College Application Workshop: The College Application and Holistic Review

Well hello everyone, just joining here. We'll get started in just about a minute or so, but I do see we still have a number of people are joining us after the session here, so why don't we just give it just a little while? Let everyone settle in? Then we'll go ahead and get started. But thanks everyone for being here.

Yeah, right, we must be pretty popular because we have quite a few participants here today pretty clearly worked out. I said this could be you.

Alright, well we still have a few trickling in, but we're starting to plateau, so I think we can go ahead and get started. I'll make sure that we all have enough time to get through the presentation and get to as many questions as possible here. Thank you all so much for joining for today's session for our College Application Workshop today. We are gonna be talking for top college application and holistic review. Whether this is your first, whether this is your 4th and you're joining us all welcome. We're glad to have you here. If this is your first and you are interested in checking out the earlier sessions from throughout this week, we do have those recorded posted on our admission site and session is also going to be posted.

On our site, shortly after we wrap up here today. So if you do have your tactical difficulties, anything like that, you're more than welcome to this recording. A little bit on later on here, but I do think these topics are going to be a lot of interest to all of you joining as we are approaching August 1 when the application does available. You may be wondering a little bit about filling out the application and how we can make on these additions here. So we are going to be getting into that during our time together today. Just to give you an idea of how this session will go without the next 45 minutes or so.

That with our presentation and then we will turn it over to all of you to answer as many questions as we can during our remaining time so you can see on your screen on the questions tab or the chat tab you are going to be sitting there. I would ask that you wait until we reach the end of our presentation in order to send in those questions because we might be answering those as we go on, but we'll let you know when the time comes to sending those questions. We're happy again to get to as many of those out as we go, but just to introduce ourselves, get into the presentation. My name is Brandon Warzones. I'm a senior assistant director in the admissions office here at Notre Dame.

In the Admissions office for about 7 years now, and I'm also a graduate of Notre Dame and graduated back in 2012. Very fortunate to be joined by the college she worked. Thank you Brendan. Hello everyone, my name is Shamar cousin. I am originally from Philadelphia PA. Now I called the Great City of South Bend IN my home. I have an admissions counselor here at the university and I'm also a proud member of the university class of 2021. It's got a few questions again. I did just want to assure because we had a question. Is this real life? Yesterday is really hopefully it proves that reading that question there and again we will get to as many questions as we can.

Once we get the shop, I do want to dive in to make sure that we are able to get to us some good information here, especially as we approach application season. But just again, talking a little bit about different application types and now the good news about biologies is that typically you are not going to have to fill out a separate application for every single college that you are applying to. We want to make a little bit easier on you by using one of these applications that are accepted by a wide number of your partner school. The three types that Notre Dame accepts for our application, but you can also use these to apply.

Priority of different schools. In addition to notification that is the most widespread for 900 partner colleges except the communication, we do accept. The coalition application is apply. Coalition on score. But we do accept that as well and we also accept the questbridge application. And again these applications were all in the way of recognizing that you are looking for a large batch of pretty similar information from all of our applicants. This was amazing by the process. So the good news is when you pick one of these applications to use to apply their schools.

When you complete the application itself, both the vast majority of application is going to be done. In fact, many copies except all the applications you may just finish the complication and then you can just apply directly to that school. Although many schools like Notre Dame will also have a supplementary portion to the outreach itself, so you complete the application and then you'll leave the supplementary specific to that university. So you want to sure that each individual university or college or applying to what the needs are. If you do have these supplementary portion in addition to the application itself, but on the application you're going to be entering.

A lot of background information about yourself, so personal information, demographic information, educational schools you attend, the classes that you're taking contextual information. You'll also be listening like activities. All the four aspects that go into our holistic review of your application. We'll be talking about a little bit later on there, but again, this is all just information that you're applying to wants to know, so that's going to be entering on the application itself by the kind of apply coalition on score or the question page application and we would be considering all this information along with your translator.

Sending you this school profile that you're high school provides that provide very important background information about your high school for us to know how long, with all letters of recognition, yeah, we got into a little bit more detail about these. We talk about holistic review in just a moment here, but that is the application itself. The different we accept and that are very popular among different colleges. But when I say holistic review really, what that means is that schools like Notre Dame are going to receive more qualified applications than we also available at our school.

Your application, your order to decide who we will offer admission to among that large pool of qualified applicants. So listing for you means that we are going to read and evaluate your higher application. It means that every party application is used as part of our view. To make an admissions decision. We are not just going to zero in on what you're gonna use that to make an admissions decision will be in evaluating your whole application. It also means that we're not going to be able to just do a review to say, OK, student has this GPA system has this test for something like that. If you give you a definitive.

Meaning that we are going to need to read the evaluate your entire application and also consider our entire applicant pool before we do make a final decision and make a potential offer of admission at our particular school and as part of that you were asking ourselves a few different questions. Will the student be academically successful? Is this a student that is going to enter into our school, succeed and thrive in the classroom, be able to graduate? Handle the workload that is here, but it's much more beyond just the active pieces we're also considering is the student going to thrive outside of the class as well? Are they going to be happy here?

Engaged and productive use all of the educational, academic and non academic opportunities that are offered in our school. I think it was always going to take advantage of all the great opportunities that our school offers while they're here to truly thrive in and outside classroom. Also, alternating Notre Dame is unique in the middle schools as well, have their own kind of unique aspects. They're bringing to the table and we want to pick up a particular school is going to be a good match for you, so again you can be happy and productive during your time here on campus. But by describing it in this way

that's pretty bad. You know, by saying that this student going to be successful outside the classroom. So Shamar and I do want to take some time to take through the application itself to let you know these are the different areas that we're going to be using to review your application or to make machines decision. So I'm going to pass tomorrow as we start diving into those specific aspects of the application comes up to make decisions. So you were right as we start reading, yes, exactly, we mentioned multiple Times Now this holistic review process gonna give an excellent explanation. I believe all the holistic review process is, I know you are sitting waiting very anxiously.

See what exactly it is that we're looking for when we're reviewing these applications so we won't barely any longer. We won't have you waiting any longer, so I would say that there are at least another day will be processed. 5 1/2 things that we're looking at. 2 1/2 are academic and three are not academic things. One academic things that we look at would be the rigor of your room, so that would be what types of courses you're taking. Some time in high school. Now the question is that usually is OK. How many people do I have to take or how many IB courses do I have to take? And the answer to that is it really depends? There is no set answer. There's no magical.

If you leave here for this session with any word in mind, it should be context and contextual because we are looking at your application and the context of your specific situation, so all schools are different. Schools have you know AP class that has the highest form of rigors some schools have I classes, some have honors classes or advanced topics classes or their own completely unique regular. So really it depends on the student themselves. Everything we're looking at in the context of your school and your situation. Really, we just want to see that you are challenging yourself across those five years.

For subjects so taking challenging math courses, English courses, science courses, history or social science courses, and foreign language courses as well. Once again, no magical number of AP's or IP's or anything like that. We just want to see that you are challenging yourself throughout your time in high school.

Also kind of going hand in hand with that idea of adding active rigor would be your performance in those classes. So not only do we wanna see that you're calling yourself, but we also see that you are doing well now. The obvious follow-up question to that is alright, but is the average GPA for an accepted in the first year here at Notre Dame or any other competitive institution. And he answered at least.

You have one because every school is different. Some have you know unweighted scores. Some have weighted GPA, some have 4.0 scales have 14 point scales, some have 100 point scales. So really, if we did try to find an average across the board, it probably be like a 17 point for some abstract number. That really makes anyone who makes the process a bit more equal for everyone involved is .8. What does that even mean? So like recalculations GPU, there's we're looking at you and the context of your school and want to see that you are.

Going well, we're not comparing you to the school down the road across the country. We just want to see that you were telling yourself and that you are doing well. Those courses. Your school specifically, where all you have things like your trends, both in terms of your grades and in terms of your course. They had a bit of rougher start here, and you can see probably time yourself for your GPA, increase junior increased, your increase as well. It turns like that we also look at trends in terms of and usually the typical path that we see is that where you're increases over time, so we'll see junior and senior year. You're taking the more regular classes.

Then what you might be taking your first year for your sophomore year in high school as well? Also looking at those other factors, clearly I think there's a lot of people thinking so mysterious on this side. Missions like are there just robots looking these sessions even live to begin with? Yes, we are human beings on this side of things that just outside factors. Maybe you got a concern yourself, more years you have to take some time out of school or you had some personal problems. All those things that we do consider where we are reviewing your application. So once again, once you but we are looking at those different.

Outside factors and also we do have to make sure that you are meeting someone to check in with with every school you're requirements for admission here, I think we probably at least 16 units of courses here. That's equivalent of one year. Of course, we will probably take four Polish 3 units of math, 2 units of Science, 2 social science, and two units of equipment. Now some caveat with that, and I encourage you to check out not just our admission site to look. Once again, all the schools you're applying to because our few caveats. Like if you're applying to be in.

You might have to take 4 units of math instead of just three. Would you prefer students take 4 units? Of course, across those five years, our finance again check in with all the schools that you're applying to the sure that you're meeting all those admissions requirements. Absolutely thanks very much. You are and move on to the final academic year. In addition to that performance and the academic rigor, something I think is a lot of people's minds standardized test scores, meaning the SAT or the ACT. So I do want to find a couple of terms that I think you're quite commonly see when it comes to schools.

Service test scores starting with self reporting scores. So if the school and Notre Dame does accept self reported scores, that means you don't need to pay to send in your official scores in order for them to. You is just part of your application. You can just self report them on your application and we use them when making an admissions decision. Now I would say that you are admitted to rule and then decide to go to that school. You eventually need to send your official scores, just not a front, so please.

Scores, and that's what that would mean if the school doesn't. And then super score so it Notre Dame. We do super score both the SAT and the ACT. So what that means is that you can either exam multiple times. We would take the highest section score from those attempts and combine them to give you guys a composite score. So if you take the SAT once you really well on math, but you don't do that well on the reading and writing section at another time. You don't do well on that, but you do clean writing section. We would just take those two quick section scores, combine them and that's the composite score that we would.

So that's what support means. If a school like Notre Dame super score for the SAT and the ACT team now I didn't wanna get into though the idea of over the past few years have moved to a test optional admissions model and in Notre Dame we have a test for the past two years and we are going to be test optional for this upcoming admission cycle so rice seniors you would not be required to submit the SAT or the ACT in order to have the application with us for rising juniors and later we do not have a decision yet about future rising seniors. We are going to be test optional and I want you to share you with that.

Those questions I know we get quite a bit well. I've had a disadvantage by not submitted test score and I can respond to that that no you are not going to be advantage. It is not you negatively if you choose not to submit a test score along with your application. We have a lot of data points that we've already talked about and we will talk about that we use when making an admissions decision, so of course remove that's one less data point, but we can still perform a holistic review of your application and use that to make it so kind of the benchmark that I would use this for. It's not necessarily I have to. Or should I submit it?

It really comes down to if you're able to take the SAT and ACT score that you're proud of. Do you feel like this whole enhances your application? Is this score an accurate reflection of your academic ability? Basically, is this score something I really want to make sure that it uses as part of our review? Go ahead and send it in, otherwise, don't feel obligated to send it because you are not putting yourself at a disadvantage. Decide not to submit the score. We are test optional for domestic and international students for reminder. International students still do need to English. For example, you have a number of those TOEFL the Duolingo.

English test I LP suppose might be different if our test optional whether the scores require or recommend for scholarships. Although I would say the redeem anything. We are test optional for all students. That includes miserable for those and you're not a disadvantage you ask for so just a little bit about test option and another different schools and defining terms if the test is required or you choose to submit the test score. But certainly we do want to move the not academic pieces just as important as the happiest exactly. Thank you Brendan and he told us non academic session section here and one non academic.

Thing that we are reviewing this entire holistic review process would be your extracurricular activities and important to note that extracurricular activities are anything that you are doing outside of the classroom does not have to be just things you're doing in your high school. Like maybe you're in theater or in the band, or you're playing, but really it is anything or any time from being in the classroom doing homework so it could be a part time job. It could be community service, it could be taken care of like a sibling, or it could be a long commute to and from school, or it could be a hobby that you're really invested in actually.

One metric reaction that releases one applicant would be proud Fish mom and nerd and she went through. She would do a lot of research on different breeds of fish. She would research like what types of foods that they need to eat, what types of fish could sit together and then she would go out and buy fish and have her own like mini aquarium at her house that they're unique, extracurricular activity, and I think it's something that most people wouldn't think to put on their activity section. But that's just to show that really is anything that we're doing outside the classroom. It does not have to be just things that you're doing in your high school and now a lot of questions that we get around.

They have to do with. Is there a different a whole lot of metric regular activities for being engaged like really goes into just one or two things like quantity versus a level of commitment or level of engagement. Once again there is no like right or wrong answer in terms of extracurricular activities I've mentioned before that everything is actually get everything contextually. So firstly it could be the case that you go to a very small school. Maybe that does not have very many clubs, or maybe you rural town that doesn't have too many opportunities at school.

Your actual curricular activities actually not be so robust. Or maybe you go to a high school that has 800 people in the class and it's really, really hard to get leadership position. So maybe you are president of that class. That would be, you know, quite for the last 800 different students. Or maybe you don't have the chance to have those leadership positions, because in your class, once again everything is contextual. We are humans on this side and we can't those different situations. We also like to say that you should demonstrate your leadership and initiative. And really what I like to say this portion is don't sell yourself short.

We are a leader and any of your activities write that out, and your extracurricular activities action. Saying that you are the President or the vice president for the state, or if you won any awards, you can put that in your rewards section. You can say first place and some sort of equestrian competition, or you got the gold medal in your dance troop or whatever the case may be. Don't sell yourself short. I love to say that there's not a lot of time in life where you get to just kind of brag about really. Just show all of the amazing things that you're doing outside of the classroom. I know you're all doing amazing things and.

All right so far. Honestly, I would say I'm glad I thought when I did I'm not too sure I don't need to think that all these new applicants are doing. All of you are doing this well. I think that's what was I doing in high school. I imagine with all the great things that you guys are done these days, so definitely don't sell yourself short. You can talk about your honors and awards. You can talk about your leadership positions and you can mention all those things that may not seem like an extracurricular activity. Just brought basin like taking care of a relative or babysitting, or working in community service or not.

Maybe really just we want to see exactly what it is that you're doing outside. Yeah, if you blue ribbon winning fish on the visionary you know I think you need to put that in there as well. Thanks. You are moving on to the next section. I'm very important and I think often the most interesting part of the application that we can read would be the personal statement essay is actually Speaking of essays. I wanted to clarify something about questions about this. We're related to the standardized test. We do not require. The essay section SAT. 40 ACT. So we generally don't consider those scores as part of the application. What the issue, that clarification. But when it comes to.

Are we wouldn't have both the personal statement on the application itself, so the common application apply coalition of score and the QUESTBRIDGE application. We all have a personal statement attached to it, about 650 words and then at Notre Dame we do require two additional short answer. Supplementary question 250 words each. So they're going to be a little bit shorter and the essays are an important part of the application because this is where we really get to know you beyond the numbers where we really get to know you better as a person and understand more about who you are.

This is really your opportunity to make application to your own. Talk to us in your own voice so we can be better than we don't have interviews as part of the admissions process will be made, but we don't. So we really treat the essays almost like a written interview. It's our best to get to know you. So the best advice when you are working picture, they're really written in your own voice, your unique personality shining through it, drawing on your own personal experiences, perspective and insight you can get to know you better. The whole goal is that after reading the essays, we really feel like we've gotten from a clear picture in our mind of what drives you, what you're going to be like.

About our campus. So certainly you're going to want to prove your show them to other people to make sure this is all new piece of writing. Certainly we do want to see you really writing abilities here, but also remember if you're not writing like a formal essay for writing much more genuine and authentic way that does showcase who you are so we can know your personality, who you are better and help to see if you're going to be a good match for our university as well. And as I mentioned, since we have so many applicants that might have the numbers, you know those grades. Everything do very well and be successful at our universities. This is a really nice way to kind of stand out from others.

Alright, that you're personalizing authentic essay so we can get to know you just a little bit better. So good thing to keep in mind is you are working on this.

And this will be our last session. Our non academic piece that we're revealing or review entire application here that would be your letter of recommendation. So at Notre Dame we just have one required letter of recommendation which would come from a teacher and a core subject once again. Now English math, science, history or social science or foreign language teachers, preferably from your junior or senior year. Just because those are teachers have seen you most recently, but we also understand that you might have a teacher from your first year or sophomore year who might know you really well. And really, that's the whole point of making sure you're getting recommendations from someone.

Who really knows you want a personal level, not just inside the bathroom but outside the bathroom. Health can speak on your personality, your strengths, your qualities, your contributions, not just in class, but to the school, a whole or maybe into your broader community as well. So we think I'll put some, you know, effort and some of these recommendation letters to them because they do provide a lot of context. He worked again, and we've been following this entire presentation here. I think we've said context 20 times so far, so they really speak on those contextual parts of your acting. As Brendan just said, we do get other people.

The things that you're doing extremely, we get to hear your own voice through your essays and your short answers. But here, when the letters of recommendation come, get to see what your community actually thinks about you. And once again they can provide some great context about maybe some different situations that we can chat earlier about, maybe injured and not being able to partake and attractive. That's something you can discuss in your additional information section of the of the application. That's also something that could come up. Any Council Member recommendation which I hadn't just yet, but we do have an option with amended Councilor letter of recommendation as well.

Once again, completely optional. We know that you know your college counselors very well, so you might be in that school that has a class of 800. You don't count health, so you are not at a disadvantage if you don't submit the counselor letter of recommendation. Most students only submit one or two letters of recommendation, so you are completely fine. But if you did have an injury like that and we're unable to participate equally, you couldn't export or you once again have the cushion and had to listen in class has a chance in those letters of recommendation as well, where your Council could speak on that context. Given you know what you were going through at that time, so.

Not really, but really anything that could be going on. Maybe what the COVID situation was in school. Maybe you had some hybrid learning, or maybe you all got sent home and everything was online, so any challenges you have to face up any sorts of injuries. Pretty much any contact that is available can definitely make sure that you're putting some time, some thoughts, some effort into making sure you get those letters of recommendation from someone who know you well. Speak on you as a person and not just ask you as a polishing union.

And so those kind of wraps up that main areas of the application that we're gonna be using in order to make that admissions decision. Again, I would stress along with that holistic review. It doesn't mean that any kind of money area is the single most important. It really means that everything on the application doesn't matter, and we'll use that to make it safe. But before we turn it over to questions, I'm gonna leave it just a little bit. So where do we go from here? There's a lot of question that we just gave you. How can you use this to you? Like moving into on the application season? So it's just a reminder the admissions process released Thursday High school. The things we talked about, your grades, we're going to be looking at those from 9th grade up starting your freshman year.

Developing good habits may be working towards your positions where you can make a positive impact and then those activities that you're a part of. It. Also remember that we're not only going to evaluating your application, you're also evaluating your colleges and universities that you want to apply to or go to as well. So starting that college search process early as well so you can really figure out what value in your college experience and you can start moving down those possibilities, which would be a good fit for you. And again, since we are approaching August 1 year, which is when the application becomes available, you wanna make sure you're devoting plenty of time to each part of the application you do not want to be in the.

Situation for 11:00 PM According deadline and you are desperately trying to get all those the application done, so making sure you know the deadlines you start working ahead of time. So for instance you can teacher that you want to write your letter dictation time in order to write that letter of recommendation. If you reach out to them the day before it's due, and say that you have 12 hours to write another recommendation. Certainly again for your essay. Likely you don't want to be in life turning in your first draft. Do you wanna take some time to edit that? Getting started on the process there early? And finally, don't be afraid to ask questions. That's why we're hearing vision offices, Shamar and I.

With all of our colleagues and our relations colleagues, other schools, we're here to talk with you and answer questions. Certainly you do wanna take the time because there's a lot of information out there on our admissions website. Bit of research yourself to see if you can find the answer, but certainly if you can't find the answer, you still need clarification. After making that effort or your house, always feel free to reach out to admissions, office, call, e-mail and we're happy to help you and answer your questions related to the application. They're definitely going to get in touch with the admissions, but certainly our social media channels you wouldn't be able to do that. Also have here for you. And at this time the rest of our time together. I think we can turn it over to all of your.

You know some of you have already sent to me, but please resend the more. We definitely need people. I'm sorry to get to all the questions you send it. We'll do our best to get to as many as possible and sure what you look. I'm actually happy to take one first because I realized I should be like here's the question was can you send the communication and the quest for your application and the answer to that Nola is that maybe you can't, but you certainly should have because all of the applications are going to be capturing the same information. So maybe you can fill out multiple applications we don't remember. That's a lot of extra work for you and it's not going to help you with the process. So really, just picking one and using that to apply.

College that's the best for you, so you're not repeating that information your question, so I have another one then yeah, here it says would have disadvantage if your application if your major and your resume or your editor curricular activities do not line up. That is in question. And the answer to that is no, you would not be at any sort of disadvantage. The keyword there is intended major, so one more client to name here. We do have option to come in as undecided. You do have to measure, but there is a major is just an intense you're not glued to that major. You not have to stick out.

You do not have to make any major declaration until at earliest end of your first year. More years here at Notre Dame, so your intended major is just an intense allowing students come in and you that first year really, as it's a permit process as a teenager in high school you do not have to have your whole life figured out. I know when I went to Notre Dame, I applied as a computer scientist and end up propagating as English or sociology minors. Though the complete opposite spectrum. No activities have to line up with your intended major is activities that you are passionate about and you are being involved inside the outside.

Yeah, really good answer. Probably too because someone asked that in terms of the rigor of courses that you're taking. Is it gonna focus more narrowly into what you want to study with the math majors? You really just be focusing on taking tough classes and kind of the math area, and I would say that we're really looking for students that are challenging themselves across a variety of academic areas across the academic spectrum. So at Notre Nation Mark mentioned, we're going to offer a very well-rounded curriculum and flexible curriculum. You're taking classes across a variety of different areas. Just because you're an engineer, you're still going to be taking writing intensive.

Versus social sciences. Just because you're English, you're still taking math and science courses. I, political science, film and television, so I was very large tomorrow. But I I think since nobody taking challenging courses in a number of areas, we wanna see that in high school as well too. But that's a very and then we'll just because we did bring up the work so much and the question was everything is how do we in an Indians team understand context? Why that's a very good question on that comes from that school profile that I mentioned earlier that we received from every application. So the school profile will provide information about things like what classes offered in that.

Cool so we can understand where a rigorous schedule will look like. There's a school there as Shamar mentioned that there are any changes to school during the COVID pandemic. When did you go for two more? All classes offered their activities being offered. You wanna know about that as well or anything unique to your school? So the school profile is helpful. The counter letter of recommendation can be very helpful for that and also historical data that we also keep from different high school communications from and certainly if we actions were not shy just like all of you might reach out asking questions, we're gonna reach out to kellers and holes as well as we need clarification so work very hard to make sure we do understand the full context.

With every application in high school.

And we have another question here. Sorry, I just actually lost it in the chat. Let me try to find all the time. There's a lot of questions popping up and they go through really really fast here. OK, we have a question from Allison about extracurriculars again, and the question is, do you have to do very, very well in your extracurricular activity, like teaching and debate to be competitive in our application process? And the answer to that is no, you do not have to be like the number one person in the entire world to be able to positively hear in our admissions process, and our review process.

Now I just want to see that you are doing things that you are passionate about doing things not just for myself, but I did mention before, like not to sell yourself. Sure, so if you do have any of those funds, you can debate it. Certainly would not hurt you to put that in your description directly activity or put that in the award section. But once again, the majority that we do see are not being national champion because I'm sure there are very many now champions in the out there. So no, you do not have to be the world not to be considered in our review process here. We just want to see that you're doing things that you are passionate about. What drives you? What motivates you?

Spending your time out time in the classroom. That's a very good question. I got a couple that already. Letters of Recommendation one was can my teacher recommendation come from a music or chorus? Right? Answer to that is how I believe I as she might require teacher letter of recommendation that would need to come from one of the core academics. So math, science, English, social studies, foreign language. There were quite a future letter we need to come from one of those. You can submit additional letters of recognition as well. If you do have like a non creature or someone else someone asked about like they're cool like an internship manager, certainly.

Special letters as well. I would just make sure before you so that they're going to be adding computer application. It is not really the case where the more letters you submit, the better your application on this much more quality over quantity. You have someone that will add a new perspective to your location so we can get to know you better. You are able to submit additional letters of recommendations. I'll give an example that sometimes we'll get students that do submit letters of recommendation from like a big white people figure. The CEO of a company or something like that, but if they don't know you well and they're just writing a generic letter, that's not going to be particularly impressive. We really want to use these letters to be getting.

Be better so it's more about asking what really add to your application. Like an impressive name or something like that, great.

Yeah, those are great questions. I see there's a lot of questions in your extracurricular activities. There was one about how would you review someone who made was working a part time job and then quit that job? Does that put them at a disadvantage when we're looking at tropical activities? And once again, no, that does not put you at a disadvantage by any means. We understand once again that we are humans on this side and everything is contextual. Maybe you just don't have the time and you'll have to work part time job you work. Maybe you picked up some other activity, give you help, play this sport or you're the lead in your drama club or theater or writing.

Own player picked up a new instrument for you. Have some personal property there could be infinite amount things. I don't want pretty much and your leg that could. You can't work for time job. Or maybe you're at school and now you have to focus a little bit more time on your homework or preparing for your exams, writing essays or whatever the case may be. So no, you don't have to ever think you're having dissipated by saying that you stopped working after job. Just once you're being genuine. Being honest in your application. So once again, kind of like with self reporting scores. We don't want anyone making up activities. I think that don't tell me that you're not doing exactly what it is that.

You are generally going outside.

Absolutely, and we're getting a fair number of questions. I'm glad that we have some around the world that are joining us regarding the proficiency exams that I did briefly 2 questions about. Can they be waived like when they required so you can because we got one specific question that if you take the SAT or ACT you still need to take the English proficiency exam and the answer is that the essay the proficiency exam can be waived if you achieve a certain score SAT or ACT the most up to date which is would be listed on our website. But I believe it's 650 on the evidence based redirection of the SAT or 27 English.

Portion of the ACT exam can be waived if you do apply test optional to Notre Dame. Then we would you know kind of circumstances require the English proficiency exam. If you do have a special circumstance, like if you attended, for instance, English speaking high school for instance, and you want to request a waiver to the English proficiency exam, that can be done after you apply, we wouldn't need to do your whole application prior to have eventually waiving the proficiency exam. What you can do is, once you submitted your application, reach out to the admissions office to request that way, or if you have a special circumstance that you think would qualify you for that.

What I would say with the English proficiency exam if you're in a circumstance where you think you can be waived because you're confident that you're going to do very well. If you're able to, I would still recommend taking the English proficiency exam, because you really well on it. That's another cause that's another good thing that you have to application that would potentially positive or so, if again, you're in a position with your relatives required for you. I'd recommend you if you feel you could potentially qualify for labor good questions there. Those are all great questions. A lot more questions about maybe this test optional policy here, question about what.

You submit a test score and then decide later on that you do not act or not proud of that score. You don't want that score to be reviewed in our process here, so if you do apply with the test and you submit score, you do have a 10 day grace period. After that I submitted to go into your applicant status portal here at the weekends, which your answer so you can switch from applying with the test being test optional or vice versa. It is important to note that you can only do that one time, so we have this temperance to decide whether or not you think the answer you can change it within those 10 days. But if you change it, that is the only time you can change it to whatever you want to do.

That is what we will review when we're going over your application.

Excellent and I got one as well and trying a few complications last couple minutes. Question for Maggie to emphasize certain activity articular they were involved in that you feel is really important just to make sure admissions officers kind of understand that and take it into account. And along with just listing the activities that you are willing to have the ability to list additional information about how many hours per week you're involved in this activity, how many weeks per year that you're doing this. So if you want us to know that you're spending a lot of time each week year round, you're involved in this, you're able to show that to you in a long listing. The activity leadership positions you do also just have a general free.

Text description box as well. So if you do want to go into greater detail piece of paragraph about this activity so you can take advice to us how important this is to you. You people need to do that on the both the activities. That's just the general additional information. Sometimes that's a good way where if you feel like you're not able to adequately explain it on the application, you have the additional information section to go into more detail. Sometimes people have more than 10 activities that are able to be listed on the application. You additional activities on the additional information section as well, so we can take that into account if you're able to do a couple more, I'll give you one more. I'll do one more.

Out here yeah we are getting towards the end here. So there are a lot more questions about extracurricular activities that you all have your thinking caps on today about these extra curricular. So one that just came in from Cindy and a few more that were related to budgeting activities and how you know where you where you should be putting them that they should be listed in order like most to least impressive or or you're most passionate about at the time. Really, it is completely up to you to sit and and judge or scrutiny that you decide to list your extracurricular activities out really in terms of.

Listen for more important aspect is to make sure that you are not selling yourself short and really being pretty thorough and your explanation especially I have mentioned this before. You might be in an activity or a club organization that is unique to your school or to your community. Maybe you're in the Spirit Squad and I know that might sound pretty obvious to you what Spirit Squad is, but I was reading application like what in the World Conference really means. So give us some more context of what you're doing. What exactly this organization? What exactly is your role and function so does not quite matter how you live.

That he's out, but definitely make sure you're through and your explanations on what exactly it is that you're doing in them. So very question. I answer a couple short ones very quickly, and then I think we can close it. Had to go in tomorrow. I'll be interested to get your perspective on it too, but we had a couple questions. Do we prefer the SAT or the ACT? No, we do not. We do not have a preference between the protest for you is totally fine. Again, we do Super Tour the SAT and the ACT as well and something I think is a good question is do course taken in middle school like high school courses I've gotten specifically about foreign language? Is that how forwards those credit requirements that you are a little bit?

And yes, they were very good question. So for instance, for foreign language we say like we would require two years of a foreign language, but that's to be judged off of the highest level that you've achieved. So if you took Spanish one in 8th grade, two in 9th grade, we would consider that two years of Spanish. So you guys have gone through Spanish 4, even if you took one or two in real school, that would still be counted as four years of a foreign language. That's a very good question. Then the one that I think was just kind of a question about is there anything on an application that you read that you view negatively? Is there anything?

And maybe while you think all kind of emotions. But what I would say is if the essay is very generic, I think that's one that's kind of challenging. Where if I think we kind of feel any number of students, we don't feel like we really got to know your voice and your person now, like if you're describing an event all you tell us is what happened. You're not telling us how you felt, what you were thinking during that time is maybe someone writes their essay about about their grandmother and their grandmothers are really amazing. Person got incredible things but after we think I kind of want to admit your grandmother, I don't know about you. I haven't learned much about you.

What are they going to say? This kind of personal to you? Showcase your personality. That's one area that I would try to like. Yes, of course. One thing that I think always stands out to me is I mentioned this a few times. We really like to see students who are very passionate about what they're doing. So sometimes that means that maybe you're not in as many activities, but you're very active and I think it is usually pretty clear, pretty obvious to see what you meant is more of just like a joiner or just doing activities just to put it on. Maybe they were in 10 different things, but they did this for 9th grade and they were in this bill for just 10 grades.

And they were that this service thing for just two days in the week and the two hours of required service for your high school or whatever. I think it always does stand out when it is truly passionate, truly genuine and helpful. Waste them and drives them and what they're interested in person is someone who thinks that oh, the admissions committee would love to see if I'm in 15 extracurricular activities, so I'm going to sign all these. Gonna do one hour one year and I'm gonna put it on my resume. So technically began with the impression of the review process. Awesome, thank you are, well, I know we are a few minutes over so we are going to stop questions, but.

A good deal of you did stick around you for your persistence through even a few minutes past. Yeah, yeah. Joining us here today.

First College application workshop or this is your 4th one and use the same. In this space all over the. We really appreciate your time. Hopefully this conference before you can definitely stay in contact with our social media there. I don't know if high schoolers are using Facebook these days, but we do have Instagram and Twitter and Tik T.O.K which I think is really excellent. So definitely check us out on those platforms engaged as well. You could sign up for our mailing list, which you can find on our admissions website. So if you go to admissions.nd.edu you can check out that you can check out the recordings for.

The last three college application workshop and this one you can join late and didn't get to catch the entire thing. You can also check out all of our virtual resources on our website as well as our on demand sessions and you can sign up for an in person session and for if you wanna make you one of our available is in person, but it's like a really around here we go a little bit over time. We appreciate your time. Listening to us ramble on about another name for 50 minutes. Definitely stay in contact. Check out those resources and as we always look to say, I will thank you so much.