3 Unique Ways to Improve Your Application This Summer
The calendar may insist that the start of summer is still a few weeks away, but I can tell that most students have already jumped head first into the vacation season. School is out for most schools and my students' calm faces tell me they are finally getting enough rest between tutoring sessions!
However, now is not the time to forget that college applications are coming. Here are a few ideas that will help you to build a great application in the fall by expanding your resume, skills, and abilities this summer!
1. Get a Job Doing Something You Love
The US Department of Labor estimates that over 50% of teens work at Retail businesses such as restaurants, fast food outlets, grocery stores and other retail stores. It's great to see kids spending their summers building job skills, but very few of those jobs will add much to a college application. If you want to really stand out at application time, put effort into finding a work place that reflects what you love.
Want to get a degree in marketing? Call every advertising firm in your hometown until someone hires you to make coffee and deliver mail. Want to be a doctor? Hospitals love to have high school kids file paperwork and run errands...if you contact them. Great jobs for high school kids are out there if you are willing to keep pushing until someone takes a chance on you. Not only will these kinds of work opportunities add something unique to your college application, but they will also have better pay and working conditions than McDonald's or The Gap.
2. Contact A Teacher You Like
Getting a great recommendation from your favorite teacher is tough. Teachers want to help students get into college, but often don't remember anything about the student that is worth writing about. To combat this, take some time over the summer to contact one of your favorite teachers. Ask them to see your summer theater performance, direct them to an article that reminded you of their interests, or simply say that you are looking forward to a class with them in the fall. As long as you reach out to them with more than "Hey! What's up?" they will remember you as an intriguing individual.
But contrary to popular belief, teachers do not crawl into caves to hibernate every summer. Instead, they go out and pursue their own goals and projects. That means the best way to contact them is via email! If you don't have their email addresses already, visit your school's website and search for their information. They may not get back to you right away, so if you need a response to an invitation or proposal contact them early and often.
3. Start Blogging About Yourself!
Writing is hard. Writing about yourself is even harder. While almost all students fear the personal statement, very few realize that writing in the first person is the really difficult part. Years of English classes have trained kids to write about books, short stories, and poetry, but they haven't taught them to tell stories about their own lives. Many of my students simply don't know where to start and panic when they look at the blank page!
You can ease your own fear of writing about yourself by getting into practice and doing it several times a week. I recommend that you take up blogging so that you not only have a place to write, but also have a way to show your writing to friends, family, and teachers. Your readership can even leave you comments and critique! As you can probably guess, I think http://www.wordpress.com/ is the best place to get started blogging. It only takes a few moments to register, set up your blog, and start writing about the awesomeness that is you.
Your Test Scores and GPA are huge parts of your college application that you should work on whenever you can. But as we discussed earlier, test scores and grades aren't enough. If you want to get into the school of your dreams, you need to stand out from the crowd. Keep yourself occupied this summer with great projects and ideas and your application will shine!