<p>Honestly, trying to find out what Stanford is looking for is moot. This comes from an accepted asian nerd, in the worse possible category you could possibly put an applicant.</p>
<p>At least, that’s what I thought, until I was accepted. My essays got me in? Give me a break, I wrote a whole essay on a physics concept: yes, that’s right, i’m not lying. I’m not even an english whiz, being a recent immigrant and non-native speaker. My why stanford essay was generic: for the specific research projects I wanted to participate in, the track team etc… and things I planned to do. My score? Generic 2300+ multiple 800’s expected from an asian nerd, who does a bunch of math/science stuff. My research? the experiment did not even work out completely, yielding incomplete data. My science math competitions? Never qualified for USAMO, won a few local/regional competitions, and that’s it.
Oh… My musical ability, I almost forgot that one 
: well if you are curious, I play the worst instruments an asian could play: piano and guitar. I have perfect pitch, but so does half of the symphonic orchestra, did a few competitions, but so did half of the asian piano players I know.</p>
<p>Maybe my recommendation? I’ll never know. I heard my teacher wrote several pages for her rec, but I think it’s unlikely the recommendation stood out, because I heard most good students can and will obtain stellar recommendations anyways.</p>
<p>So all in all, this discussion is moot. Before applying, I thought that all my research on college admissions made me an pundit, with the ability to assess how much my profile could “fit” into the acceptance pile. And Stanford was the last college I expected an acceptance from (in fact, I thought I was more likely to get into MIT or Caltech or even Princeton than Stanford, being a nerd with a lack of leadership).</p>
<p>After being accepted, I’m really confused, happy, overjoyed… but confused nonetheless.</p>