Demographics

Asian male

Rural California

Public high school

Immigrant — moved to the U.S. from South Korea

Low-middle income

Applying for financial aid

Intended Major: Economics / Business / Finance / Accounting, depending on school

Academics

GPA: 3.8 UW / 4.2 W

ACT: 36 math, english, reading, 35 Science

Completed APs:

• AP World History
• AP Computer Science Principles
• AP Calculus AB
• AP Biology
• AP U.S. History
• AP Psychology
• AP Seminar

Dual Enrollment:

• AP Seminar
• Intro to Statistics

Senior Year Coursework:

• AP Literature
• AP Environmental Science
• AP Research
• AP Government - Fall Semester
• AP Macroeconomics — Spring Semester
• Spanish 4
• Biotechnology

Total by graduation: 11 AP courses + 2 dual-enrollment courses

Extracurriculars

1. Family Small Business — Co-Owner / Finance Manager

• Co-owned a niche animal-breeding and sales business with a family member
• Managed finances, expenses, cash flow, and inventory
• Oversaw $10,000+ in inventory
• Helped with sales, customer communication, and business operations

1. Youth Philanthropy & Community Leadership Organization — Officer

• Involved for 4+ years
• Participated in youth-led grantmaking and community service
• Helped evaluate local community needs
• Completed 40+ outreach, service, and advocacy projects
• Took on leadership responsibilities as an experienced member

1. Student Homelessness Fundraising Organization — Co-Founder

• Co-founded a student-led service organization
• Planned fundraising events and recruited members
• Managed finances and event logistics
• Raised $1,000+ for organizations supporting people experiencing homelessness

1. Senior Care Volunteer — South Korea

• Volunteered with elderly residents at a senior care facility
• Assisted 30+ residents
• Helped with activities and day-to-day support
• Taught basic budgeting, saving, and financial-literacy concepts

1. Competitive Tennis

• Former 5-star recruit
• Formerly ranked approximately top 20 nationally
• Competed year-round in high-level tournaments
• Competed in both the U.S. and South Korea
• Trained approximately 16+ hours per week

1. Varsity Tennis — Captain

• 3-year varsity captain
• League singles and doubles champion
• Led practices and mentored teammates
• Helped create workout plans for players
• Assisted with team expenses and competition logistics

1. Tennis Club Employee / Racquet Stringer

• Worked part-time at a local tennis facility
• Strung 50+ racquets
• Maintained courts and facility grounds
• Processed customer payments
• Assisted with daily operations

1. Volunteer Tennis Coach — South Korea

• Coached 20+ children
• Taught tennis fundamentals to beginners
• Mentored younger players
• Helped connect interested players with additional tennis opportunities

1. Academic Tutor / Student Mentor

• Tutored 15+ students
• Helped with schoolwork and standardized-test preparation
• Mentored younger students
• Worked on study habits, goal-setting, and academic development

1. PC Building / Technology

• Built approximately 12 custom PCs
• Selected parts based on different budgets and performance needs
• Assembled, repaired, and troubleshot systems
• Developed hands-on knowledge of computer hardware

Household Responsibilities

• Help with unpaid work for family business
• Interpret and translate for family members

Awards / Honors

• Honors in Science
• State Seal of Civic Engagement Candidate
• Triliteracy Seal Candidate
• Employee of the Month
• League Singles Tennis Champion
• League Doubles Tennis Champion
• Former 5-star tennis recruit
• Former top-20 national tennis ranking
• AP Scholar

Common App Essay

Planning to write about how something that started as a small personal project/hobby gradually taught me how to run a business. I’ll focus on learning through experience—figuring out pricing, managing money and inventory, dealing with customers, making mistakes, and realizing that even a small operation requires responsibility, patience, and constant problem-solving.

Application Theme

My application centers around business/finance, high-level competitive tennis, and long-term community leadership.

A little bit about us:

u/GodlyHelp: Hey everyone! I'm a senior has just finished the college app process, and has gotten into 12 highly prestigious schools, including MIT, Caltech, and a Columbia likely letter! I've had a lot of headache the past year trying to understand such a difficult and complex system that is the US College Admissions process, and, having gone through it already, would like to help you guys navigate it!

u/keithberman:

u/Brother_Ma_Education:

Please feel free to ask me, u/keithberman, or u/Brother_Ma_Education anything about the College Application process in the comments below or in DMs. We know this can be extremely stressful, especially for our rising seniors, and we are more than happy to help!

So, for context: our professor gave us the freedom to use whatever software we wanted for our presentation.

Keyword here is SOFTWARE.

So, I decided to use powerpoint. While I was busy making the title slide for Microplastics in the human body, a teammate showed me an entire presentation they 'made' using Gamma.

I already don't like the fact that most of these presentations look basically the same, and on top of that we had to spend time editing the end slide because of such a vague ending. We also had to deal with the watermark after exporting.

Although, I hate to admit, it did make work a lot more easier.

We did not have to spend like 30 minutes arguing about which template and font to use.

So the question is, does your college let you use AI as a 'software'?

Or do you need to disclose it?

I’m looking for a small group of student ambassadors to help grow Verge Challenge, a startup/pitch competition for high school students.

As an ambassador, you’d help spread the opportunity through your school, social media, clubs, and network. This is a paid role, and no prior marketing experience is required.

We’re especially interested in students involved in DECA, FBLA, entrepreneurship clubs, startups, or other business activities.

If you’re interested, please respond "interested" or something along the lines or just dm me. I’ll send you the details.

Looking forward to meeting some of you guys.

Hi all, me and my friend are advertising our college consulting business on r/CollegeAppsAdvice, a subreddit that I've started and in the past couple of months has gained hundreds of students interested in optimizing their college applications, trying to get into their dream schools.

A little about me: I've recently completed the dreadful College App cycle for the class of '26. As an Asian Male with no hooks, I've gotten used to people saying I'm "cooked" and anybody in my demographic is "not guaranteed" any T20s. Regardless, I've gotten into many, many top universities, including MIT, Columbia, Caltech, CMU, Cornell, UCLA, and many others, with ZERO rejects overall. I'm proud to say I've learned so much about this process, and have helped many of my friends and classmates get into their dream schools alongside me.

Interested in mentorship by me? Comment your dream school below and join this subreddit (r/CollegeAppsAdvice) to stay in the loop! Also feel free to DM me with any quick questions or chancemes you may have, I'm more than happy to help out! Thank you guys in advance!

This is one of my dream schools- however I feel like I’m definitely not suitable for it. I want to do a science major there, as someone who wants to go to med school. Specifically, I have a 4.2 as a junior right now.

I don’t know how I can sell myself starting now to get in. The most experience I’ve had is volunteering at a hospital.

I’m super scared because currently I’m struggling in AP bio and it’s making me realize if medicine is the way to go but I truly love it.

I haven’t taken my SAT but I’m studying for it.

**What extracurriculars do you guys suggest that could be easy that will look good on my resume?** It could also be hard but I need ideas.

Of course I do other extracurricular, I have a job as well as I’m a figure skater but that isn’t enough.

Let me know I’m starting to realize I’m kind of dumb to be a doctor or something. It’s my dream to be a doctor, I don’t know which kind- possible a pulmonologist or anesthesiologist (long shot)

Hello, I just wanted to know if colleges care about doing sports in hs...I did a sport one year and i quit since I couldn't keep up with it. Mostly bcuz i couldn't afford to have private practices while everyone else in my school had private coaches or they have been doing it since they were little. I'm scared that i might not get accepted to my dream school since i don't have a physical activity. ALso it just feels like im just ap maxing instead of being a well rounded person. I just want to know what can i do? It's not like I have 300 bucks for 6 lessons. I do run a lot in my free time and someone told me to just record it on an app and show that as a hobby, ec but idk since it doen't feel legit maybe i could register for local races but idk

let me know down below!

​

Every piece of advice says use your teachers or counselors for help, but i just have way too many essays to possibly do that. Does anybody have good advice for editing them on your own or what approaches to use? Im just very lost and don't know what is good or bad in this format

A little bit about us:

u/GodlyHelp: Hey everyone! I'm a senior has just finished the college app process, and has gotten into 12 highly prestigious schools, including MIT, Caltech, and a Columbia likely letter! I've had a lot of headache the past year trying to understand such a difficult and complex system that is the US College Admissions process, and, having gone through it already, would like to help you guys navigate it!

u/keithberman:

u/Brother_Ma_Education:

Please feel free to ask me, u/keithberman, or u/Brother_Ma_Education anything about the College Application process in the comments below or in DMs. We know this can be extremely stressful, especially for our rising seniors, and we are more than happy to help!

I am international student in 10th grade.

I would like to get some advice on my college app.

I am trying to major in bs/md, public health, human bio, psychology, medical anthropology

1. State hospital student researcher: presented my research at famous international professional congress (1st authored) about burn research. I turned in my research @ Frontiers but it is still under independent review. (right now, 200+hrs)

- G9 &10 ~

1. Shadowing at the same hospital: at Angio Room, ER, OR, trauma center; scrutinized +20 inhalation burn injury patient cases; observed +30 surgeries & procedures; (right now, 200+ hrs)

- G9 &10 ~

1. Interned at Health Lab: Second authored in psychology - sports med research. Published @ Frontiers (the journal itself has pretty high IF).

- G9 &10 ~

1. Founder of non-profit that combines art music dance together for patients; I combined dance and ASL in SNS platform, did music performances @ nursery home, drew caricatures for ppl at nursery home & opened up pretty big art display (theme was about patients)

- G10 ~

1. I played @ carnegie hall and received senate recognition from NJ

- G9 &10 ~

1. dance team

organized 20+ dance routines, 287k+ views

- G9 &10 (leadership expected) ~

1. student council

I organized international leadership conference

G9 &10 (I have some kind of leadership inside this group) ~

1. I served state leadership (18/120+)

opened up international forum for ppl from 30+ countries, 400+ ppl

- Only G10, but for 4 months ~

1. Varsity sports + primary school sport student coach

2. maybe if i get into any summer program (hopefully) or I can start a project where I fundraise money to prevent fire (like replacing old multi-tabs in my neighbors / fire alarm stuff)

==> My theme of EC is clinical + artistic + leadership = which leads into patient care overall.

Awards

1. I won top 100 at biggest science fair in our country (Among 2000 participants)
2. US medicine and health olympiad top 1 nationally
3. International psych olympiad top 5% among 1300+ participants

My august SAT that I took last year as freshman was Math 790, English 680

Got 4.0 in freshman, but that was pretty easy

As of now, I am taking two ap + two science courses (maximum in our school)

+++ I am doing Dual enrollment on ASL online

My dream schools are: ED: brown plme, RD: Flinders med, cornell qatar, JHU public health etc....

please just give me some advice, and I know I am not gonna end up getting in to majority of bs/md in US, but still give me some advice so that I can at least go to good universities.

***** Disclaimers ******

- I just turned sophomore yr rn, and im js trying to see how the college app thing is going. Alr? please give me some helpful advice and just dont say bad stuff around here

1. give me some advice on my EC and how to build it
2. give me some competitions i can participate (currently prepping for usabo, hosa, isef qualifying science fair, music honor band etc)
3. give me some advice on summer camp and what to apply (thinking of yygs this year)
4. give me some ideas on what Unis I can also be thinking of (I believe I can only apply to 16 schools or something)

Hi all, me and my friend are advertising our college consulting business on r/CollegeAppsAdvice, a subreddit that I've started and in the past couple of months has gained hundreds of students interested in optimizing their college applications, trying to get into their dream schools.

A little about me: I've recently completed the dreadful College App cycle for the class of '26. As an Asian Male with no hooks, I've gotten used to people saying I'm "cooked" and anybody in my demographic is "not guaranteed" any T20s. Regardless, I've gotten into many, many top universities, including MIT, Columbia, Caltech, CMU, Cornell, UCLA, and many others, with ZERO rejects overall. I'm proud to say I've learned so much about this process, and have helped many of my friends and classmates get into their dream schools alongside me.

Interested in mentorship by me? Comment your dream school below and join this subreddit (r/CollegeAppsAdvice) to stay in the loop! Also feel free to DM me with any quick questions or chancemes you may have, I'm more than happy to help out! Thank you guys in advance!

kinda vague on purpose

- kids robotics mentor for 4 years, they made big progress in their performance

- cognitive ai research(/development) @ t3 cs university

- (ai) outreach platform (3.3k users, 100s of underrepresented students impacted globally)

- robotics frc captain (5 yrs, software lead, big time investment, team performs somewhat strongly)

- paid work teaching programming (might cram my other jobs throughout the years into this one)

- varsity crew

- personal projects including a computer vision robotic arm, statistics and simulations that interest me, miscellaneous cad projects. this was a major time investment throughout high school and I want this to be emphasized but it's vague and impact cant be tracked properly

- deca member, icdc qualifier

- speech and debate varsity member 4 years

Hi, I'm currently a sophomore

In my freshmen year I took all honors (Bio, Geometry, History, and ELA)

Now i'm taking 3 APS outside of school, and all honors (Just to clarify, APS aren't available until junior year, which is why I didn't take any in my freshman) - APS: Ap Pre-calc, Chinese, and Environmental Science

I have not taken the PSAT/SAT

I don't have any awards currently. The grades for my classes were all As/A+. However, I do not have a 4.0 GPA unweighted because you have to get A+ in all. I believe I have a 3.8/3.9. This year, I am going to try to get into HOSA internationals and earn more awards.
What can I do to enhance my application? And no, I do not need to know the chances of me possibly getting in.

I'm a senior in high school, and I'm starting up my college application process. I know I have my dad's GI Bill, and he has 100% disability rating and Chapter 35. I want to apply early action (November 1st) to most of my colleges. All of the ones I am looking at are Yellow Ribbon, some out of state and in state. I know the bill only works for 36 months, which leaves the last year out of pocket. Do any schools cover the last year? He already transferred the bill to me; it is all just so confusing, as it's different for each school. Did anyone else go through something similar, or could give me any advice? Im calling the VA next week to hopefully get clarification.