I’m Raj Pabari, a student at Stanford University. Here’s a look inside getting into top schools from the perspective of my admissions officers, college interviewer, friends, and myself.
Raj’s Ten Tips to Stand Out in College Applications:
1] Tell a Story Through Your Essays
2] Tell Your Whole Story
3] Be Creative
4] Get Familiar With the Program
5] Assume Nothing
6] Fill Up the Activities Section
7] Find Diverse Recommenders
8] Stay Loose During Your Interview
9] Submit Well Before the Deadline
10] Relax and Be Yourself
Motivation
There are a lot of college application resources online. I am no professional college counselor, and I’m not trying to sell you anything. My overarching motivation is to share what I wish I knew before I started, with students who are undertaking the college admissions process. In this post, I will try to accomplish three things –
1] Collect the knowledge I’ve gained from external primary sources – my peers, admissions officers, and interviewers – this is invaluable knowledge that is exceedingly hard to gain without having gone through the process
2] Give examples of what the “good” things to do on your college application actually look like in real life
3] Create a shareable mega-thread that aggregates information about succeeding on college applications from start to finish
About Me
Freshman at Stanford University
Major – Computer Science and Management Science & Engineering
ACT: 36, GPA: 4.0 unweighted
Primary extracurriculars –
1] Founder/CEO of Off Grid Technologies, Inc.
2] Founder of TutorsForGood.com
3] Guest speaker with TEDx Talk, entrepreneurship instructor, press coverage
Interests –
1] Social entrepreneurship
2] Running, hiking, and the outdoors
3] Fostering kittens
For a broader view of my activities and interests, visit the homepage of my website.
Video
If you’d prefer to watch a video version, check out the webinar I presented about “Standing Out in Your College Applications” to students hosted by the US Embassy in Kenya.
Note: there is more information in the written tips below than in the video. At the time of presenting this webinar in July 2022, I hadn’t yet received feedback from my Stanford admissions officers and interviewer.
Raj’s Ten Tips to Stand Out In College Applications
1] Tell a Story Through Your Essays
Your essays are your chance to show the admissions officers the story behind your resume rather than just telling them a list of accomplishments. Beware of “veering descriptive” (quote from my Stanford admissions officers) in the sense that you’re just explaining what you did without any insight about how you did it or what it reveals about you as a person. Don’t fall into the trap of just listing your accomplishments in your essays.
A valuable way to think about your essays as a story is to consider your life as a movie or book where you are the hero. A good movie has to follow the basic structure of a plot. There’s an exposition, rising actions, climax, falling actions, and denouement. I recommend that your essays be structured in a similar fashion. The main character (you!) doesn’t have it easy all the time – they are generally navigating their way through a series of many challenges throughout the story and eventually come out on top (but likely not unscathed). However, the reader or audience is supportive of the protagonist because they are a good person who finds themselves in a tough situation and gets through the challenge with a clear mind.
Use these insights from the elements of good stories in your essays. Don’t make everything sound easy; instead, make sure to highlight how you overcame challenges that eventually led to success. It’s okay to reveal a weakness or something that you struggle with. Even superheroes have their weaknesses (think: Superman and kryptonite), but they’re still characters that you want to see succeed. Maybe an especially impactful experience altered you in some way or changed the way you perceive the world – make sure to mention these lasting effects as they are often remembered by the application readers.
For those of you who are reading this in advance of college applications, I recommend gaining these formative experiences that you can use to tell your story. Keep a note of any very important periods of your life that you can write about later in your essays. Otherwise, you may simply forget about some very impactful stories that would make a great essay. If you don’t challenge yourself enough such that you can grow and learn, now’s a great time to start putting yourself out there!
Example:
A weaker thesis of an essay may read like this: “I am a leader in my community and am good at finding opportunities to serve.”
On my application, I decided to convey this idea by telling the founding story of TutorsForGood.com, which stemmed from a need I identified in March 2020 for personalized support during distance learning. Telling this story allowed me to demonstrate leadership beyond just starting TutorsForGood.com, by explaining some of the challenges I resolved in order to grow the service. Again, focus on showing the admissions officers the characteristics you exhibit rather than telling them.
2] Tell Your Whole Story
You learn a lot about the protagonist in a movie. You don’t just learn about how they contribute to the central movie plot; you also gain insights into their personal lives. This multifacetedness is part of what makes them likable. If they were one-sided, you wouldn’t feel nearly as much connection to them.
Similarly, colleges are looking to admit real people with real lives. They want to hear a bit about what your personal life looks like. If you only present what your academic and professional accomplishments look like, it may even appear that you’re obscuring part of your personal story. Balance these topics with insights into your life and hobbies. You will likely be able to tell stories about the many lessons you’ve learned from non-academic contexts. For instance, I wrote an essay about the insights I’ve drawn from running on an organized team and on my own (if you’re interested, that essay was essentially a super-condensed version of my July blog post).
Showing different sides of yourself also spills over within each category (academic, professional, and personal). If you can avoid it, don’t just talk about one research project you did, an internship you worked at, or one extracurricular activity. If you do find yourself talking about the same experience in multiple places, at least write about different aspects of it – space on your college application is limited, so don’t waste it by being repetitive.
Example:
For each application, I spent 1-3 days making a topic map before writing any of my essays. The topic map was my brainstorming period. I looked at each prompt, wrote down a few ideas that I could use for each, and considered which option would be the strongest. Then, after selecting a topic for each essay, I looked at the application as a whole to ensure it painted a full picture of me and adequately balanced academic, professional, and personal, revising my selections if necessary.
3] Be Creative
Top schools are looking for bold students willing to push the boundaries. A great way to demonstrate your boldness is through your writing. This could be the topic you choose, the way you approach the prompt, or the way in which you write. You have the opportunity to tell your unique story – do that to the best of your ability.
In discussions with Stanford interviewers, I learned that given the locale in which they interview each year, they become familiar with the local context. If all of the students in your school participate in the same extracurriculars and have very similar profiles, your interviewer has likely heard a very similar academic story before. Those things, while impressive relative to the average applicant, may not be as important in context. Similar to the interviewers, admissions officers are often localized so they can gain knowledge about the context. Instead, your creativity, unique perspectives, and uncommon extracurriculars are what will make your application memorable.
One of the simplest techniques to demonstrate creativity is to include a hook in your essays. Your readers see an incredibly high volume of applications, so it would behoove you to grab their attention as quickly as possible. Having an eye-catching hook may be the difference between your essay getting looked at closely and skimmed over.
Example:
Stanford Prompt – “How did you spend your last two summers?”
I wrote an essay that showed my love for the outdoors while hinting at the work I did over the summer working on my startups and dual enrolling in community college courses. Based on my topic map from Tip #2, it made sense to tell more of the personal part of my story, hence why I chose to just briefly mention my work rather than focus on it.
This essay was distinctive because I structured it atypically as a numbered list of what I did over the past two summers, where each of the items was connected by a common theme. This expressed creativity in the way I wrote the essay (list structure) and the topic I chose (most students write about internships, research, etc.).
4] Get Familiar With the Program
Every college is unique; make sure that you understand the quirks of wherever you choose to apply. Most students apply to many colleges. As they continue applying, the “why us” essay reads more and more generic, reading generally along the lines of meeting interesting people, studying rigorous academics, and living on a beautiful campus.
Each of those generic reasons why you’re interested in a specific college is completely valid. Honestly, when people ask me what my favorite part of Stanford is so far, it’s certainly the amazing people and community I am surrounded by. If you have unique reasons why you’re interested in a given college, write about those. If you don’t have any, at least contextualize the generic reasons for the program you’re applying to. If you can research professors, courses, or research opportunities on campus, it shows a greater degree of effort than the average applicant.
Example:
For one program I applied to, the director hosts “moving office hours” where he talks to students for an hour while on his morning run. I mentioned this detail in passing in the context of how I look forward to engaging with faculty, which demonstrated my understanding of the program and faculty.
During a webinar introducing another program I applied to, the director suggested making a personal website to showcase experiences – this was part of the reason I created rajpabari.com.
5] Assume Nothing
Assume the reader knows nothing.
Assume they know nothing about your background – Even though you may have included some piece of information in your 50-word activities description, or listed a class on your transcript, you can’t assume that the reader remembers every little detail. If there’s an important piece of information you’re writing about, give a brief one-sentence summary of it, just to ensure that you and the reader are on the same page.
Assume the reader knows nothing about your subject – Because admissions officers read many applications very quickly, if they’re confused by yours, it won’t stand out from the rest. Avoid using an excessive amount of jargon or overly specific details about your area of expertise. Your essays should tell a compelling story to a complete layperson.
Assume they haven’t even read the last paragraph you wrote – If a reader picks up your essay at some random point in the middle, will it still make sense or be incomprehensible because it presupposes too much information from the beginning of the essay? This would be akin to picking up a movie halfway through. The reader may not get the full experience, but they should at least be able to get the gist of what’s happening without being totally lost.
Example:
I had a handful of people that know me in different contexts read a draft of my essays. Each person was confused by different things and having them point out these areas of confusion made my application sound from all angles. Be careful not to have too many people review your essay, though, as you risk losing your own voice. However, having too few people review your essay will give you no external perspective on your essays and could lead to some obvious areas to improve that you’re simply missing because you’re too close to it.
This was my last tip about essays – the next five will focus on other parts of the college application. If you’re looking for more free resources on college essays, I’d definitely recommend checking out College Essay Guy.
6] Fill Up the Activities Section
It’s easy to neglect the activities section after writing the essays. For reference, on the UC application, you have space to list 20 activities in 350 characters each, and on the Common App, you have space to list 10 activities in 150 characters each. Even just length-wise, this is a huge opportunity to give color to your story by doing justice to the work you put in throughout high school.
My advice for the activities section isn’t too unique. You probably intuitively know what you “should” do if you were going to maximize every character of the activities section. My emphasis here is to actually do that – it’s not the place to put in half the effort. Treat each of your activities like mini-essays. Similar to the essay advice above, ensure you balance academic, professional, and personal activities to paint a full picture of yourself.
At the end of the day, each of your activities is only as important as you make it sound with your descriptions. It’s on you to show the admissions officers why your background makes you a uniquely good candidate for their university.
Example:
To the best of my ability, I followed this advice. I listed the maximum number of activities and used nearly every character in every activities section I submitted.
7] Find Diverse Recommenders
Choose the recommenders that best add color to your application. Your recommendation letters should provide evidence for what you’re saying about yourself both inside and outside of the classroom. The same protagonist principle that I mentioned in tip #2 still applies – be sure your recommenders can attest to your whole story rather than just part of it.
In the Stanford application file, students are assigned a score in a handful of categories (extracurriculars, high school rigor, intellectual vitality, and support). The support category is reflective of the quality of your letters of recommendation and your interviewer’s comments. Make sure that they truly support your whole application.
Ideally, you will find “merit” recommenders and “character” recommenders. Merit recommenders can attest to your competence. Think of them as backing up that you truly excelled in your most important activities and resume items. Character recommenders, on the other hand, will attest to personality traits such as your work ethic, dependability, and trustworthiness.
Another way to frame this difference is in terms of point and slope. Some recommenders may be able to say that you are one of the most intellectually capable students they’ve encountered (high point). Others will be able to back up that you learn and grow quickly, take advice well, and are persistent (high slope).
Many people overlook the importance of having a high slope. Those non-measurable indicators of future success are very important to universities. They’re not only looking to admit students who are already successful – they are also looking to admit the innovators and leaders of tomorrow. If your recommenders can show that you exhibit the characteristics to maximize the resources you’ll have access to in college, that will help your application substantially.
Example:
For my Stanford application, I received references from a high school history teacher, a college business professor, and a mentor.
For other scholarships and programs, I received references from the Stanford recommenders alongside a community leader, a close family friend, and a college computer science professor.
Overall, these letters of recommendation showcased a holistic, well-rounded perspective of me, which resulted in a high score in my support category on my Stanford application.
8] Stay Loose During Your Interview
Many colleges that you apply to will have an alumni interview program. If you don’t get an interview, don’t worry – it is somewhat random and based on location. If you do get an interview, be prepared to answer the basic questions, such as:
– Tell me about yourself
– Why do you want to attend this college
– What is one weakness that you have or challenge that you’ve overcome
If you’re looking for a more comprehensive list of interview questions to practice, check out College Essay Guy’s compilation.
Remember, you’re talking to alumni, not admissions officers. These are real people who have attended the college you’re applying to and are volunteering their time by interviewing applicants like you. I’d recommend that you keep it fairly casual. Pretend that you’re having a regular conversation with an acquaintance at your school.
To prepare for my interviews, I made a 1-page note sheet with the things I wanted to highlight about myself. The document was formatted with each of my important activities as main bullet points and 3 stories to tell about each activity as subpoints. This way, I could make a more casual conversation by centering the interview around stories that highlighted different aspects of me.
In reality, I didn’t use my note sheet very much during my interviews. That being said, I think creating the document in and of itself was helpful. I didn’t need to look at the sheet because it was organic to use the stories I had written down. When I wanted to talk about a part of my background, I had clear, well-reasoned ideas immediately coming to mind of things to say.
Example:
My Stanford interview went very well. This, as well as my letters of recommendation, contributed to my high score in the support category of my Stanford application. I’ve kept in touch with my interviewer since then; he’s been a great person to bounce ideas off of. Again, your interviewers are real people – I’d highly recommend maintaining a relationship if you can!
9] Submit Well Before the Deadline
College applications are important, so don’t wait until the last minute. Start early and give yourself enough time to brainstorm, write your application, review it, and be fully comfortable with what you’re submitting.
This could easily take a few weeks of work for each application. In my opinion, if you have five applications, I’d advise working on all five applications simultaneously. This would mean starting by brainstorming five topic maps for each of the five applications, then once you’re done with all five topic maps, writing rough drafts for each, etc. The alternative would be working on the applications chronologically, which would reduce the quality of your later applications substantially.
When I was applying to colleges, I fully wrote and rewrote essays multiple times. This is perfectly okay if you leave yourself enough time. However, if you’re up against the deadline and you feel like you need to rewrite your essays, it can be incredibly stressful. Give yourself enough time to sleep on those parts of your application that just don’t feel quite right. Changing those things could be the difference between a good application and a stellar one.
Overall, I’d recommend using a simple spreadsheet to keep track of deadlines for regular/early college decisions and scholarship applications (I like this template). Also, use progress points to keep yourself on track; instead of just telling yourself to get the entire application done by the deadline, set more proximal goals. For instance, you could try to finish brainstorming a month before the deadline, have a rough draft of your essays two weeks before the deadline, and complete the remainder of the application and make final touches one week before the deadline.
Example:
I submitted all of my college applications at least a week before the due date. For a couple of scholarships, submitting early actually saved me from major technical difficulties – their platforms crashed just before the deadline, but I was able to get my application in before the overload.
10] Relax and Be Yourself
I’m concluding this post with a reminder to encourage you to stay calm. You will end up at the right college for you. Applications are a matching process between you and a university. I know that college applications can be stressful and intimidating, but don’t get in your own head.
The purpose of college applications is to represent yourself in the best light, not to change yourself into the “ideal candidate” for the college you’re applying to. Prioritize being authentic and true to your story above all else.
Don’t be overwhelmed by all of the components of the application. You’ve got this! Best of luck, and contact me if you have any questions.
Example:
I re-read every application before submitting it, asking myself if the writing represents who I am to the fullest. As long as the answer is yes, I can confidently press submit!
Thanks for reading this blog post! Feel free to contact me with any questions.
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