I am an Asian student (male) that has moved from South Korea to the states last August due to my father’s job. Currently I am almost finished with my Junior year at a public high school. My grades, at South Korea aren’t that good. I was at a selective high school, which grades students with relative evaluation not absolute evaluation like the US. Consequentially, my grades were translated as mostly Cs and few Bs when transferring to a US high school.
My current grades over here are all As, and the SAT I took last December to check my deviation without studying for it was a 1400. I am planning to take on more at June, and looking at my practice test scores, I expect to score about 1550. Also, since my high school doesn’t provide many AP classes, I applied for Dual Enrollment for my Senior year. I suppose that I will end up with a unweighted GPA of 3.7.
I heard that US colleges are really put emphasis on ECs, so I’ll list a few of my main ones.
- Founded a ‘Marketing’ study club. We researched about marketing strategies and actually experimented them to the whole school by selling goods, launch a campaign, do surveys, etc. Made about $300 as a total, and we donated it to the school to be used for other clubs.
- Participated in a theater club. I did shows at local festivals as an actor and also volunteered to teach mentally disordered children about acting and supporting them to make their own play (They got a chance to perform at a local stage! :D)
- Started a program called “student counselor”. Our school was extremely competitive, so there were many students that showed initial symptoms of depression or were actually suffering from it. It was a program that I started personally, which I counselled my peers that had different problems they had in school or family. I’m not sure if this is considered as a “result”, but I got 4 people to cut off antidepressants. Even though I moved to the states, I am still counseling a few that still need help.
- Was a student government representative. Too long to explain what we did.
- (Now at the US) Founded a ‘App development’ club. We are currently preparing to make a utility app for Android phones. Planning to put it in the ‘Play Store’ before summer break ends. What’s the connection to this to psychology? I do some coding, but my main role is make the ideas and direct the process. The app’s goal in a big picture is to reduce teen depression, but to be realistic, we would be totally grateful if our app’s users could just feel a little better.
I didn’t include any athletic clubs and some other things that I have done, but these are the things that I am most proud of myself until now. If it is too week, please tell me what I am lacking and please give me suggestions to raise my chances.
