Chances? Should I go early?

market_state
Sat, 23 Sep 2006 19:05:44 +0000

Everyone’s being so hard on “passion.” Yes, I know it is corny, but it is the word that is standard for expressing the quality of being exceptional. When the Yale Dean of Admissions looks at the mountainous stack of applications all yearning for admission, he doesn’t say: “OK, I’ll take the top few thousand, looking for SAT scores, GPA, number of clubs of which they were a president.” No, he tells his staff to “sculpt” a class comprised of a few thousand brilliant young men and women who have already accomplished something great in the field they love. That greatness is what we call passion, and it is the primary factor of college admissions in HYPS.