Comparing Ivy League Colleges: Brown, Columbia, Cornell

Webinar Transcription

2024-04-22 – Comparing Ivy League Colleges: Brown, Columbia, Cornell

Anesha: Hi everyone and welcome to tonight’s webinar. My name is Anesha Grant. I’m a senior advisor at CollegeAdvisor and I will be your moderator today. Today’s webinar is comparing Ivy League colleges Brown, Columbia, and Cornell. To get started, I just want to orient everyone with the webinar timing, so our presenters will introduce themselves, share a bit about their experiences at their respective institutions, and then we will open up the floor to respond to your questions in the live Q&A.

On the sidebar, you can download our slides under the handouts tab, and you can start submitting questions whenever you get ready in the Q&A tab. As a heads up regarding Q&A, we cannot give you a personalized admissions assessment. So, So please don’t share your profile and the questions. We cannot summarize your chance of getting in to any particular college.

So please do not ask us because our answer will be, we don’t know. Um, all right. So Katie, can you kick us off with a quick introduction and then we’ll move with Hania and then Meaghan.

Katie: Yeah. Hi, everyone. I am Katie. I am currently a fourth year medical student at Alpert Medical School, but also went to Brown for undergrad and was part of the eight year, uh, PLME BSMD program here. And that’s me.

Hania: Hi, everyone. I’m Hania. I graduated from Columbia last year. I did a dual degree. So I was Part of Columbia’s dual degree between school and Columbia University. And I studied science economics and did a track education.

Meaghan: Hi everyone. Nice to meet you all. My name is Meaghan. I graduated from Cornell university in 2019, and I majored in industrial and labor relations and modern in business and inequality studies. Um, and right now I work in. industry.

Anesha: Thank you. Uh, before we let our presenters get started, we’re going to do a quick poll, but presenters don’t go anywhere. Um, I usually ask about food as we were waiting for poll response to come in. So whenever you feel ready, tell us about what your favorite food spot, restaurant, um, or even dining hall was while you were on your campus.

Katie: Oh, go for it, Katie. Of course, no, no, go for it.

Meaghan: Um, my favorite food place at Cornell was Max, which was part of the hotel school. Um, and they had really great flatbread, so anytime I needed a pick me up, I would get the sun dried tomato flatbread and I would feel a lot better.

Katie: I love that. Um, I was going to say there’s this like tea shop on campus called Ceremony and they, it’s like a really calming environment to sit and study, but also they have really nice like tea drinks and boba drinks and like all these like fancy tea things. So that’d be my favorite.

Hania: And, um, for me, Columbia had like the subway sandwich, like dining hall type, and it was really good. So I loved going there and I thought the prices were really good. Um, it’s quite a small school, so we don’t have a lot of dining halls. So that was like my favorite though.

Anesha: You just happen to be in the middle of New York city though.

So I feel like you can find some places, even if you didn’t stay on campus. All right. Um, thanks y’all for sharing. I hope folks keep those spots in mind. And I liked this. The not studying and kind of cost affordable spaces as well, which is very important in college. I’ll go ahead and close our poll. It seems like the majority of folks with us are 11th grade.

So we have 43 percent from 11th grade, 29 percent from 12th grade. From, uh, 10th grade and then, uh, 29 percent other. Um, so I’m assuming some parents and teachers are in the space with us. I think our audience will grow over time, but, um, we’ll go ahead and move forward. I’ll stop talking. Katie will kick us off, then Hania, and then I’ll come back a little bit later for Q& A. Um, yeah. All right. Take it over.

Katie: All right. Hi, everyone. I’m Katie. Um, kind of introduce myself. So we’ll start with my college application process. So I’m from Los Angeles, California, and I went to a public magnetic high school just for all of you to have a little bit reference of who I am. And this high school is actually a title one school, which, um, for those of you who might not be familiar is has to do with the income class of the students that go to the school.

And so we often got Um, like, you know, help, help with lunch and help with AP test funding and things like that. Um, I also apply to most of my colleges with an interest in cognitive science and or pre med interest. Um, and, uh, mostly cognitive science, but interest in linguistics or human biology was really my thing.

And then a lot of the schools that I applied to include state schools such as UCLA, UCSD, UC Berkeley, and also a good number of target schools. The BSMD schools like I kind of talked about the program that I’m in, which is like a combined bachelor of science and then medical school sort of long eight year long program.

And then obviously I also applied to a good number of reach schools, including like the Ivy’s MIT Stanford with Western rice. Um, and I put here, cause I want to talk about how I decided which schools to not apply to. And I think that’s a, that’s a good question for those of you who might be looking at the Ivy league colleges and, you know, just in general, like, you know, reach colleges and like, Oh, my God, there’s so many schools that I want to go to.

Um, I think one thing that makes a big difference as far as schools of size, definitely pay attention to that. Um, whether it’s like a small school, like Caltech versus I would categorize Brown and most the Ivy is a medium size versus large as like UCLA. And then some other things I thought about was location.

So like, if you enjoyed being in New York City, for example, at Columbia, or if you You, um, I don’t know, like you look at essays, I think, like, I was like, Oh, I don’t, I don’t, this, I think Chicago’s essays were a lot, so I’m not applying, but those are some of the decision making things that I went through when I was applying.

Um, as far as other Ivy League schools, I was considering a number of others and the one, I think like my dream school at the time, um, my two dream schools were Stanford and Yale. Um, and I always say, uh, like my rejections as well as my acceptance in Sanford was a school that I applied to early action, did not get in, um, and then Yale, I ended up getting in, but ended up choosing Brown and BSMD program over that program.

Um, and some things to consider as well are going to be like, Thinking about for me as a pre med student, right? Like how easy the grading is, what my GPA was going to look like, what are the opportunities they had for me at this college, as far as getting research done and doing other pre med e things, um, as well as like financial aid.

And, um, when it came down to it, actually, after I got in, The financial aid packages between the schools actually differed quite a bit. And so thinking about, you know, like what I could negotiate as far as financial aid, um, going to these schools. Um, so ultimately Brown was the right fit for me, I think for two reasons that I listed here.

So PLME was one of them being the eight year long program. And then the open curriculum really was a good fit for me. And I will say, cause I, I know, um, you’ll talk later also, but, um, for me, like, I think Brown and Columbia, I think are like really Good representation that like the opposite end of the spectrum as far as how our freshman year curriculums are set up and the brown open curriculum ended up being the right fit for me as far as my exploration of things.

So, for those who are interested in applying to brown, I always say, I think it’s a great idea to get a good sense of what this school is so outside of just, oh, it’s an Ivy League school. Between each of the Ivy League schools, like what are the things that stick out to you about its philosophy? Like what makes one school different from another?

And how can you incorporate that into your application is a big part of how I advise my students to think about applications and also how I did it. Um, so for Brown itself, I would say our focus is very heavily centered around student advocacy as like a community. So thinking about ways in which we can get involved even with like school um Um, like getting admin to change things about different policies was a lot of what I did in undergrad, but also people get involved with like the steakhouse because it’s so close here and runs just small state.

You can actually make a pretty big impact as an undergrad, um, and as a medical student, I will say, and the other bit is the intellectual curiosity piece. So what makes Brown a little bit different is that we don’t have a, um, base, what is it called? Like base curriculum, like we don’t have classes that you have to take, um, Because you’re in college, if that makes sense.

So if you were an English major, you could theoretically never take a single math class in your entire four years of college. Um, gen ed, that’s what it’s called, gen ed, general departments. We don’t have any of those. And so there’s a lot more flexibility, I think, as far as your classes. schedule to take the classes that you might want to explore or learn about more about these disciplines.

I will say, I think, depending on the kind of student you are, for some people, this is overwhelming. You’re like, Oh my God, I have too much freedom. And for other students, this is like the best thing ever. And I definitely landed on that side of the spectrum where, um, uh, like looking at the courses being released every semester, like one of the most exciting things for me, I’m like, Oh my God, what are the new classes available?

Like what are the syllabi? Like, I loved doing that, like shopping of classes and learning what I could learn. What costs I could possibly take and getting excited about them. Um, other little bits of advice, um, balancing risk and creativity in your essay. So, um, you will, for those of you who are juniors, especially you have a lot of essays to write for all of our respective schools, um, multiple, more than one essay.

And so balancing, like maybe your personal statement is, More, um, of your traditional personal statement, or you write an essay about an extracurricular that’s pretty prominent in your application and balancing that with like, maybe a riskier essay that’s like a smaller essay. So I think, for example, one of my, like one 50 word essay, which is really short by the way, it’s like tiny, tiny.

Um, but one of my like small one-off essays was about, was written in the form of an autopsy report, um, of myself. And that was like a one way that I played with risk slash creativity to demonstrate. something about me and talk a little bit about, like, something about, of my interest that made sense of my personality.

And I would also say, like, don’t force it. Like, don’t write an acrostic poem if there is no indication of your interest in why you’d be doing that in the rest of your application. For example, um, and then finally do your research. We all have websites with information about our concentrations, about our professors.

Professors often have websites listing with research they’ve done, right? And I put here, um, a little link, which is, uh, cab. brown. edu, which is accessible to the public, which is courses at Brown. So you can actually look through what the students see every single semester as far as what classes are available to students and kind of shop through them. It’s like, look at what. And then that way, when you’re writing an application, you can be very specific.

Hania: Awesome. Thank you for that, Katie. Um, hi, guys. Um, my name is Hania again. Um, background, um, about me, I went to school in the Bay Area, so I’m from California as well. Um, I went to a public school and applying to colleges. Going in, I was a little bit confused. Like, most of, What I heard from or from other students and like my parents weren’t from the U.

S. So they had never navigated the, um, admission process before. So it was like really tricky, um, and scary. So going in applying, I knew I wanted to apply to the UCs since being from California, everyone did. So that’s what I mostly did. Um, I didn’t necessarily have a strong affinity to any, um, Ivy league per se, but then I came about, um, Columbia’s.

dual degree program, which really interested me. So for those of you who don’t know, um, Columbia and other schools as well, they offer a dual, dual bachelor’s degree, which means you study for two years, um, at one institution, and then you study two years, um, at another institution. So you’re not necessarily a transfer student, you’re getting a degree from each school, um, and you’re a student of each school.

So you’re kind of going to two different schools and getting two bachelor’s degrees. So I thought that was really cool. Um, so the school I went to was all the way in France. So it was really interesting to me, um, studying abroad in France for two years. I’m like also a native French speaker, so it just made a lot of sense.

And I always wanted to explore the world and was really interested, um, in that. Another big thing was I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. So I had a very strong interest in background in computer science. Most of my extracurriculars have been completely in computer science. So I knew I wanted to pursue computer science, but I had a deep affinity for humanities, for arts.

I was always a very creative, artsy person. So I knew that I really wanted that. And I was scared to commit and, um, apply as a computer science major. So for most of the schools and I applied, I didn’t specify like applied undeclared for most schools. And when I did the dual degree, um, I went on and like really focused on.

my computer science background, but also my humanity, my interest in humanities and combine those two together, which I think definitely helped. Um, so then for my applications, actually one more thing before that. So anyone interested in applying to the dual degree, another thing is when you’re applying to Columbia’s dual degree, you’re not allowed to apply to any other program.

So you can only apply to. So I was so in love with that program, so I definitely applied to it because of the program. I wasn’t necessarily looking at Columbia directly, but I really loved the idea of the dual degree. So going in the application, my application strategy was really, um, taking a holistic approach, which means don’t worry completely on just the numbers, like your academics and your SATs, but really focused on.

what you have to offer and who you are. So I had quite good extracurriculars. I was really focused in computer science. I loved building things. I loved applying to competition. So I really made sure that I showed that off and I showed my other interest in other fields as well. As I mentioned, like I really liked humanities and the arts.

So again, showing that I’m a well rounded student. I don’t only And focused on computer science. Um, so definitely highlighting that really helped. I also went to a lot of info sessions. So the dual degree offered a lot of them. And there they really highlighted the importance of extracurriculars. And when you go to info sessions, they tell you a lot about the program that gives you a good glimpse.

So you can use that later in your, um, personal essays. Next. So, uh, this goes, I kind of touched on that already. What made me consider Columbia compared to other schools. Again, the dual degree, I really loved it. It was so unique. It was very different, but that being said, it’s not for everyone. I know most people would hear like right after high school, going, studying abroad to a different country.

Um, it’s definitely not for everyone. And it’s very, very different. You’re not going to be having, um, the same traditional. Um, uh, pathway as like someone applying directly to Columbia. So when it comes to Columbia specifically, we have three different schools and we have, um, general studies. We have the School of Engineering, and we have, um, Columbia College, which is the main college and the dual degree you apply through, um, general studies.

And that school was like a bachelor. It was a bachelor’s school that was for, um, vets like after World War II. So usually it’s untraditional students who are much older that go to that school. So it has like a stigma associated to it. So, um, being like a traditional, somewhat traditional high school, uh, college applicant going to that school is very different.

So when you come into Columbia, you are coming in as like a transfer student. So there, it’s a very, very untraditional pathway, but I really liked it. And I love that Columbia offered that. So, um, that’s another thing you can look into as well. And next advice for students who are also interested in applying to Columbia.

So, um, main thing I would say is really research your programs thoroughly. Um, make sure that, um, You’re highlighting and showing who you are. So for me, it was really about my love for computer science, but also combining my love for fashion, my love for environmental science and the projects that I did and the community service that I did.

I was also very much into politics, which brought in the humanity side. So I did a lot of internships, canvas and campaign. So again, I feel like showing that you have a strong attachment to the program and that yeah. Your background really speaks to who you are and that you would be a good candidate. Um, and that goes again to the personal statement is really highlight who you are.

Like you’re more than a number. You’re more than your SATs. Um, show who you are and show them that you would be a great addition to the school. And again, that goes back to researching the program. Like, what does the program really highlight? What kind of, you know, people and backgrounds are they looking for? And if you could showcase that from your experience, then you could really show your case for being a good candidate.

Anesha: All right, before we get to Meaghan, uh, I want to do a really quick post or pub for, um, the Virtual College and Career Summit. So we want to take a moment to promote the event, which is happening on May 4th. It is a great opportunity for younger students, especially sophomores and juniors to connect with admissions officers and start their college journey by learning more about.

Schools like Stanford, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Columbia Brown, um, and Cornell will also be, I think, represented there. So you can scan the QR code that’s on the screen to register for that event. We are looking I’m hoping to get a very, very big network of folks for students to connect with, so definitely encouraging as many people as possible to register using the QR code that’s on the screen if you want to use it, and I’m going to navigate away from the screen to send me a quick message and I will put it back on so that folks can register for the event if you are interested. But again, all right, I’ll stop talking and we’ll hand it over to Meaghan.

Meaghan: Awesome. Thank you, Anesha. And before I get started, just please excuse me. I have a little bit of spring allergies right now, so I’m a little sniffly. Um, but to get started on what my college application process was like, I will preface this by saying I was looking at colleges in 2015.

So this is almost 10 years ago, but I would say that a lot of things, while a lot of things have changed, a lot of things have also stayed the same. Um, so excited to share a little bit more about what my journey was like a couple of years ago. Years before Katie and honey’s experience were, um, so ever since I started high school, college was on the mind because I have an older sister.

She was two years older than me. So we’re in high school at the same time. And when she was looking at colleges, I kind of just tagged along with her. I probably it wasn’t like the, you know, most important thing that I was thinking about, but I was exposed to it at an early age. And my sister was mostly targeting Ivy League schools.

Um, I think when it came to me, I. Was a little bit more looking at a wide range of schools. So thinking about like, or kind of concentrating a lot of my schools in more of the target range and I think this part of why my approach was like, that was because I honestly did not really know what I wanted to study and I needed a little bit more time and a little bit more flexibility to kind of figure out, like, What do I want to do for the next four years?

So I did have to do a lot of self reflection and figure out like, what are my likes? What are my dislikes? Especially, I think there was a little bit of confusion in high school because I, at first, I was really into STEM. And then in my junior and senior year, I realized that I was more into the humanities.

Um, so just like bearing with my own journey of figuring out what I was interested in and what I wasn’t. Um, And then that kind of flows into like how I finally identified the schools that I wanted to apply to. So I did a lot of research and then I really honed in on schools that had business programs and curriculums that were a lot more flexible and you could potentially do anything with.

Um, and then finally, I think because of my indecision, but also just because the process is lengthy and takes a lot of time just, you know, writing essays and putting together a personal statement, getting all your materials together, um, especially being a senior did take a lot of time. Um, I applied to around 10 schools.

There was a lot of supplemental essays. Um, there was a lot of additional work that had to go into it. So I think if I would pick one. could change anything going back in time. I would definitely start as early as possible and I would definitely try to refine my list, my school list as much as possible.

And that will kind of depend on what your priorities are. Um, so like there’s no right answer as to like, should I apply to like four schools versus 20 schools? It’s really kind of like where you’re at in the journey and what’s right for you. So, um, thinking about. the different reasons why I applied to the Ivy Leagues that I did apply to.

Um, so I, I ultimately applied to both Cornell and Columbia. Um, I grew up in the Northeast and frankly, like I only applied to schools in the Northeast. Um, so I think what really drew me to Cornell was, you know, going back to the whole theme of like, not really knowing what I wanted to do was the variety of different opportunities.

So Cornell has seven different schools. And the ones that I was most interested in were the applied economics and management major or school and the industrial and labor relations school. And then Columbia, on the other hand, does not have like a concrete business major. Rather, they have like a business concentration and then you can major in other things that can ultimately lead to a business career or like a career.

business kind of related, um, post grad opportunities. Um, and then in terms of location, I know that Katie and Hania kind of touched upon this before, um, but Cornell and Columbia are kind of very different environments. Cornell being a lot more, I guess you can say rural. It’s kind of like if you drive.

There from anywhere. You’re gonna pass by a lot of nothing. Meanwhile, Columbia is like right in the middle of the city. So, um, it was an interesting decision to factor in, like, the environment of the location as well. Um, and ultimately, I was a little bit more familiar with Cornell because my sister end up did end up going there.

Um, and then I grew up on the East Coast. So, um, I, I was familiar with Columbia as well. Um, but I didn’t want to. Kind of like, get a little bit further from home, which is why Cornell ended up being my choice. Um, and then finally, the opportunity. So, obviously, in New York City, you have a lot of, um, a big concentration of, of the alumni base.

There’s a lot of different companies and a lot of different opportunities there. Um, and while Columbia is kind of like, in the heart of it, all Cornell was actually pretty. Close to get to New York City was just like a four hour bus ride away. Um, and I think something else that drew me to Cornell was the model was any person in any study.

So as a result, I kind of felt confident that while I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do as a senior in high school, that I would be able to figure it out at Cornell and. You know, kind of like test out different opportunities and try different things. Um, and. So that kind of takes me to the next slide, which is what advice do you have for students interested in applying to Cornell.

I think it’s really important to kind of understand what your personal brand is. Um, I think this will help to highlight kind of like who you are in your personal statement and throughout your supplemental essays. I think that this, that, um, admissions, um, Is looking for kind of like a narrative and like how you want to show yourself.

So, um, and something that I kind of observed throughout my time at Cornell is that, you know, if. If someone was an entrepreneur, then they could really, they could really thrive at Cornell or like if someone branded themselves as a leader, they could find a lot of opportunities to do that. Or if you were pre med, there were a lot of different clubs and activities that can help you explore that.

And then I think something else that was super important was just demonstrating your leadership skills and how that can translate from the high school setting to like what you get involved in at Cornell, um, at Cornell, there were like thousands of different clubs that you can participate in and thousands of different opportunities to show your skills as a leader.

Um, and I think that Cornell really values that because it really contributes to the culture of the campus. Um, and. It really, especially because Cornell is kind of, um, it’s not in the middle of nowhere, but it’s definitely not in a big city. So a lot of the different activities that you could do on campus, it was student run, which I thought was really cool.

And, like, it gave me the opportunity to do a lot of things that I, that were probably out of my comfort zone as well in that regard. Um, and then. The next point I think has been universal, like definitely understand the different programs and opportunities available. So something that stood out to me in terms of applying to the industrial labor relations school within Cornell was the opportunity to kind of like travel and, you know, Get new experiences that I probably couldn’t elsewhere.

Um, so while there was not, it’s not a dual degree program, but there were like exchange programs internationally where you can kind of like go to another school abroad and they were connected to Cornell and take similar courses to what you would learn in the industrial labor relations school. Um, and then I personally.

Participated in experience a summer experience where I was able to travel to India for the summer and volunteer and do an internship. And that was super valuable to my experience. Um, and then finally, again, like, I know this is something that Hania and Katie touched upon, but it really is important to do your research.

These schools want to know that you’ve actually. Like spent some time thinking about your application and like, why you want to go to the school. Um, and I think it does help to also just to visit the school if you can, or at least go to. So I know that a lot of schools hold webinars or different like E or like, I guess, virtual sessions that you can participate in as well.

Um, But I think what really helped to high, sorry, what really helped to kind of highlight like my essay and my application at Cornell was showing like how much I knew about the program and like how I could tie that back to my experience. Um, so. Like, for example, the School of Industrial and Labor Relations is pretty focused on, like, organizational leadership and psychology.

So I thought about my personal experiences in high school and, like, my leadership positions and connected it back to potential opportunities that I could pursue at Cornell. Um, and I think ultimately tying all of that together, like your personal brand, your leadership skills, the research, and then, um, Kind of like putting it all together is what will help you be set up for success. Um, so with that, I’ll hand it over back to Anesha.

Anesha: Thank you. Meaghan. Um, all right, we are going to jump into our question. So that is the end of the formal question. I’m sorry. Presentation part of our session today. The way that Q&A will work is that you will go ahead and Submit your questions through the Q&A.

I will read them aloud and paste them into the public chat so that everyone can read them and give our panelists an opportunity to answer. If you’re having any challenges with submitting questions, just know that you might have to log out and log back in via the link you received in your email and not through our webinar landing page.

Again, we cannot give you a personalized admission schedule. assessment. So please do not share your profile in the questions. We cannot summarize your chance of acceptance. Right. The first question I wanted to ask, and I’ll ask, um, honey, uh, to start over, start, start with it because I think Katie responded in the chat. But I like the questions I wanted to ask to everyone. How has has attending an Ivy League school made a difference to your career prospects?

Hania: Um, hi, thank you for that. Um, to be honest, I’m going to say that it didn’t help completely. I would say, um, it definitely does give you a little bit of an advantage.

Like when you say I went to an Ivy League, I went to this school. School. Um, immediately you’ll be granted with a lot of respect. And there’s like a lot of prestige that comes with it. Um, that, so I will definitely not, um, under undermine that. But when it comes to it, I feel like, especially I’m coming from like a tech background.

So I think your, um, industry matters a lot too. So, so. Some people who were doing more law or they were trying to do more humanities based stuff. The Ivy League name definitely did help. So I’ll preface that. So coming in like computer science and like more of a tech background, I don’t think it holds as much, um, leverage and weight, but it does definitely help to a certain degree. Um, in my field, I think experience outweighs all. So it could be because of the job market as well, but that would be my honest response.

Meaghan: I’d like to chime in too. I definitely agree with you, Hania. I think, you know, A lot of it is experience and hard work. And I think the one benefit that going to an Ivy league provides is that there are some companies, it depends on what field you’re in that will kind of exclusively recruit at certain schools.

Maybe it’s not Ivy leagues, but it could also be like other top tier schools. So I think that does help. And then something that I have experienced just being in the workforce for Almost five years now is if you find other people that went to the same school, um, you kind of find yourself a little mini community there at work and they can help you in terms of mentorship, providing advice, et cetera.

Um, but at the same time, like I have a lot of friends that went to public schools that were also really great and they were able to find similar benefits in terms of like a huge alumni base and also like finding people at their workplace that also went to the same school. So while. I think there are a lot of benefits. Um, I think that, you know, it’s not going to be like a make or break for your career.

Anesha: Katie, I don’t know if you wanted to add live what you shared, um, in the chat.

Katie: Oh yeah. Um, I was, I would just quickly say, I think for med school and I would say some of my friends who are like doing PhD slash like research type program, professorship type things, it’d be slightly different in terms of, I think in med school, Or med school applications, it’s very much heavily based on your GPA and on your MCAT score to put very bluntly, I mean your college GPA, so it’s, it’s, um, it certainly helps to go an Ivy League or go to a big name school, but I would say what it really comes down to is those two factors.

And if you go to a lesser known school, Cool. You have an amazing MCAT score, amazing GPA, and like your application comes together. I think you have just as good of a shot at going to a great med school, um, as an Ivy League school. Um, and then for PhD, what I’ve, what I have come to, I think, understand is just, I mean, I’m not in it, so I’m kind of guessing at it, but my understanding is like, you want access to ideally good researchers and also PIs, PI being principal investigators, like people who are renowned in the field and being able to work under them and work with their research can be a huge boost to your application, but I think similarly, right, it’s at the end of the day, it’s about your experience and the projects you’ve worked on. Um, and so that’s certainly, uh, what it comes down to, too.

Anesha: Thanks, Katie. Um, uh, Meaghan, I was gonna pose this question to you because I think it came up while you were speaking, but everyone absolutely feel free to chime in. Um, someone asked, How early did you apply? Most college applications open August 1st. So are you staying to start earlier? Are you saying to start then or early? I think you were saying start early.

Meaghan: Yeah, happy to answer. So I believe I started thinking about it more seriously in September. I think during the summer I was like very loosely thinking about like, oh, like, what are the prompts for the Common App, but I wasn’t actually like writing anything down.

Um, I think it is helpful to use the summer to just at least jot down some ideas, brainstorm, think about, you know, what, what you might want to talk about in your Common App essay. Okay. What schools you are that are going to be on your list and getting yourself organized early and that I think will set you up for success when it becomes like September, October, November time frame when like early action, early decision, regular decision starts rolling in just so that you can balance both your schoolwork, your extracurriculars and applying for college apps.

I do feel like Applying for college sometimes probably felt like a little bit like a part time job just because there’s a lot of time that you have to put into it. So the more that you can prepare yourself for that the less stressed you will be and like I think the more successful you’ll be at the end of the day.

Anesha: Anything to add Hania or Katie? I will say, um, just as an advisor, I would say to go into senior year with your personal statement done. Um, I think that’s the, that’s the one thing you don’t have to wait till August 1st to start, but the topics will usually be the same. Um, and I, yeah, that, that would be my one piece of advice is just going into senior year with your, your personal statement done.

So start working on that for however long it takes you to get through essays. Um, I think, Hania, did you come off? I feel like you went, you went off, you were going to say something, but I,

Hania: Yeah, I was just going to agree with Meaghan, like everything she said and what you said as well starting as soon as possible definitely helped just getting a loose idea.

So like, I was similar to make it as well during the summer. I was loosely thinking about it like my friends were. So I guess having a circle of friends were also actively in the same space. Spot as you definitely helps in working together. But yeah, definitely starting as soon as you can. Like don’t stress your yourself out too much during the summer, but at least outlining it and figuring out vaguely what you’re going to do will definitely help you and you won’t be stressed. Like last minute.

Anesha: Okay. Our next question is I’m not going to ask you to do exactly what it says, but I would say someone said, can you describe what type of students you were in high school? And I’ll ask you to talk about what extracurricular issue you participated in.

Katie: I can start us off. Um, so as far as GPS, I mean, I applied a while ago at this point now, so the numbers are very different, but I had decent like number academics.

I think what it came down to was extracurriculars for me. So one of my two, my more prominent ones would be, um, I worked at a suicide hotline when I was in high school and ended up writing my personal statement about that. And I think that was certainly a factor that. Help me stand out both for the undergrad applications and for the medical side of the applications, um, and I would think a bigger even more than just like, Oh, look, the novelty factor of what I did.

It was more about how I pull it together with my application. Um, and also what I’m, Currently, I’m still going into so clearly I’ve been very consistent the past eight years. Um, but I work at a suicide hotline and then I really connected to the kind of importance of linguistics and language and active listening, but also thinking about things like, uh, child abuse and child development and all of those things were also prominent parts of my application and the importance of writing and storytelling and the other extracurriculars, some of the more minor extracurriculars you would put in quotations, I guess, um, was like, I, I worked on like the, um, school magazine, for example.

So that kind of contributed to. This like understanding that I was someone who was interested in humanities as well. And then my other prominent extracurricular was that I was captain of our science Olympiad team. Um, and again, I was some person, right? Went into sciences, like vaguely, but, um, as captain of science, Olympia team that I really wanted to emphasize was the fact that I went to a title one school and that we did not have a lot of funding.

or parental support for our science olympiad team. And we also still did really well at the state level. And so I talked a little bit, a lot about my role as a captain and what my role was as far as like administration, having a lot of responsibilities and being able to take that on as well as like what it felt like to, and if I could go back to what I would write more about, even, um, deliver bad news, like, you know, Talk to peers and let them know like, Hey, like you did not get this position slash you did get this position, um, figure out like those like high tension situations and, and have to navigate that as a leader. Um, so those were kind of my main, I think, point.

Meaghan: Go ahead.

Hania: Okay, thanks. I can go. Um, yeah, for me, I did a lot of extracurriculars in computer science. I majored in computer science. I really wanted to show that. Um, so I worked on a water optimization system, like, my freshman year, part of like a science fair project. And from then on, Um, and then after the science fair, I started competing and improving the project and going to different competitions.

I ended up going to like a competition in, um in Chad, where my parents are from in Africa and competed there and met with some presidents. And then after that, I competed like at other tech competitions, and it just was like kind of like a domino effect. So I was like, really fortunate to have like my start.

Just the local science fair and that opened opportunities to other places and then being a woman in A woman of color in computer science. I definitely really, um, made sure to give back. So showing like, Hey, I didn’t think I was good enough. I didn’t even want to do computer science. So I gave back to my community by showing, showcasing my project at, um, maker fairs and, um, having like keynote speeches and talks.

And then that got me into teaching computer science as well. Um, and then I wasn’t only interested in computer science, but I also really loved it. Political science and economics. So I wanted to weave that in. So I mentioned it earlier, um, that I did a lot of internships, um, at the local, um, council level.

Um, so I interned for, um, my, the assembly women’s, um, election campaign, and I also interned for my Congress, uh, our. local congressman’s presidential campaign. And when I was writing my personal statement, when I did my interviews, I really highlighted the fact that I was interested in the intersection of technology and economics and seeing the influence of technology and more developing countries and developing economies in Africa.

So the dual degree I did had a program in Euro African studies. So I really leveraged that and my interest in like, um, computer science and promoting it to women and in Africa as well. So that really tied in very nicely. So I was able to find a program that fit my interests and made sure that it was really authentic.

So I think that’s really a big thing that helps is like finding a program that really speaks and can. Is relatable to, um, the extracurriculars that you did in your genuine, genuine interest.

Meaghan: Um, I can answer pretty quickly here. So in terms of GPA and SAT, I would say, well, I think one thing that I do want to share is that you don’t need to get all A’s in high school to get into an Ivy League. Or, or top tier school. Like I definitely like failed tests in high school and like got a B or I might’ve even gotten a C and like, at the end of the day, the admissions process is holistic.

They’re not just looking at your numbers, but they’re looking at you as a whole person. So I know the other part of your question was extracurriculars. I would say it was a little bit all over the map on this one. I did participate in a lot of different sports. Um, sports clubs, I guess, in school. And then I also held a bunch of different leadership positions and also did a lot of kind of like honor societies.

And honestly, I think if I could do things differently, I would focus only on the things that I actually cared about and that I enjoy doing rather than just trying to get a bunch of different leadership positions on a page. I think that is a more valuable use of your time and it’ll really help. It’ll really like.

Shine through in your application that you’ve spent your time on things that you care about. Um, so that that’s kind of my thoughts on GPA, S.A.T., extracurriculars

Anesha: you. Thank you. Meaghan. Thanks all for giving your thoughts before we move forward with the question. Going to do a quick little P. S. A. So CollegeAdvisors team of over 300 former admissions officers and admissions experts are ready to help you and your family navigate the college admissions process in one on one advising sessions.

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We will go ahead and leave that QR code up on the screen and get back to our questions. So our next question, um, and I guess people can comment on this as they want, but let’s Start with Hania and then, um, Katie and Meaghan, let me know, um, when looking at the environment of a university, which one is better urban, suburban or rural?

I’ve heard some say that the smaller cities and towns are better because the professors might have more time and availability. So feel free to speak to the question as an advisor or about your own, um, experience and how you chose your college election.

Hania: Yeah, that’s such a wonderful question. It’s a really great question.

Um, especially for me going to Columbia and like New York City, very much like, uh, city environment, very busy. Um, and going in applying. I didn’t really think too much about that. I didn’t think too Keep put that in mind. And I was like, just very lucky that it ended up working out for me. But I would say it is very, very important to think about what kind of person you are and what kind of environment, um, you’re most compatible with.

Cause I had a lot of friends who absolutely did not like Columbia because of the environment. They really loved the suburban, the quiet, the slow town life. So keeping that in mind will definitely help. As for me. Um, I love the city life and going in, I didn’t know. Cause like being in high school, you don’t know, like, am I going to like the suburban?

Do I want the city life? So some people, they know, they know what they want from the get go. And some people don’t, I definitely going in, didn’t really think much about it or knew what I wanted. Um, but I ended up absolutely loving Columbia, um, where. We’re in the upper west side where it’s not super, super busy like NYU.

So NYU is like just in the middle of downtown. Very busy, very crazy. But we have like a small campus, very small school in the middle of the city in a very quiet area, not the most fun area. It’s a very quiet area. I also felt like since it was a smaller school, you would walk around and you would see a friend like there’s no day where you’re walking around campus and you’re not going to see someone that you know, it’s a very small campus so very tight knit communities, where it’s also not small to the point where everyone knows everyone so when I went to the French school the environment was definitely giving high school, and everyone knew each other and it was very too too tight and I didn’t like that.

That’s I really love that. Columbia was a perfect balance. So to answer the question, I think you definitely want to think about what your you feel like you would thrive in the most. But for me, I absolutely love the city life, but I know it’s not for everyone. Um, and it was like just the perfect balance for me. So it really does depend on the type of person you are.

Meaghan: Yeah, I would definitely agree. Um, it’s really about your preferences and like what honestly it could be also about what you’re comfortable with or what you’re not comfortable with. So like maybe you come from a super like urban area and you want to try something new and like experience a different pace of life like that could be a factor or maybe you’re Yeah, From the suburbs, and you want something that is a little bit more similar to how you were used to growing up.

Um, and then I think to kind of just talk a little bit more about like my experience at Cornell, as I mentioned before, again, like Cornell is not in the middle of nowhere, nowhere. Like there’s a couple of different cities that are maybe like a two to four hour drive away. Um, but at the same time. There was all like Cornell is definitely like a very college town vibe.

So like downtown Ithaca has a lot of restaurants and little venues and shops that you can go to. And what I mentioned before is that I think the students really make the community. So while maybe we didn’t have like a huge city nearby, like there was always something to do because there were different like Student performances or, um, different events going on.

So I think that like, that is a similar sentiment that you’ll hear at other schools too. Like the students really make the community. And at the end of the day, so much of what Hania said, it’ll really depend on like what you’re looking for. And if you can, like, definitely recommend seeing it in person just so that you can like see for yourself and understand what it might be like. For the next 4 years or so.

Katie: Yeah, I really second the seeing it for yourself too. Because I mean, as someone from LA, I was like, used to the urban setting and I didn’t really know what people meant by rural until I visited Dartmouth. And then I kind of understood like, oh, this is like. What an example of a smaller school in a more remote setting would look like Um, I would say that brown so brown is in providence Which is the capital of rhode island rhode island being our smallest state Um, and so it’s like a in the way that brown is set up.

It’s like on a hill and so they’re kind of like you get a little bit of the best of both worlds in the sense that you have like a College campus and like almost like a college little town But also if you want to go a little broader you go downtown And then there’s all of Providence as a city. And I would say now as a medical student who, you know, works in the hospital and lives down the hill now in the city, um, it’s like a really nice size for me personally.

Um, in the sense that it’s, it’s a city, but it’s a smaller city. So I still get the benefits of like, you know, there’s like a restaurant life. It was like a whole, like, there’s like multiple different kinds of communities, like in pro in, in Providence and Rhode Island that I can go to very quickly, but also it’s not quite like LA where it’s, um, Like there’s just such a vastness of both diversity and culture, but also of like space and, and things that might be a little overwhelming for, for me as like a, or for us as like a first time adult kind of living your college slash young adult dreams.

Um, and also Boston is like a, a really, really quick. Train or an hour, but like it’s a really easy train ride away And so as an undergrad also whenever I wanted to go and see my friends at different schools Or I wanted to eat different like foods that weren’t available in providence. I would just go to boston Um, and I would say part of that question I saw was about like opportunities I wouldn’t say the opportunities so much are based off of the urban suburban rural designation.

Um, I think Because at the end of the day, the opportunities that are available to you are based off the university that you’re at. And I think at any of these universities, you will have a great amount of opportunity available to you. I think maybe what you might be thinking of or might be getting at is a kind of like thinking about like a liberal arts school.

I think it’s like one way to think about liberal arts school, um, meaning like one of those like much smaller, um, Class of 2000 students type of schools where it’s much smaller. And therefore, you know, the professors might know you more personally, um, versus that a much larger public school, for example, where, um, your chemistry class might be hundreds of students.

And therefore, you probably will not be on first name basis with your professor of your chemistry class. Um, and so that’s like, I think, I think when we’re talking about professors and opportunities, it’s really about the size of the school. And I think when it comes down to it, that really is what makes the biggest impact in my opinion, um, as far as.

As far as like getting access to research and also kind of how it feels, um, and most of these medium sized schools, the way I like to summarize it is if I walk across campus, I will typically at least see one person that I recognize, um, whether it’s from a class I’ve taken with them or they’re a friend or from like one of the other affinity groups that I’m a part of versus at a larger school like UCLA.

I think one way that my friend described it is like when you cross campus, like you will, Almost every time you will not see a single person that you recognize slash no, because the school is just has so many more students and is also a bigger campus. Um, so hopefully that kind of got at the front parts of that question.

Anesha: Thank you. Um, I appreciate your thoughts and comments on that question. The 1 thing I would add to the professor perspective. I agree with Katie’s last comment of. The campus doesn’t really affect professor availability. I think it will be definitely more if you’re interested in that. I would look more at the faculty to student ratio.

That might give you a better idea about availability. Um, and then also looking at how much research or those types are internships are open to undergraduates versus graduate students, or if it is a campus with graduate students on it, because I think that also sometimes it makes campuses bigger. Um, okay, uh, the next question is what advice would you give to students that have a hard time earning leadership positions in schools?

Are there alternatives? So, um, I think we were talking about extracurriculars in the past and people feeling they need to stack up leadership. Any thoughts for folks who may not have a ton of leadership on their resume?

Meaghan: I think there’s a lot of different ways that you can show leadership that don’t necessarily mean being president of a club.

Um, so for example, if there’s something that you’re super passionate about, like maybe in your community and you volunteer, that is a kind of like a demonstration of leadership. Like you’re taking initiative and you’re doing something that matters to you. Um, I think another type of leadership or another way to gain more leadership experience is.

Maybe identify a gap at your school, like if there’s a certain club that you would really love to be a part of, but it doesn’t exist. Like that’s something that maybe you can consider creating. Um, something that I did a couple of times in high school was create a couple of clubs Um, that definitely gave me a lot of leadership experience because you have to identify in some schools like a teacher that will be your advisor.

You have to recruit members. You have to put together a plan for what the goal of the club is going to be and like how you’re going to accomplish those goals. Um, and I think even like having. A part time job could show leadership as well. So I think, um, there’s a lot of ways to show leadership without it being like the traditional way of being a president of a club or like captain of a team.

I think, especially in your position, applying to colleges, like, it’s up to you to define what leadership looks like and kind of like weave that into your application.

Katie: Yeah, I would really strongly second. And I would also argue, like, there are some people who are presidents of, like, tons of existing clubs that ultimately don’t do very much, like, some, like, some clubs, like, you know, like, they don’t, they kind of sit around, eat lunch once a week. And that’s like the entire club.

And, like, the value of that leadership position, I think, yeah. More than you maybe you guys realize like I think like we in admissions are pretty aware of like what that looks like and We’re able to be like, oh, yeah Like this is a club that like what were the what were the contributions of this club?

And we kind of like have a good way of stratifying it um So I think some people get really anxious about about like the number of leadership positions their classmates have versus them And I really think that’s like a thing to emphasize like it is quality over quantity And we are able to parse that out.

Like, you know, we’ve been through this system We all know what it’s like we can sense that kind of thing Um and And I think even beyond like starting a club, um, if there are things like in the community extracurricular wise, so I, I think unlike, um, our other two panelists, sadly, I’m still in school and therefore I’m still applying to things and therefore I’m also still thinking about my resume.

I’m very much in the same position as a lot of you juniors out there right now, as I’m looking forward to residency. And so. Like one example of something that I don’t have, it’s a leadership position, but I, um, decided I was going to use my college essay editing experience to work with, um, the local foster kid community.

Cause it’s a kid, that’s a community that I actually work with a lot in my clinical practice and I’m really interested in. Um, and so I was like, yeah, I’ll just reach out and like on paper, I am just a volunteer. But also I am like, I would be starting this thing. And so in, in that way, like it is an innovative slash, like it’s like, it is its own form of leadership and it will certainly come through that way if you were able to explain it that way.

Um, and not everyone, like not everyone has a strength in like administrative slash, like getting logistics done slash like organizing people. Right. I think that’s like a very specific skill set and not everyone has that skill set. And I think that’s. Totally okay, and we often think about leadership in that way because we’re that’s how we’re taught leadership looks like but it can definitely look It can look very, very different from that.

Um, and so finding kind of where it carving out your own niche of where you can forge your own sort of path and, and calling that leadership, I think is one, is one way to think about it.

Anesha: Anything to add Hania?

Hania: Um, no, I second, uh, second, everything that you guys said. Um, I don’t think I have anything to add. It was good.

Anesha: Wanted to make sure. Um, uh, this question also comes up frequently. Um, what were the topics of your essays? How did you go about developing your personal statement?

Hania: I can take this one. Um, a really great question. Um, the, I’ll start with the topic of the, um, essays that I wrote for the program I ultimately got into. Um, I think one, one of the topics was about challenges. And then the second one was about just like, why do you want to be a part of this program? program.

So I was really able to shine using those two. And then one tip that I feel like isn’t given enough is like to really be authentic. I leaned in on my friends who knew me the best and they helped me craft ideas or just stories of myself that they knew or they saw with me. So with the challenges I had ideas and challenges that I went through, but getting it from their perspective, seeing the challenges that I went through and they saw me overcome it and getting their perspective and having them read my essays really did help me make it more authentic and really real.

Um, the crazy thing is recently I was talking to another student and they were asking me about like, Um, my essays, I shared it with them and they were like, this sounds exactly what like you today, like you describing yourself today and the things you told me today. So, um, I feel like I was able to make it very authentic because I leaned in and made sure that it was true to me.

And I leaned in on people who knew me very well to help me with it. Um, I also applied to the UCs that had, um, Questions and topics that I was able to really show myself in. So there’s one about creativity. So I really touched upon that being like more in the stem and the tech world, but also being able to combine my love for art and creativity that was usually pushed away by my immigrant parents who always wanted me to focus on stem.

So, um, Again, really finding topics that speak to you and that can help you reveal your true, true authenticity, um, will help you shine, will really help you, will go a long way.

Katie: Yeah I, um, I like, I really like what you said about sort of it reflecting who you are today. I do think like the, which the mark of like a really, like I think applications, if you can look back and say like, Hey, like those classes that I said, I was going to take, I took them. Like those things that I said I was interested in, I actually was interested in them and like pursued them in college.

And I think like, that’s a great marker of like showing you did like accurate introspection to be taught. Like, I like, it’s a funny way to put it, but it’s like your introspection was there and it was true to yourself and it was accurate. Um, I talked a little bit of my essays already. Um, one of them being about my work on the suicide hotline.

Um, And then another one that I thought, um, I remember someone had caught, like, one of the admissions officers had mentioned to me after I got in was, um, I had an essay about how I failed as a captain of the science Olympiad team. And at the time, this was something that was incredibly, like, emotionally difficult for me.

I remember in high school, because it was a lot of, I thought there was a lot of stress, a lot of pressure. And I really felt like I was failing in a lot of ways. But I ended up turning it into this essay. It was kind of like a challenge essay, um, talking about like where, like what was meaningful about this experience to me, but also like where I felt as I felt filled as a leader and sort of like, well, like what I learned and what I grew from that experience.

Um, and then the other main essay that I wrote a lot of was why medicine as someone who was applying into like a lot of these medical programs. And so for my why medicine essay, um, I spent a lot of time in any of these rather pre med may have also seen my pre med talks but the main things that you really want to focus in on an aspect of Being a doctor and a very specific things for everything like every anytime you’re talking about an interest of yours You want to be as specific as possible because that’s going to help you be in quote unquote like unique, right?

Because there’s no essence ever going to be unique but if you can find a particular intersection of interest of yours that you can really use to to that are supported by your extracurricular supported by, you know, the cost you’ve taken your interest like that can make for a really interesting application and also make you come together as a person that makes sense to me as someone who’s reading an application, remember you in that way.

Um, and so my why medicine application was amongst a lot of things focused in on Um, the importance of being an educator and being a teacher as a doctor. And, um, today, like, I’m still really interested in medical education, something that I almost certainly go into. And so, and, you know, it all makes sense, but having that focus is really important.

Anesha: All right, thank you. Uh, sorry, I was like, going between questions. Um, all right, our next question, um, and I think anyone can take this. Oh, sorry, we’re at time. I was not paying attention. I was going to go keep writing. But thank you, everybody. Thank you all for those questions. We appreciate, um, our panelists for taking the time to come in and connect with us.

Someone asked about e portfolios. Did anyone have an e portfolio as we’re wrapping up? No. Yeah. Um, I don’t, I think it’s, if you have it, share it, but if you don’t, don’t worry about it. Don’t stress. It’s not something you need. Okay. All right. That was our official last question. Um, all right. Thanks to everyone for joining us.

We hope you had the opportunity to, we hope that you enjoyed the opportunity to hear from our panelists. Thanks Katie, Hania, and Meaghan. Webinars this month. Uh, tomorrow, April 23rd, we’ll have an open “Q&A With Former Admissions Officers.” Former AOs will also be back with us on Wednesday with “Advice for Fine Tuning Your College List,” and we’ll end the month with a session on “Starting Early to Stand Out,” sharing guidance specifically on how to prepare for college admissions in 8th through 10th grade.

All right, but until next time, take care and have a great evening, everybody, and thanks again to our amazing panel.