Move on - find activities of interest - where you can make an impact and have tenure.
I wouldn’t worry about NHS.
Are they doing something, activity wise, that’s meaningful and impactful that you can’t replicate elsewhere?
I get peer pressure at school - but for college apps this is a non issue.
Keep your grades up and keep being the best you that you can.
And don’t give this any energy - honestly.
Good luck.
My opinion on this is what I’ve spoken to our children about. Whatever you do, please don’t make excuses for grades or lack of completion of assignments. Always own up to those experiences.
You are, what I call, “overscheduled”.
The colleges do not want to see burned-out students who have no more energy left by the time they get to their college.
Find one passion and stick to it. Or get a part-time job; they love when students can handle the discipline of going to school and working or being involved in the community.
When you work you will learn skills that you need as an employee at a future company. You’ll learn how to be punctual; you’ll learn to meet deadlines; you will learn to work with the others; you will learn to read contracts and apply business ideas.
That’s why they like students that work part time jobs or students who can stick to one idea/passion.
You don’t have to overdo it. You need sleep, meals, and rest or you won’t be able to physically and emotionally function.
You need to get to school on time.
Punctuality is really important to employers. You will have deadlines in contracts to meet.
Get rest, eat and get to school on time. If you’ve been flagged for tardiness, then your counselor may not make an “effort” to promote your strengths and skills when he/she fills out that counseling report to the colleges.
All three of my kids got into NHS and they did their mandatory community service hours, but they hated it, so I told them to do the bare minimum and then get out. Which they all did. (Basically they hated it because the officers in NHS “were jerks” and self promoted, so the seniors dropped out like flies after their mandatory hours).
It did not impact them getting into the top tens. They did, however, all work part time jobs in high school to earn money for college. Because of their work experiences, they were all able to find jobs, on campus, at their colleges.
You shouldn’t have a dream college, but you can have a list of colleges that you would like to attend.
MIT is a great school but the rejections exceeds their acceptances. The school just does not have enough seats for all qualified candidates. It has nothing to do with your stats or you. It has to do with the fact that they don’t have enough seats to put you in a class.
NHS is stupid. Please do not spend another minute worrying about this! My D20 missed the Elton John farewell concert to attend her NHS induction and she will regret that choice to her grave. Most colleges will straight up say they do.not.care.
NHS is not necessary, but DEFINITELY focus on adding concrete community service projects. The service does not need to be fancy, but it should be consistent.
Community service seems to be an overarching theme in every college application that I have seen this year. And my son applied to 22 schools.
Btw, my son did not apply to MIT nor did I encourage him to. He is a bright, valedictory candidate with excellent ecs, but I think MIT would have been too much of a pressure cooker for him.
THIS! I got asked why I didn’t apply to all the ivies as a top student and clearly “gifted” (I wasn’t a hard worker and was seen as naturally smart, my IQ is in the Highly Gifted-Lower Genius range).
I liked the idea of a small liberal arts college, not an Ivy where I thought I would be more pressured and couldn’t be my true authentic self.
I don’t find anything about the college application process to be “authentic.”
This. Don’t give it a second thought.
Being a permanent resident or not isn’t what matters - if your GC can indicate you were in Esl and/or have been in the US from a non English-speaking country for 2 years or less you have access to a translating dictionary (no definitions) to level the playing field with kids who’ve spoken English for years and years.
Ask your GC.
Also ask him or her about dual enrollment for Math since you took Calc BC this year and for colleges like MIT or Olin it’s better to show some initiative wrt advancing in math. There should be a community college nearby for Calc2 (or Discrete Math or Linear algebra or calc-based stats, which AP Stats isn’t. )
the application process itself? It’s a business and a game.
NHS is not worth the time spent on the application, if you have any other achievements. One of my kids did not bother with it (way too busy with other things that did matter) and got into a tippy-top early decision.
What is of concern here is that you’ve overloaded yourself to the point that you are late on assignments, late to school, and committed an academic honesty offense. You explain it all, but you don’t seem to be able to recognize that you have to stop taking on too much. You’re lucky that you didn’t wind up with a blemish that colleges would see. You have to lighten your load a little bit, so that you can actually complete what you’re taking on.
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