^^this. With just about all of the kids that I know who have been admitted to tippy-tops there was something ‘more’ about them all the way through. As with @Lindagaf’s example, they were not necessarily #1 in everything (some were, some weren’t), but there was always something else that stood out. Using the quote above- a kid who makes things happen, and who has for years, b/c it’s a real part of him.
That’s why MIT/Stanford etc emphasize to do things that are true to who you are- not any particular form of service. Community service became a short hand way of saying, show us that you are aware that you live in a community and you contribute to it. Remember, none of these institutions want to be full of people who live in their rooms and their libraries and just studystudystudy to advance themselves. They want people who will write the college paper, put on the shows, be on the teams, run the peer tutoring centers, organize town-gown initiatives, etc., etc. They want people who can achieve at a high standard AND have something else. It’s the AND that is crucial.