Impressive High School Internships in Finance

Applying to colleges can be a big task. These days, with Ivy League schools (and even non-Ivies!) boasting single-digit acceptance rates, it can feel challenging to get ahead of the competition. Internships are a great opportunity to build something meaningful on your resume. But we recommend against going for a major company everyone’s heard of.

College Essays About Your Job

Many people think that they need a fancy internship or an international community service trip to make a competitive resume. We disagree! In fact, we love it when our students have jobs. And they don’t need to be prestigious-sounding jobs, either. Many, many, many students across this country work in order to help their families, save for college, or just accrue a little spending cash. And admissions counselors (who have jobs themselves) will not only understand, but they will respect the effort.   

How to Write the Connecticut College Supplement 2023-2024

Connecticut College is a private liberal arts college in New London, Connecticut. With only about 1,800 undergrads, it’s small. While it was initially a women’s college, it has been coed since the 1960s. The college is somewhat of a hidden gem, especially for those looking for a classic New England liberal arts experience. They are committed to being test-optional and usually have around a 40% acceptance rate.

Rejected from Stanford Early Decision 2023  

Being rejected is not fun. You worked extremely hard to be a qualified applicant. You studied for tests, labored over homework, and participated in extracurriculars while some kids watched TV. We know you wanted to be done and we know this hurts. And we want to remind you that it’s not personal. College admissions are incredibly competitive. WAY more competitive than they were back in your parent’s day. In fact, Stanford’s acceptance rate hovers around 4% these days!!! So, first thing first: you need to understand that this isn’t a reflection of who you are and additionally, that you’re going to be okay. Here are some tips about what to do next:

How to Write the Northwestern Supplement 2023-2024

Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois, aka the Chicago suburbs. Northwestern is probably most famous for its journalism and music programs, but the university has over 130 majors and minors. Their acceptance rate is around 7%, and they take around half of their class during early decisions. They also extended their test-optional policy for at least another year. 

How to Write the University of Maryland Supplement 2023-2024

UMD, or the University of Maryland, is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. It’s a big college with about 30,000 undergrads, 12 schools, and more than 90 majors for undergraduates. There is a lot to love about UM, including excellent academics and sports. Last year, their acceptance rate was 34.3%. This was significantly lower than in the past two years as the amount of applicants has risen sharply.

How to Write the Lehigh Supplement 2023-2024

Lehigh University is a small research university in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania located between New York City and Philadelphia — close enough to both for a day trip. The school has the resources of a large research school, but with a compact student boy of 7,400 students overall and 5,600 undergraduates among six undergraduate colleges. 85% of the undergraduate students are in the College of Arts & Sciences, College of Engineering & Applied Science, and the College of Business. The average class size is 28, and Lehigh leans into emerging technology, even encouraging professors to come up with class ideas that incorporate Artificial Intelligence technologies into students’ creative processes. Students appreciate this, and they receive 15,000 applications annually. The acceptance rate is 37%.

How to Write the Georgetown Supplement 2023-2024

Okay, we’ll level with you here: Georgetown doesn’t go through the Common App, so you have to jump through a few additional hoops to apply directly through their system. Their defense? Having their own application allows them to “fulfill [their] commitment to this holistic admissions process” and “allows [their] applicants to best express their personalities, talents, skills and accomplishments.” Our personal opinion? The initial online form and subsequent application supplement are pretty standard, so… Sometimes people just need to feel special. (Get in line, George!) Speaking of special, last year Georgetown had an acceptance rate of just 13% for incoming freshmen.

How to Write the Occidental Supplement 2023-2024

Occidental College is a small private liberal arts college in Los Angeles, California. While it was founded by the Presbyterian Church, since 1910, it has not been sectarian. It is located specifically near Glendale, so while it is one of the oldest Liberal arts schools in the West, you can still claim you went to school in “The North East...” as long as you mean the North East neighborhood of LA. Occidental, also sometimes just called Oxy, has around 38% acceptance rate during Regular Decision and 52% during Early Decision. Currently, Oxy is test-optional, and they have even said, “There is no plan to return to standardized testing requirements for any future entry term.”

How to Write the Mount Holyoke Supplement 2023-2024

Mount Holyoke is a small, women’s college that’s part of the Seven Sisters along with Barnard, Bryn Mawr, Wellesley and Smith. (Vassar is now co-ed and Radcliffe joined Harvard). It’s located in suburban South Hadley, Massachusetts, within several miles of many, many Boston-area universities. The acceptance rate is about 40% and the undergraduate population is around 2,000 students. While Mount Holyoke says its supplement is option, we feel that no piece of a writing on an application is optional. So, here’s our advice on how to tackle it:

How to Write the University of California Supplement 2023-2024

The University of California is more than Berkeley or UCLA (although those are two of the most popular colleges among our clients). The UC system is made up of nine different colleges (UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz, UC Riverside, and UC Merced), all with varying acceptance rates, admissions requirements, campus ~vibes~, and class sizes. While the UC system isn’t on the Common App (boo!) they do have a pretty cool portal that allows you to apply to all nine, with the same essays for each, with a simple click. Well, technically nine clicks (gotta check off all the boxes).

How to Write the Macalester Supplement 2023-2024

If you are looking for Minnesota nice, you might be thinking about applying to Macalester. Macalester College is a small, private liberal arts college in St. Paul, Minnesota. When we say small, we mean small. The freshman class is about 500 students. Their acceptance rate is around 28%, and they have a permanent test-optional policy.

How to Write the MIT Supplement 2023-2024

MIT, or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is one of the most well-respected, intense, and iconic universities for the pursuit of STEM and STEM-adjacent subjects in the world. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts right alongside Harvard, MIT is one community focused on innovation. The university offers about 4,600 undergraduate students an education rooted in the practical world. Engineering and science are the lenses’ through which they engage with the world, often layered with humanities subjects in non-traditional and unexpected ways. The combination works. MIT has been home to 100 Nobel laureates and 60 National Medal of Science winners. The acceptance rate is a mere 4.8%.  

How to Write the Scripps Supplement 2023-2024

Scripps College is a small, liberal arts women's college in Claremont, California. It is one of the Claremont Colleges, which also includes Pomona College, Claremont McKenna College, Harvey Mudd College, and Pitzer College. Students at the Claremont Colleges can use resources and take classes across campuses. So, while Scripps might be a women's college with only around 1,000 students, it is part of a much larger non-gendered community of 8,500 students across campuses.

How to Write the Wellesley Supplement 2023-2024

Wellesley is a small liberal arts women’s college 12 miles west of Boston. Founded in 1870 to provide an Ivy-caliber education to women, Wellesley continues in that mission today. Only those who have consistently identified and lived as women, regardless of gender assigned at birth, are eligible for admission, and the school identity as an institution for women runs deep. For many of Wellesley students, this makes the school a uniquely powerful place, and the alumnae community is known as one of the most powerful networks of women in the world. It also isn’t uniform, despite being single-gender. The campus is deeply diverse, with 40% of students identifying as students of color and 80 countries represented, and 52% of the admitted class of 2027 spoke a language other than English at home growing up. All this adds up to a special place, and lots of applicants agree. The acceptance rate is only 13%.

How to Write the Stanford University Supplement 2023-2024

Stanford University, located in Stanford, California (very creative) is one of the most competitive and sought-after universities in the country. You probably knew that, though. Stanford famously does not post their acceptance rates, but they do put out a Common Data Set, so we know that last year the acceptance rate dropped to 3.86%. Less than 4%! With a super competitive acceptance rate like that, you don’t just need perfect grades, scores, and impressive extracurriculars. You also need supplements that stand out from the crowd.

How to Write the Syracuse Supplement 2023-2024

Syracuse University is a private research university in (you guessed it) Syracuse, New York. With about 15k undergrads, Syracuse has a lively and vibrant campus. If you google “Syracuse acceptance rate,” you will probably see 59%. Take that number with a grain of salt. While it sounds around right, Syracuse annoyingly doesn’t publish their acceptance rate. We have seen estimates from the low 40s to the high 60s. However, they have announced they will stay test optional through 2025, so at least we can count on that.