Читать книгу Accepted!. Secrets to Gaining Admission to the World's Top Universities онлайн

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Self-study, as I define it, refers to taking a subject outside of your traditional school. You could self-teach it, you could enroll in a part-time course offering like Crimson's online high school, Crimson Global Academy, or you could hire a tutor for it. The point is, you aren't taking it as a student in your traditional school. You're choosing to do extra.

Why is this strategy so effective? A university is trying to guess at who the most competent students are. When they read about your extracurriculars they may ask themselves, what does this mean? How legitimate is this organization? Did this really take much time? How passionate is this student? The main issue with extracurriculars and most other activities is there are very few universal standards that can clearly translate to an admissions officer exactly what you've done. (Not that extracurriculars are not crucially important to the college admissions process—they are, and we will get to that later. But they are viewed alongside your academic record, which you have to nail first.) When an admissions officer sees you've written an independent report on business in Japan, they will be intrigued but they will have limited comparability when they evaluate you against other students—when they place you head-to-head.