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Application Strategies (part 3 of 4)
The Non-Essay Portions of Your ApplicationAs stated earlier, essays are a low-income student applicant’s best friend because the rest of the application is fairly straightforward and, in fact, has the aim of being as standardized as possible. Applications will ask you for your grades, standardized test scores, your class rank, your awards, extra-curriculars, and your contact information.There isn’t a great deal of elaboration that you can do within these categories. You’ve done certain things, gotten certain awards, received certain grades, or you haven’t. Therefore, the only way to maximize these areas is to know what colleges consider an achievement or an extra-curricular activity. This is not the time to be shy or modest. Admissions officers want to know about your background and what you do outside of the classroom in order to put your academic performance into a larger context. In the extra-curricular activities section of your application, you will have the opportunity to state any activities that are meaningful to you. A college wants to see a student that has demonstrated interests beyond academics. Your involvement in these other interests allows colleges to see how and what motivates you when you aren’t in classes. You may have needed to spend your time doing things you don’t consider to be as “college attractive” as your peers’ activities. For example, you may have needed to work a part-time job, take care of your siblings or family members, or have had a personal emergency that you have needed to take care of. If this is the case, there is no need to worry. So long as you indicate somewhere on your application that these other activities are ones taking up your extra free time, then most admissions officers will not look at you less favorably. These seemingly less “college attractive” activities happen to be very common for low-income students, especially having a part-time job. Having a job is a fantastic thing that shows a high level of personal motivation. Working part-time to support yourself or your family is generally more challenging than doing volunteer work in your community. You can indicate these things in the section of the application where you list extra-curricular activities, within an essay if a certain activity you do is meaningful enough to you (we have read some excellent essays about after school jobs and taking care of sick relatives), or within an essay that asks you for any additional information that you were not able to express in your application.
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