<p>How would you rank these items based on what Dartmouth considers more or less important while admitting students?</p>
<li>GPA</li>
<li>Rank</li>
<li>Course Rigor</li>
<li>Extracurriculars</li>
<li>Essays</li>
<li>Recommendation Letters</li>
<li>Ethnicity/Race (I’m Indian. Woo.)</li>
<li>“well-roundedness” v. being really good at one particular thing</li>
<li>Leadership & Dedication</li>
<li>Early Decision v. Regular Decision</li>
</ol>
<p>Are you intentionally leaving out SAT/ACT, etc?</p>
<p>bbbahahhahaha @ C’BadDad. Well OP, are you? I’d say it goes something like this: (from most to least)</p>
<p>1.Class rank/Course rigour/GPA
2.SAT
3.ECs
4.Ethnicity
5.Recs
6.Essays</p>
<p>yeah I completely for about standardized testing when I made that list. My bad. and thanks!</p>
<p>Without the most rigorous course load you won’t be considered without a major hook. After that:</p>
<p>–rank/scores–very numbers oriented school with lots of vals and high scorers
–ECs/leadership
–essays/recs</p>
<p>Like all schools they have quotas for everyone. Much harder if you’re from an overrepresented state and if you’re an ORM. ED doesn’t help if you don’t have a hook.</p>
<p>what does hook mean?</p>
<p>a hook is something that distinguishes you from the majority of applicants, which in turn lowers the standards for your application/renders acceptance more likely. </p>
<p>examples of hooks:</p>
<p>-URM (underrepresented minority i.e. Hispanic, African American, Native American)
While Asians represent ~5% of the U.S. population, which is less than both Latino (~15%) and AA (~13%) minorities, they are considered overrepresented minorities because so many of them apply to top schools.
-Athlete (recruited for a sport)
-Celebrity (Emma Watson)<br>
-Crazy EC (published a novel, perform saxophone for 1000s of people weekly, etc.)</p>
<p>^legacy is the other major hook, they get in at almost three times the rate.</p>
<p>how much does first generation help?</p>
<p>First gen is also generally considered a hook 'round these parts.</p>
<p>Does anyone know how heavily Dartmouth considers freshmen year grades? I have a pretty significant freshmen -> junior year upward trend and am unclear whether this is viewed positively or negatively… thanks!</p>
<p>me too… my frosh year sucks. is that heavily considered?</p>
<p>The typical accepted Dartmouth student will have a strong record throughout high school. This year’s class has 34% vals and lots of slas too I’m sure. Rank is very important.</p>
<p>That being said, they also definitely look for upward trends, and as long as your freshman year didn’t completely destroy your GPA/rank, it won’t disqualify you.</p>
<p>ah, well. I guess I have no big hooks, then. I’ve gotten a few poems published and am ridiculously involved in EC’s, but my GPA is 3.8ish/4.3ish (which doesn’t look so bad, but my school’s competitive enough that it might kick me out of the top 5%)</p>
<p>I guess we’ll see how it all works out in the end. I’m used to walking the hallways and noticing kids crying over their 2250 SAT because it’s wayyyy too low for their standards.</p>
<p>You don’t have to be in the top 5% to get in to D. </p>
<p>You do have to have something that distinguishes you from the BWRK herd, though.</p>
<p>Seconded. I wasn’t even in top 10 and was accepted (albeit I’m from a tiny class, So I think I’m 13th percent, with not even 10 people ahead of me, lol)</p>
<p>what if you go from a 3.0 freshmen to a 4.0 sophmore, and junior year?</p>
<p>you’ll probably be okay…</p>
<p>according to collegeboard, this is how dartmouth weighs everything:
Very important admission factors:
Character/Personal Qualities
Class Rank
Application Essay
Extracurricular Activities
Recommendations
Rigor of secondary school record
Standardized Test Scores
Academic GPA
Important admission factors:
Talent/Ability
Volunteer Work
Considered:
Alumni Relation
Geographical Residence
Interview
Racial/Ethnic Status
First generation college student</p>