The Young Leader

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How to Make Your Application Stand Out to College Admissions Counselors

Applying to college can be unnerving. Demands on high school students grow every year, admissions counselors look for excellence and personality in prospective students, and applicants just have a few sheets of paper-applications, resumes and maybe an essay-to put their best foot forward in the application process.

You might think that resumes are just for job applications and internships, but they can also play a key role in the college admissions process, highlighting your experience in a way that an admissions form can’t.

So how can you make your application stand out? Here are a few surefire tips to ramp up your application and impress admissions counselors.

1. Be Choosy

Do your research before you decide which schools will receive your applications. Find out what potential colleges specialize in and how you can get involved. Don’t apply unless a school fits your lifestyle and goals.

When you submit your applications and/or essays to admissions, mention what you like about that school and the ways you believe it will be a perfect fit for you. If you’re struggling to come up with good reasons to go, that school might not be the best match for you. Once you’ve figured out where you want to go and why, having those reasons clearly defined will shine through in your application.

2. Let Your Personality Shine

When a university like Princeton receives tens of thousands of applications from students who all made perfect grades through high school, they have to narrow their choices somehow. As a matter of fact, admissions counselors say that perfect grades don’t guarantee you a spot… anywhere. Admissions offices are looking for more than that.

This is where your extracurriculars, life experience and even personality come into play. Admissions counselors say they want to get a peek at the person, beyond just a stack of impressive papers. Keep it professional during the application process, but don’t be afraid to be yourself.

3. Go On a Trip

One of the best ways to add weight to your resume is to participate in an exchange program or in an overseas pre college summer program. Universities know that well-traveled students have a more developed outlook on life, and tend to be more culturally savvy than students who haven’t ever stepped outside their comfort zones.

Participating in a high school volunteer abroad program is one way to get this type of experience; GLA offers a wide variety of programs that can give you language practice, environment and ecology experience and a look into the rich traditions of cultures on the other side of the world.

4. Submit Your Application Early

Just because you have until the last few hours of a deadline doesn’t mean you should take them! Getting your application in early gives admissions counselors time to thoroughly review your information, and it shows that you’re on top of your game. Some universities have early-admittance policies that favor students who turn in their applications ahead of time.

5. Be Specific

According to an interview with Fox Business, one of the best ways you can make your application and essays stand out is to give clear, specific details for your experience. Don’t just say “Worked at Safeway stocking shelves.” Tell admissions counselors about projects you’ve completed through teamwork and challenges you’ve worked through.

Make it clear how your volunteer and work experience and any awards you’ve earned have affected your educational goals.

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Prepping Your Application for College Admission

College Prep Tips for Perfecting Your High School Resume

From soccer game bruises to eternal study sessions to slushy-slinging bullies, high school can be intense. The cool news is that you can transform the intensity of your high school years into stuff that matters on a global scale. To do that you have to think of high school in terms of a resume.

As you engage in project partnerships, various academic clubs and sports, consider the experiences you’re collecting as resume highlights. This infographic offers tips for categorizing those experiences to build a solid high school resume. You’ll also find tips on how to match your HS resume highlights with the right college. You’ll even see how volunteering abroad can give you a foundation for future leadership.

So, yeah, the sports scrapes and the pop quizzes aren’t soft and cuddly. But they may just help you build a perspective that will inspire your community and your world to make positive changes. And that’s definitely a good payoff.

Prepping Your Application for College AdmissionGraphic brought to you by Experience GLA.


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Encourage Others to Volunteer

You know how rewarding it can be to serve your community. Maybe you’ve been on a service learning trip to a remote settlement in Tanzania, fell in love with the culture there and grew to love the place and its people. You’ve been bitten by the volunteerism bug, but your friends don’t get it. Why would you want to give your own time when you could be fine-tuning your essay-writing skills?

• Why would you want to sleep on a straw mat in Tanzania when your family is going on vacation to The Bahamas this summer, anyway?

• Why spend your vacation working in a community garden?

• Why spend weekends at a community center, tutoring underprivileged kids?

Your friends don’t quite get it – but you’ve been there, and you’ve seen the smiles on the faces of people you’ve helped. Maybe you’ve experienced cultures on the other side of the world that gave you a totally new perspective on life. You can understand their initial hesitancy to dig in because you were there before too. So the question is how do you get your friends involved in volunteering? Here are a few tips to help you get started.

For the Intellectuals

If your friends would rather polish their college admissions applications, crunch numbers to solve an unsolvable algebra problem, or fine-tune their essay-writing skills, here’s the card to play: Show them how service trips and volunteerism can help their future careers.

College admissions representatives look at more than essays and high grades when considering students for admission into competitive programs. Given two students with 4.0 GPAs, the student with volunteer experience has the advantage.

Getting involved in service opportunities now can set your friends up for a rewarding future, because their service experience will precede even their college education. This will look good on resumes for years to come—and they might find themselves bitten by the volunteerism bug, giving their time and abilities for more than just the extrinsic rewards.

For the Adventurers

Maybe your friends would rather be shooting hoops, cross-country skiing, running a marathon or hiking the Appalachian Trail. If they’re putting off volunteerism for these activities, maybe you should introduce them to overseas service learning trips.

That straw mat in Tanzania might not be the first aspect of service learning you want to mention—but to those with a knack for athletics and a curiosity about exploring the world around them, a trip to help build homes in hurricane-ravaged Dominican Republic or to plant sustainable field crops in South America might be just the impetus they need to get out of their comfort zones and stretch themselves in new ways.

Service learning abroad might be the most intense type of adventure available, no matter what your friends’ interests are. Show them photos of beautiful, off-the-beaten-path destinations and make plans to go together this summer.

For the Homebodies

If your friends are more interested in sitting around reading Greek epics, playing video games or surfing the Internet, chances are good it’s just been too long since they tasted sunshine and service. Volunteer to take your friends with you on your own volunteer project in the community—try to let them see the most rewarding aspects of the volunteerism you love.

No matter what type of friends you have or their interests, you have one thing in common: you’re friends! Talk to them. Tell them what got you interested in service and why it’s worth your while to make time to stay involved. Chances are good they’ll listen.

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Community Service at Home and Abroad

With all the talk about service learning, volunteerism and reaching out to those in need, sometimes it’s hard to tell exactly where community service starts and what it means. But giving your own time and labor is more than just a trend. It’s life changing – and not just for you.

But… community service doesn’t stop when the service trip ends. Here are some ideas of ways you can stay involved right at home.

Find a project that touches you.

We all have passions, interests and concerns unique to us. By finding a community service project you believe in and identify with personally, you’ll be setting yourself for a truly fulfilling volunteer experience. And because you’ll love what you’re doing, you’ll be even more effective.

If you love spending time with the elderly, you might try volunteering at a senior citizen center or delivering meals. If education and literacy is more of a concern to you, chances are there’s a community center where you could teach ESL classes or help adult students work toward a GED.

Get others involved.

Giving back to the community means even more when your friends are on board. Any volunteer effort is sure to result in new friends, but there’s no reason you can’t encourage those in your school or community to get involved.

Volunteering in groups can be less intimidating. By gathering friends to serve with, you’re making it easier on yourself to dedicate your time and talents to service.

Get started at home in your town, then consider branching out and trying a service learning trip in the future. It’s a great way to see the world, experience other cultures, and use your mind, hands and unique skills and talents to give back through opportunities you don’t normally have.

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Is Volunteering Abroad All Work and No Play?

Dear Future Global Leadership Adventures Student:

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to travel and serve abroad on a summer volunteer program, there’s no better source than someone who’s actually done it. So, as a proud GLA alum, I’d like to share my story in a few words, and in a video that hopefully transports you to my destination: Guatemala.

On getting there: During my summer I had the incredible opportunity to travel to Guatemala for a fourteen day service trip. I couldn’t have picked a better trip to go on. From the very moment I arrived at Guatemala City I felt welcomed, the trip advisors made us feel right at home, and the whole group just clicked immediately.

Some of the highlights: Every moment was a memory I will treasure forever, from singing  in the van, making a flash mob at breakfast, and eating copious amounts of chocolate, to meeting the most incredible group of Guatemalan children, learning bits of sign language, and learning about Guatemala’s history from a war veteran.

One thing you should know: If there is one thing people should know about this trip it’s that you will learn so much not only about a new culture or friendships but about you, you will discover so much more about yourself , which will inspire you to find your own unique way to make the world a better place.

Without further ado, here’s the video I edited together from my trip that captures some of things words just can’t. Enjoy!

Sincerely, Vita Benitez-Thomas

PS: To check out videos by other Student Ambassadors from destinations around the world, click here:  http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9D9339FEC8A56509. No two programs or experiences are ever exactly the same, and that’s something to celebrate.

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