Strategies for shining

THIRD IN AN OCCASIONAL SERIES

Luna Yang felt too jittery to take the wheel herself, so she asked her mother to drive. She was going to Orono to meet with a woman who had graduated from MIT. The face-to-face conversation is recommended for students applying to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Luna was nervous. She wanted to shine.

As classical music played on the Honda Civic's radio, she tried to calm herself by concentrating on what she would say. "Who am I?" she thought. "How am I supposed to get across all the things I've done and why I deserve to go to MIT?"

Luna has stellar credentials. A senior at Wayzata High School, she was one of just six Minnesotans to get a perfect score on the SAT college entrance exam last spring. Her résumé sparkles with perfect grades, advanced classes, volunteer work and extracurricular activities.

Yet with competition for college as intense as it has ever been, even star students like Luna feel the pressure to market themselves.

Many seniors applying to college this fall and winter -- especially those applying to selective schools -- are spending hours talking with their counselors, polishing their résumés and essays, and figuring out how to highlight their best assets. They're looking for the strategy that will get them noticed in the huge crowd of applicants. Will they sell themselves as the first in their family to attend college? A star athlete? A great musician or writer?

Luna's Honda pulled up in front of the MIT alumna's house eight minutes early. Rather than lurk in the car, she walked to the front door and boldly rang the bell, trying to quell her jitters.

"I figured, just calm down and don't blubber on and get off topic," she said later. "I'm just going to present who I am and hope for the best."

Looking for an edge

At Edina High School, where most kids go on to college, counselor Mike Holbach says his job is to "help a kid present himself well."

He's honest with students and parents about how unpredictable selective schools can be. The Harvards of the world get so many excellent applicants, he said, that to get noticed a student has to have some kind of hook.

"It could be that he hits a golf ball 300 yards, or she's the best oboe player in the city," he said.

Martha Homer, a Minnesotan who is a senior admissions officer at Harvard, has spent 26 years reviewing applications from Minnesota students. About 23,000 students applied to enter Harvard this fall, and most of them met written requirements for admission. Only about one in nine was accepted. So what determined who got in and who didn't?

"We're looking for kids who have pursued their passion, whatever it is, and have become very good at it [while they've] been top-notch students," Homer said. "There are an awful lot of kids across the country that fit that outstanding profile."

Some college applicants angle for attention by shipping homemade sculptures and videotapes to college admissions offices, or plastering their applications with glitter or feathers. (Please don't, colleges say.)

But what about kids like Luna who have perfect SAT scores? She's savvy about the unpredictability of admissions decisions, and made sure that her applications highlight other attributes, like her determination to conquer shyness by joining debate and speech.

Even Harvard looks twice at students with perfect test scores who are school leaders, Homer said. But "there's no formula." Some years the football team needs a kicker, other years it doesn't. Everyone at Harvard lives on campus, so enrollment is limited by the size of residence halls.

At MIT, Dean of Admissions Marilee Jones said that roughly 95 percent of last year's 11,300 applicants qualified on paper to join the freshman class of 1,000. Clearly, something had to give. She looks for students who "are self-motivated, who are willing to take risks, who are willing to risk their ego and are OK with being wrong," she said.

But perhaps her favorite freshmen are those whose résumés aren't loaded with awards. They're "nerdy, very uncool kids who live full industrial strength for their interests" and have a passionate curiosity.

"Give me those kids any day," she said. "Admissions is always about the match. You can have a lot of really bright kids who would be floundering at MIT because they are too passive."

Holbach advises students to apply to at least one "safety" school -- that is, a school they know they can get into. He's seen some teens ignore his advice and then panic as the rejection letters come in. He's dealt with pushy parents, too. One dad handed him a summary of points he wanted Holbach to mention in a letter of recommendation. Holbach told the dad he'd write his own letter, or the family could find another counselor.

In the end, it's the student who sells him or herself.

Too much to do

On an afternoon in late October, Jen VonFelden rushed into Richfield High School's counseling office. She was swamped with school and work, but inspired after a visit to the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

She and counselor Estee Stene had less than an hour to talk, and a lot of ground to cover. So Stene talked fast. She raced through Jen's school records -- eighth in a class of 304, a weighted grade point average of better than A+ -- and flipped through a book of scholarships, marking those Jen should apply for.

Then she got down to business. In the next couple of weeks, Stene said, Jen needed to prepare an activities résumé and complete a questionnaire to help teachers and counselors write letters of recommendation.

Jen nodded, but as the list of tasks grew, she slumped at the table, overwhelmed. Had she applied yet to the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities? Well, no, Jen said. She was waiting until she retook the ACT.

"I want you to get the University of Minnesota application in by Thanksgiving," Stene said firmly.

Jen looked stunned. She was so focused on UW-Madison that she'd let the U of M slide. She hadn't even toured the campus yet. Plus, she was preparing to retake the ACT in two days, she had a job at Herberger's, was editor of the school yearbook, treasurer of the student government, and secretary of the National Honor Society.

"I'm so busy," she said.

Break the work up, Stene said. Do a little each week.

Jen relaxed a little. That makes sense, she said.

Jen gets it together

The advice helped. By mid-November, Jen's three-and-a-half page activities résumé was done, as was the questionnaire. She had finished a draft of the U application.

At a follow-up meeting, Stene interviewed her for a letter of recommendation. As Stene typed furiously at her computer, Jen swiveled in an office chair and answered the counselor's questions.

I paid for most of a school trip to France last year, Jen said, by setting aside a portion of my Herberger's paychecks.

Good, Stene said. That shows discipline.

I'm good at working in groups and have learned not to do all the work myself, Jen said.

So you learned to delegate and hold other kids accountable, Stene said, still typing.

With Jen's high class standing, strong academic record and volunteer activities, Stene figures she should get into the U of M. But UW-Madison, which has been criticized for admitting so many out-of-state students, is less predictable.

Still, Jen is "someone who has used all her God-given talent and run with it," Stene said. "This is what she did in high school, and this is what she'll do in college."

A day before Thanksgiving, Jen got good news. On her second run at the ACT, she boosted her score to 27. That higher score gave her a strong chance for admission to both schools.

Beyond the perfect grades

When the door of the Orono home opened, Luna's nervousness began to fade. The MIT alum, a scientist who works in aeronautics, greeted Luna warmly; a puppy helped break the ice.

They talked for more than 90 minutes, a half-hour longer than planned. Luna said she felt good when she left.

"We laughed quite a bit, and it was great to hear about her experiences as an undergraduate," she said later. "In the end, you realize that people don't have extra eyes or arms. It's the same kind of conversation you might have with friends, not an interrogation."

Luna has a strong sense of her distinctive qualities. "I'm fairly articulate," she said. "I'm good at working with other people. In lots of ways, I'm old for my age. All the nonprofit work I've done exemplifies that. And I have kind of a weird sense of humor."

To show admissions people another side to the perfect grades and test score, one of her essays focused on how she persevered in tennis, eventually making the varsity team.

"Academics has never been anything I had to work day and night at," she said. "But I'm not naturally gifted at tennis. It's sort of amazing that I stuck with it."

Mary Jane Smetanka • 612-673-7380 • SMETAN@STARTRIBUNE.COM

COMING IN JANUARY:

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