The Q: I attend a local public high school and am in my sophmore year. I have maintained a 4.0 average GPA and am a reading tutor at the local elementary school. My hope is to one day attend Brown University, so I was wondering what other activities should I get involved in to increase my chances of acceptance.

The A: I think you're doing just fine: your grades are excellent, you're already involved in an activity that helps others and makes you a better person; and you're looking forward to your future. What's most important now is that you keep all of that up. All great colleges -- not just Brown -- look for students who are intelligent, hard-working, well-rounded folks who have a real passion for making their lives (and the lives of others) fuller and richer.

I think Brown is a very realistic possibility for you, but keep this in mind over the next couple years: You can't do anything specific that will guarantee you admission to a school like Brown. Schools may have specific admissions requirements -- a minimum GPA or SAT score, a few years of language classes, etc. -- but when that admissions committee sits down to decide who gets in and who doesn't, it usually comes down to the intangibles. They look at everything you've done, they look at your essay, they look at what they got out of your interview, and they decide whether or not they -feel- like you're the kind of person they think should go to their school.

Beyond continuing to work hard in class and do as well as you can, you really do have very little control over the admissions process. That's why it's important that you just do everything you want to do and be true to yourself. If there's one thing admissions committee's -don't- like, it's students who are obviously trying too hard, or are doing too much just because they think it'll get them admitted. Stay balanced, join whatever clubs or do whatever activities you think you'll enjoy, have fun and don't burn yourself out. I'm sure you'll knock them dead when you apply there -- or anywhere else -- your senior year.

—Myles Helfand, General Advisor

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