<p>It does not matter that only 12 students get it per state. All it means is that 12 high schools in your state have some type of relationship with the Princeton alumni club in the state and have arranged for Princeton’s local alumni club to give out the book award.
While any book award is nice to list in your application, and it is an honor to receive one, it is an honor like any other high school award that you might receive on an awards day at your school. Receiving a book award has nothing to do with that particular college wanting you. I know of students who received a book award applied to that school thinking that the school really wanted them. The book award has nothing to do with the college. Usually the alumni club speaks with the principal or head guidance counselors and the high schools and the princiapl or guidance counselor comes up with a list and teachers vote and they decide who will get what book awards.
It does not matter that only 12 them in the state. It could very well be that more don’t get them because more schools have not arranged for the alumni club to give one, or were not contacted by them</p>
<p>Added to last post - The essay thing might have been something your school came up with to pick who was to receive it. At my school there was no essay required</p>
<p>^ yeah…
but she did not mail it to her school.
…</p>
<p>she mailed it directly to PRINCETON</p>
<p>I don’t know specifically about the Princeton book award but far more than 6 or 12 per state are awarded of most book awards. You can look at Princeton alumni assocaition web sites and see that they handle it differently in dioffernet states (they say so themselves). It is sponsored by the alums, not by Princeton itself. The purpose is to raise the image of Princeton (or whatever the school is). It’s a nice thing to get, and indicates a student is a top achiver in their high school, but that’s about it.</p>
<p>parkrunner: frankly, it’s not that important – I hate to tell you. It’s actually public relations work on behalf of the local alumni association. They want to keep visible in key high schools – that’s all. It’s not like it’s a city or state wide competition. Each and every year that the alumni club member delivers the book and award to the high school principal, someone will get the award – it’s that simple. If the alum happens to be too busy – guess what? No award that year. Sorry – that’s what I know of it. It’s a nice item for a Junior (and hopefully inserted is an information card to the college).</p>
<p>My alumni association awards a very nice and expensive book to the recipients – we do anywhere from one to four awards a year.</p>
<p>One more thing: Given the very informal nature of the award, it’s probably decided like this: The principal is given the award by the alum. Principal goes to English Dept Head and says: “Which Junior should win the award this year?” Reply: “Well, Jane/John isn’t ranked 1 or 2 and my get overlooked on Awards night. Let’s give it to her/him.” “OK”</p>
<p>That’s it. It’s not an indicator per se of the winner’s likelihood to be viewed favorably by Princeton besides the fact that he/she is probably one of the better students in the school.</p>
<p>And the number awarded in your state is determined by how much the local alumni association wants to pay for the awards.</p>
<p>^ Yup. Exactly.</p>