<p>This is a serious question, I’m not trying to be condescending or arrogant. For example, if a kid is really good with let’s say astronomy and has clearly represented his passion and excellence in it, how would that compare to a student who is pretty good at everything and has great EC’s and such. To clarify, do colleges like to see students who are more well-rounded or students who are dedicated and passionate in one area?</p>
<p>success in life is about specialization…remember that. The jack of all trades becomes your neighborhood handyman.</p>
<p>They like to see somewhat versatile students, because the current economy requires a degree of versatility to survive and to succeed.</p>
<p>Further, students who are involved in lots of ECs will win competitions and prestige for the colleges.</p>
<p>Also, if colleges assume that versatile students will be more successful in their careers, they can count on more money from versatile students and more prestige for their school.</p>
<p>Colleges are looking for students who are accomplished, and it’s more likely that an applicant is accomplished in one particular area than in many just by virtue of the difficulty of being nationally recognized in multiple areas. In that sense, colleges aren’t looking for versatility at all, or at least the top ones aren’t; rather, they’re looking to build a well-rounded incoming class.</p>
<p>But for a student to be competitive for the top colleges, s/he will need to be versatile to an extent, as top grades and scores require skill across disciplines.</p>
<p>That is tough to call… Although some schools may like students who have a wide variety of interests, others may want a person who is just undoubtedly awesome at one or two things.</p>
<p>My thought would be to look up the schools website, research it, check out forums, news releases, etc. I think that all that stuff jumbles together and kind of gives an idea of characteristics the school wants in it’s students.</p>
<p>Schools are happy to take students who are awesome at one or two things, but those students are usually expected to be able to do some other things.</p>
<p>Schools won’t necessarily want someone who’s amazing at science but has Cs in English and history.</p>
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<p>This is the key: you may only need to be super-bright and super-passionate about one subject area, but you need to be able to hold your own across the board because, frankly, it’s not much of a challenge to get nearly all A’s in high school. High schools expect a lot less from you than colleges do and if high school is a struggle, college will be simply brutal.</p>
<p>They want super heroes.</p>
<p>“do colleges like to see students who are more well-rounded or students who are dedicated and passionate in one area?”</p>
<p>“Colleges” is of course too broad a term; your local CC that takes anyone with a pulse and Dartmouth both fall under the label “colleges”. But I assume you mean the most selective schools. Here is what Stanford says in its FAQ
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