·      How have your extra-curricular activities helped prepare you for university study? These might be academic exploration, team and leadership skills, or perhaps a prize for a literary competition you entered.

·      What have your studies taught you about the course you hope to apply for? For instance, if using it for an engineering course, what have you done through your high school curriculum that sparked your interest?

Read More: Claremont Mckenna College

Putting it together

Now that you have put all of your ideas in some order, now is the time to start putting words onto paper. A clear structure will help you write a PS with a natural flow and enable you to develop good transitions from one section of your PS to the next. For clarity, I have described the PS under headings; however, the PS you submit with your UCAS application should be written using something other than subheadings.

Introduction

Your role with the introduction is to grab the interest of the admissions tutor; they probably have to read hundreds of these PS, so try to make yours stand out. This might be the point to share a story about when you realized that the subject you are applying for was what you wanted to study.

Academic achievements

This should be something other than a list of subjects and grades; that information will go elsewhere in your application. Instead, you’d like to tell the admissions tutor about the specific things you have done in your curriculum with your interests, the course content, and how they’re doing.

Extra-curricular activities

Showcasing your abilities and interest in school shows how you have pursued those interests through extra-curricular activities. In addition, these extra-curricular activities demonstrate how you have followed your interests beyond the curriculum and different aspects of your personality that a university might look for, leadership, or an interest in broader issues facing humanity.

Conclusion

Your conclusion should tie in all the most critical aspects of your achievements into no more than two or three sentences. Then, finish with a clear, positive statement that encapsulates why the universities reading your PS should accept you.

Final points

You should expect to rewrite your PS a few times, but each time you think you have finished, read it out loud. It’s a great way to test the flow and identify any clunky language. Then, having done that, put it down overnight and proofread it again. Keep doing this until you stop making changes to what you have written. It is always a good idea to ask somebody who knows you well to read it before you add your essay to your UCAS application; they may pick up on something you have missed.

Working with study abroad consultants, overseas education consultants, or, more commonly known, college counselors, can help you plan and perfect your personal statement. Ivy Central offers exceptional and experienced writers that can give you some of the best advice for your PS. Start today!

October 27, 2022
Understanding College Rankings

September is college rankings season. Across the world, websites and newspapers publish stories about the rankings of colleges and universities; some focus on specific countries like the US and UK, while others claim to tell you which are the ‘best’ in the world.

While there are many other factors that students should use when making final admission decisions, college ranking lists are a resource that applicants should use, so in this blog, I’m going to help you understand college rankings.

What are rankings?

College rankings have been around for many years. Offering a list of colleges, ordered by numerical scores, they have become an essential part of the annual education cycle, with the US News, Times Higher Education, Forbes, and Shanghai rankings all being published in September each year. On the face of it, the rankings offer an easy way to compare one college against another, but this is different. Each compiler will use vastly different criteria when determining the status of institutions. The more prestigious lists seek to base their results on objective, statistical information, but many lists use more subjective assessments, such as students’ views. To make the most of the information that ranking lists contain is vital to understand what is being measured.

How college rankings are compiled

If you look at the three college rankings mentioned above, one thing is very apparent; there is little agreement across the rankings about which is the ’best’ college or university; while both US News has Princeton topping their list of national colleges, Shanghai has Harvard topping while the Times Higher Education ranking names Oxford University as its’ top institution in the world. So how is it that different rankings can come up with different results? Well, it’s all down to what was mentioned earlier, different rankings use different criteria to calculate their lists.

Let’s compare what US News and Times Higher Education consider when they assess institutions. Both ranking methodologies use quantitative and qualitative data to base their results on, but what they look at is quite different. The top two factors for US News are Graduation and Retention Rates and the subjective assessment by peers and counselors, each of which constitutes 22.5% of the total ranking score. The Times Higher Education methodology is a little more complex; it has three top factors, Teaching, Citations, and Research, each of which counts 30% towards the overall ranking. The teaching element includes a reputation survey to measure the “perceived prestige of institutions in teaching” and the student-teacher ratio at the school. The research consists of a study to judge the “university’s reputation for research excellence among its peers” and a measure of income the school makes related to its research. Finally, the citations element of the methodology seeks to assess the institution’s role in spreading new knowledge by capturing the number of times the universities published research cited by scholars.

The difference between the two methodologies becomes starker when you look at the other factors being considered. US News includes elements such as student selectivity (12.5%) and alumni giving (5%), which are significant factors for US colleges but have less relevance for other parts of the world where less store is placed on such measures. Using reputational rankings can become a circular discussion: a strong reputation leads to a strong reputation. This benefits well-known universities but fails to reflect the benefits of teaching and learning, research, community engagement, or any other academic activity.

The Forbes rankings are different again. Unlike the other three, the Forbes rankings only cover universities and colleges in the US. It places the highest weight on alumni salary, with slightly less importance given to debt load, graduation rate, return on investment, and the leadership and entrepreneurial success of graduates. Having the focus on salary debt load and return on investment results in colleges that charge less but achieve good outcomes for students appearing higher up the ranking links. While MIT tops the Forbes list, in third place is the University of California Berkeley, while UCLA and UC San Diego also appear in the top 20. In the US News rankings, Berkeley only makes 20th place.

Given that each ranking will be looking at different things and placing a different emphasis on them, it is common that they come up with different results, so it is wise to understand which ranking best aligns with individual student priorities.

Final Thoughts

College rankings can be a handy tool for students, especially as they begin their explorations of colleges. Alongside the numbered list, they usually have helpful overviews of the different institutions. It can be unhelpful to put too much emphasis on rankings. However, other factors such as size, location, and what the program includes should also be key when deciding which colleges to apply to.

September 29, 2022
Still Writing Your Common App Essay? 5 Tips to Help You

With the submission deadline for applying in the early round of US college applications rapidly approaching, you will hopefully be well on the way to finishing your personal essay. However, if you are struggling, this article will hopefully help as I share five tips from college admission professionals that can help you create a winning essay.

For many students, writing a solid personal essay is the most challenging part of the application; its test comes because what is required is significantly different from the types of essays most students have been writing during their schooling. While it may be challenging, you must spend the time to create as powerful an essay as possible; this is the one opportunity you have to help the admissions teams get to ‘meet you’ and understand something about the individual behind the grades and scores.

1. First impressions count

Any student attending college should expect to do a great deal of writing, irrespective of their major. So, the first thing somebody reading your supplemental college essay will ask is, ‘Can this person write?’

When you read your essay, is it well put together? A strong essay will nearly always have a strong theme or story that runs through it from beginning to end, with clear transitions from one paragraph to the next. Write using an active voice rather than the passive one generally expected for an academic essay; try to engage your reader from the very start so that you can be seen through your words. You should always ask people who know you well to read your essay; if they say that they can hear your voice as they read it, then you are probably a winner!

Finally, grammar and spelling count; make sure you go through what you have written and check it with a good spelling and grammar checker. Again, make sure you are using American spellings.

2. You are the story

The college admissions team is reading your essay because they want to find out about you, so make sure that what you are writing about is you. It seems an obvious thing to say, but you would be surprised how often students write essays where they talk about their parents, grandparents, or teachers who have helped shape them into the person they are now. Unfortunately, this sort of supplemental essay rarely comes across well as you will inevitably spend much of your limited word count talking about what makes that person special rather than what makes you special, how you live your life as an individual, in the spirit of the person.

To create a strong impression on the admissions officer, you want them to feel that they know what makes you who you are, your motivations, and your passions.

3. Reflections

Creating the strong impression I just mentioned requires you to reflect on who you are and how you became that person. This is something that many students find difficult, but without sharing that knowledge in your essay, you risk it will come across as shallow or, worse still, clichéd! On the other hand, sharing your reflections can add depth and character, making even an everyday experience, such as waiting for the school bus, into a profoundly revealing portrait of you and your life.

4. Add value

When talking about their work, top college and university admissions officers will speak about ‘crafting a community.’ What they mean by this is that they are not just trying to fill the number of places available; instead, they are looking for people who will contribute to the campus experience. So in your personal essay, try to focus on your genuine strengths, using anecdotes that will best portray them.

5. Be consistent

Be clear about what impression you want to create in the minds of the people who will read your application. Having done that, ensure your application, including your essay, aligns with that picture. For example, suppose you want your essay to portray you as a passionate biology researcher. In that case, you don’t want your activities to reflect a person who loves to spend their time deep into self-published online stories. If your essay does not resonate with the rest of your application, you need to take a step back and consider how you can make the whole application reflect who you are. Ivy Central always here to help you.

Good luck!

September 8, 2022
And the Graduation Rate is…..

There are many considerations that you should use to decide which college is right for you. Having the right major is one of the most important, as will be the reputation of the college, its size, location, and student body. Another aspect you should look for when researching your college options is the graduation rate; this can tell you a lot about the quality of the education provided by a college.

Degree courses in the US are based around a four-year program of study, but across all institutions offering degrees, the average time it takes students to graduate is over five years. The reasons for this are numerous. It might be that a student changes their major, or there are personal circumstances that result in them taking time out from their studies, but it might also reflect difficulties in getting a place on popular courses or struggling to pass a graduation requirement.

Read More: Ivy League Universities

Graduating in four years means reducing the cost of college; if you take longer, additional tuition, accommodation, and food will need to be paid for. This is where the institution’s graduation rate comes in.

The graduation rate is expressed as a percentage of those starting at the college as a freshman who go on to graduate from the same institution; they will usually show this as a four and six-year graduation rate. If the institution has a high graduation rate within four years, it suggests that the odds of completing the degree in that time are good.

It is important to note that the graduation rate is not the same as the retention rate, which shows the percentage of students who return to the same college for their second year.

According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, the colleges and universities in the United States with the highest six-year graduation rates include:

·       Yale University (97.5%)

·       Princeton University (97.3%)

·       Harvard University (96.4%)

·       Dartmouth College (95.9%)

·       Harvey Mudd College (95.9%)

·       University of Pennsylvania (95.7%)

·       Duke University (95.4%)

·       Bowdoin College (95.2%)

·       University of Notre Dame (95.2%)

·       Amherst College (95.2%)

Out of the public colleges, those with the highest graduation rates are:

·      U of Virginia (94.6%)

·      College of William and Mary (92.1%)

·      U of Michigan at Ann Arbor (91.6%)

·      U of California Berkley (91.1%)

·      U of North Carolina Chapel Hill (90.9%)

·      U of California Los Angeles (90.9%)

·      U of Florida (88%)

·      U of Wisconsin Madison (87.2%)

·      The College of New Jersey (86.6%)

·      U of Maryland at College Park (85.4%)

Other colleges that are popular with our students include:

·      Georgia Institute of Technology (85.3%)

·      U of Washington Seattle (84.4%)

·      U of Texas at Austin (82.7%)

June 16, 2022
Journey to US College-What Students Should Consider

Journey to a US College-What Students Should Consider

It can be very easy to be seduced by the idea of going to college, particularly at one of the great colleges and universities worldwide. The good news is that the dream is increasingly becoming a reality for those who aspire to this goal ,but achieving it is not always straightforward and can sometimes come as a shock.

In this article, I want to help anybody considering applying to a US college, and their families, think about some of the hard questions that will need to be answered on their journey toward college and university.

Academics

People have all sorts of motivations for applying to college. It might be the prospect of exploring an area of interest in more detail or the freedom to develop into the adult you want to be. Whatever your motivations, for colleges and universities, it is about you as a student, and while US colleges look at more than just your grades, how you perform at school is an essential element of your application and graduation rate.

Not all colleges expect the same academic performance; top colleges will expect a higher academic achievement, so you must take a step back and look at how you have performed over the last few years. The good news is that, in most cases, an institution will match your academic performance, but that might be different from the college of your dreams.

Top colleges, like the Ivy Leagues, will expect you to have averaged A’s across the four years of high school. So, if an Ivy League is your dream, look at the grades you have been getting; if they are not A’s, then ask yourself if you can and are willing to do the work needed to turn them into A’s.

If you are not that A student, then by all means, still apply, if that is your dream, but also make applications for colleges that better reflect the grades you are achieving. Ivy Central would advise that at least half of your applications should be made to what we call target institutions. These are ones that broadly align with your academic performance. If you don’t get the grades you expect, you should include at least one safety college.

Another question you should ask yourself is, ‘are the subjects you are good at the subjects that are important for what you want to study or indeed work in?’ Over my career, I have met many young people who have a view about what they want to study that is incompatible with their academic strengths. For example, they might wish to study mechanical engineering at college, but maths is not a strong subject for them, and they dislike physics, both integral subjects for what they want to study. Too often, these people drop out of their studies because they can’t cope with the work or it just does not interest them enough. Fortunately, switching from one major to another in the US is often possible, but a hard, realistic assessment of their strengths can help you avoid that.

Occasionally students feel pressure from family or friends to aim for a particular study area. It is essential to recognize this pressure and for you, the student, to own the decision about what you do at college. Try to understand the feelings family and friends have about your future, try to help them understand why you believe your choice is right for you and your dreams, and realize your concerns about pursuing the major they would prefer you to follow.

Asking yourself these questions is not always easy; it can be hard to refocus your dreams if the reality does not fit. However, the ability to reflect on who you are is an important skill to master and will help you to make better decisions throughout your life.

Read More: Public versus Private Universities

Family discussions

While you will be the one attending university, the support and encouragement of your family should be an essential consideration. While you will have your dreams about going to college, your family will likely have dreams for you as well. Hopefully, those dreams will match yours, but that is not always the case. There have been occasions where the parents of students we have worked with have wanted their son or daughter to attend a particular college or sometimes go to a college near family members who can offer support.

Another important area to have an early conversation with your family about is cost. Irrespective of where you go to college, it is expensive, so talk to your family about what the family can afford. Sometimes we see students who have the potential to be accepted by one of the highly selective private colleges in the United States but are not able to afford the high costs that can be required. In those circumstances, it might be better to focus on slightly less selective colleges that will appreciate what you bring to the college community and provide you with scholarship money to make it more affordable. This can be a particularly beneficial strategy if you intend to go onto one of the professional programs like medicine or law.

One of the most common areas where we see differences between parents and students is what to study. Some parents will put a value in studying a particular major, typically in the STEM areas, but you, the student, might want to pursue your interest in the arts or humanities. Understanding these tensions can help you when considering your choice of college. For example, you could look at colleges that will provide the opportunity to follow a double major, one with more of a STEM focus and a second in the areas you want to follow.

Planning

Another consideration is that you should try to be realistic about the amount of time you have or can put into applying to college.

Applications to top-tier colleges take time.

A student at the end of Gr 11 only has six months before the application round ends; during that time, in addition to all of the work you are doing for the application, you will also have to keep on top of your school work and continuing to work on your extracurricular activities. So when you are starting the process of building your application profile is essential. The earlier you start, the better.

Even if you are starting the process early, you are still likely to struggle to do all of the things you are used to while completing the activities and working to build your profile. Are you willing to spend less time playing your favorite sport, hanging out with friends, watching television, or whatever it might be? Successful students find they have to manage their time well if they are going to accomplish everything they want to. Are you willing to make the sacrifices needed to achieve your goals?

None of this is said to try and put you off following your aspirations of college; far from it; we want you to succeed but asking these tough questions is part of the journey.

There will be bumps on the road, times when things don’t go how you expect, maybe you don’t get the grade you expect, or a research experiment fails; often, people will not be accepted by the colleges they most want to attend.

All of this is normal, and you should expect to have disappointments along the way, but there are rarely no options remaining open to you. So be flexible and open to opportunities, and you will have a great future ahead.

Good luck!

May 26, 2022
All Change for the SAT… But Not Yet.
New SAT-Changes Announced

The SAT, together with its near relation, the ACT, has been a feature of college applications for many years. As a result of the COVID pandemic most US colleges have moved to a ‘Test Optional’ application format, meaning that applicants can choose whether to submit an SAT or ACT score without it affecting their chances of acceptance. This test-optional format remains in place with most colleges for the 2022/23 round of applications and some colleges, including some of the most prestigious, have already announced that this will be the case for the following two application rounds.

All of this has led to questions being asked about the future of standardised tests and if they are needed. The University of California colleges announced last year that they will no longer consider ACT or SAT good scores when making application decisions and an increasing number of colleges have followed a similar route.

In an attempt to reinvigorate the SAT, the College Board, which owns the SAT, announced at the end of January that, following a trial in November 2021, they are going to make significant changes to the SAT and the way it is administered.

What’s changing?

Going digital – the new SAT will be administered digitally meaning that those taking the test will be able to use their own computers, devices in schools or one issued by the College Board for the purpose of taking the test. The test will continue to be administered in school or a test centre, there will not be an option for students to take the test at home.

Format – when the new test is introduced it will take around two hours to complete, rather than the three hours required by the current test. The reading passages in the test will become shorter and the range of topics will become broader to better reflect what students read in college.

Calculators – The maths section of the current test contains one section where calculators are allowed and a second where they are not. The new test will allow students to use calculators across the whole maths section of the test, indeed a graphing calculator will be built into the testing app.

Test security – the current pencil and paper test has come in for criticism when whole testing cycles in countries have been scrapped because the test has been leaked. The new digital test will enable each student to be set a test that is unique to them while retaining the same level of difficulty. This means that it will be virtually impossible for students to share answers or for questions to be leaked beforehand.

Results – sitting, waiting to find out what score you achieved in the SAT will still be there, but it should only be for days, rather than the current couple of weeks.

Flexibility – as a digital test there will no longer be a need for the SAT to a pre-set schedule. Currently there are six SAT administrations on dates that are set months in advance. The new test will enable schools and test centres greater choice of when, where and how often they administer the test.

What’s not changing

Rigour – there is no suggestion in what the College Board has said that the test will become any easier. The SAT will still seek to assess the ability of the student to meet the challenges of study at college.

Scoring – The SAT will continue to be scored out of a total of 1600, 800 for the English section and a further 800 for the maths section.

When does this happen?

The new style SAT will be phased in over two years. Students taking the test in international centres will start using the new digital test from March 2023, while students in the US will take the new test for the first time in March 2024.

Further information on the revamped SAT can be found on the College Board website.
March 17, 2022
WHY THIS MAJOR ESSAY?

In less than a month’s time, the big reveal of Supplemental Essays will take place. While there could be a variety of supplemental essays that colleges/universities ask their students to answer, one of the most common and prominent is the one about what would you like to study in college. We call it the ‘Why this Major?’ essay prompt.

Voila! The perfect opportunity to prove your love for your major just arrived. So how do you welcome it?

Well, here are 5 tips to help you do that –

1. Your academic subjects and performance

As an example: If you’re applying for Computer Science, you do not necessarily need to have taken Computer Science as an academic subject. However, you would need to demonstrate strong performance in Mathematics. Talking about your strong math skills definitely works in your favor.

If you’re applying for gender studies, then talking about how History and/or Literature have pushed you to think critically about the world around you would help make your case for this major. Did you develop deep reading skills that have allowed you to go beyond the obvious and really analyze two sides of the coin?

2. Your Academic Extracurriculars

Academic Extracurricular activities are those that are related to your major. This is an amazing way to showcase a tangible outcome in support of your choice of major. Students typically would engage in writing a research paper or a book or creating an app. In the UK, these are typically referred to as Supercurriculars. When writing your UCAS Personal Statement, you can definitely talk about them.

3. Opportunities offered by the University

Colleges and Universities offer tons of clubs and organizations to meet students’ interests and talents. These literally range from a simple Robotics Club to something as fancy as the Squirrel Club at U.Michigan. The latter would make sense if you’re planning for the pre-vet track or Animal Psychology major! Thus, ensure that your choice of club/organization is in sync with your major and related interests.

4. Summer Programs

If you’ve participated in any summer programs that demonstrate your interest in the area you’d like to pursue at college, do dive into what you learned and the goals you achieved. This could be in the form of a poster presentation or a talk at a symposium or a full length research paper.

5. Community Service Projects

If you’ve demonstrated strong passion for a subject area through activism or volunteering, this is the time to mention it. One thing to be weary of is that some universities would have a specific Community Essay wherein you may need to use these anecdotes. In that case, it would be best to stick the any of the aforementioned points so that you can use your community project for the community essay, even though this doesn’t necessarily need to be the case.

Final Word

Supplemental Essays for 2021-22 will be declared on 1st August on the Common Application portal. Given the pandemic, you could expect some changes to the supplemental essays this year. Guess only time will tell. Ivy Central always here to help you.

May the countdown begin!

July 11, 2021
Importance of Pictures and Videos for College Applications
Why Pictures and Videos are Important for College Applications
As unexpected as it may sound, clicking pictures and videos of you engaged in extracurricular activities can help you stand out in your college applications.

Here’s why we recommend it:
1. Personal website
  
  A lot of our top students are able to effectively showcase themselves and their work through developing a personal website. It acts as a great visual résumé when they document their high school journey through photographs and videos. While the cliche ‘A picture is greater than a thousand words’ stands true, it is also key to have a blurb accompanying the photo. Here you can talk about what motivated/inspired you to undertake this task. Remember to keep it short.
  
  Most admissions officers will click the link to your personal website, so be mindful to put your best foot forward. These could include everything from your top extracurricular activities whether it is lab experiments, research papers, theatre, dance, music, or sports.
  
  Read more: College Application Checklist
2. College Application Questions
  
  Sometimes, universities ask their applicants to share one of their defining moments with them. For instance, by asking “In keeping with Rice’s long-standing tradition (known as “The Box”), please share an image of something that appeals to you,” Rice University wants a photoresponse to learn about one of your beliefs or inspirations. You need to pick something that is meaningful to you, and so there is no right or wrong response to this. Avoid sending a picture of rice, for obvious reasons. No surprise, it has been seen to put off admissions officers.
3. Pictures & Videos prompt great essays
  
  If you haven’t realized yet, your college essays need you to weave in a story. Looking at photos/videos of you in action will help you go back to what you felt in that moment, and how far you have come. Pictures act as an effective springboard for reflection.
Compiling these pictures will make you feel you have achieved so much in recent years. They will remind you of perseverance and how you stood up when things got tough.

So go out there, and capture your moments because you have earned every bit of it!

College Application Submitted What’s Next
November 11, 2020
University of Chicago: A Students View.

My ‘Why UChicago’ essay was longer than most newspaper articles.

Therefore, as you might’ve guessed, I arrived at the University with high expectations. My head was ringing with visions of school-wide scavenger hunts, bizarre class lists, and professors who re-enact papal elections — complete with costumes, assassinations and alliances — below the gothic spires of Rockefeller Chapel. The University of Chicago, with its traditions, quirks, and eerie resemblance to a certain wizarding school, had become almost magical in my mind.

I realized, after my first few weeks, that the true magic in University of Chicago wasn’t in these grand traditions and wacky classes. While seeing the entire school grumble out of bed at 6 am every frigid winter morning for Kuvia was astounding to say the least, what really made UChicago special is the people. Everyone has something to teach you, and they’re always excited to learn new things. They’re also incredibly passionate about their interests, so small talk isn’t something that’s heard often on campus.

These diverse passions and backgrounds really come into focus during core classes. UChicago’s core is a set of requirements across disciplines, from the arts to the physical sciences to civilization studies, aimed at instilling a broad renaissance education into their students, ensuring that no matter what they choose to pursue, they have a myriad of perspectives to draw on. These classes are also great for building community, for example, every first year is required to take a humanities class, which is limited to first year students. In these classes, students from all around the world, majoring in everything from comparative literature to Chicago studies, discuss primary texts and their effect on society. I learnt so much in these discussion based classes as it wasn’t just the professor that I was learning from, but the rich dialogue created by the diversity of perspectives in the classroom. The professors are always happy to help out, and much like the students, are usually conducting research into something remarkable (one of my professors, for instance, specialized in puppeteering practices in Afghanistan) that they’re always eager to talk about in office hours! The core was a fantastic way for me, as a bio major who loves literature, history, and theatre, to maintain my interests in college and still (hopefully) achieve my professional goals. In high school, I would email hundreds of professors for research opportunities, and never get a response. I expected finding a lab to work in to be just as hard in college, but to my surprise, the first five professors responded to me immediately, and within the week, I had a research position at a tissue engineering lab that I’m still working in now!

The university is located a short hop away from downtown Chicago, which is easily accessible (by Uber or the train or a long-ish bike ride) for a quick brunch or shopping trip. Chicago is an amazing city, and as someone who lives for food, I love how no matter where you go, you’re assured to find a delicious and wide variety (even on/near campus)! The university has gained a reputation of being where fun goes to die, in terms of academic rigor. While classes are certainly not easy, the university does offer resources that help, such as the Harper core tutors. Moreover, while Greek life isn’t as big as it is at most public universities, it is still a large part of the UChicago community. Making friends is also not as hard as I expected it to be. The university assigns you to a ‘house’ based on what dorm you’re assigned, and you can eat with them, go on house trips (to see the Chicago Bulls for free, for example) with them, or just hang out with them in the house lounge for a study break (usually with fun snacks)!

UChicago was the perfect fit for me, as someone who loves learning, no matter what the subject (well, perhaps not physics), and wanted a college experience within a city environment. I also love to read, which I would say is quite important as some core classes can be quite text-heavy. What I love most about the university is that intellectual vitality that they prize, and that lives on in every student, professor, and TA on campus. It shines through everything from the snippets of conversations about quantum computing and Egyptology overheard on the quad to the school wide traditions like Scav, where one year, students built a functioning nuclear reactor. I’ve also made friends who I feel like I’ve known all my life, who understand me on a different level, who I learn from everyday. From the classes, to the professors, to the city itself, I can easily say that there’s no better school for me.

We know what it takes to get into the top 100 colleges and working with study abroad consultants, overseas education consultants, or, as more commonly known, college counselors, can help you plan ahead and make those high school years count. Ivy Central offers exceptional focus to help you prepare for college admissions throughout the high-schooling years. Start today!

October 18, 2020