What Do I Need For harvard?

gibby
Tue, 16 Jun 2015 14:55:23 +0000

Your SAT/ACT score is currently not competitive for Harvard (but you know that) as 75% of accepted students have scores that are in excess of about 2100, so keep practicing.

Once you raise your scores, then you need to realistically look at your overall application. Right now, it seems pretty similar on paper to thousands of other students – and that’s a problem many students face. How do you make yourself standout from the crowd?

As Harvard receives so many applications from strong students with top test scores, Admissions uses a student’s essays, teacher recommendations, guidance counselor report and interview report to help them distinguish between one high-performing student and the next. Only one of those items is in your direct control, and the rest is subjective, so it’s impossible to say what any student needs for Harvard, other than a high GPA, top test scores, killer essays and teachers who go to bat for you in your letters of recommendation. See: https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/preparing-college/choosing-courses

Our Admissions Office chooses carefully from a broad range of applicants who seem to us to offer the most promise for future contributions to society. Not all of the students who are best prepared for college will be among those with the most future promise, nor are all of the most promising well prepared academically.

While the heart of the matter will always lie in academic promise, we prize candidates with special talents and with outstanding personal qualities; we are interested in students who excel in one or more extracurricular activities; and we seek a distinctive and diverse national and international student body.

Most of all we look for students who make the most of their opportunities and the resources available to them, and who are likely to continue to do so throughout their lives.