Part II: The limbo between high school and college

There's a nice, long eight month break between the end of high school and college. Especially for those in year 6, contending with all the madness of school, rounding up ARPs, and college applications, you'll probably by looking forward to the long break. So let's see what might be happening during those warm, sunny, honeymoon months.

An approximate time-and-action line for those going overseas on a scholarship

Final High School year:

• May: AP exams, school exams. Application anxiety truly begins to sink in.
• June - July: research schools to apply for, round up SATs and placement tests.
• August - October: Score as high as possible in your last few tests, assignments, and exams. Keep mugging. Have no life. Push to the end - its almost there but yet so far away!!
• September: Time to apply for UK if you're eyeing Oxbridge. If not, you have until next year to apply.
• September - December: Anytime between here, apply for US schools. Bug teachers for recommendations. Most people tend to apply for the early decision schools around this time. You'll probably be so busy with school work you don't have time to apply for regular decision now, no matter how much this is advisable.
  
• October: Oxbridge interviews and tests. Force yourself to squash out time to prepare for them, despite having 1000 assignments due next week and your last high school exams looming.
• November: Graduation and Prom (At long lasssssttttt!!!!!!!)
• December: Early decision results released. Decide what to do next based on the results. There's still time to apply for more schools. NUS and NTU application opens around now as well. Work. Apply for the scholarships with an early intake/ Enjoy being free, finally, after 12 years of school! You've earned it! =DDDDDDDDD

Year after graduation from High School:

• January - August: (Approximately) Continue working/ NS/ find a job/ slack
• January: Early cycle interviews for scholarships/ Enlistment for guys. Oxbridge results should be out around this time. Scream with joy or mourn, whatever. There'll be more such emotions rolling by in early April.
• February: Interviews from US college alumni. You'll be quite busy ... if you applied for a lot of schools. Most UK schools should release the application results by now. Start getting panicky about where your life is heading in the next few months.
• March: A Level results released; regular cycle for scholarship applications opens. Nervousness rises by a factor of 10 each day as the US College decisions release dates loom. Beg teachers again for recommendations. Persuade people who like you to be your referees.
• January - March: Loads of scholarship talks at cool locations like Swissotel the Stamford =P. Nice food served at tea reception. And of course, you get to talk to scholars up and personal.
  
• April: D-Day has arrived. US College application results released. Scream and hit the ceiling if you got into your dream college. Cry over split milk about schools you didn't get into. Go to admit receptions from schools you were accepted to. Talk to people about their choices. Decide which school to go to. Enroll. Go for more scholarship interviews.
• May: Scholarship results released. Decide which scholarship to accept. Sign the preliminary contract of acceptance.
• June - July: Scholarship Pre-departure courses occur around this time. Heard they vary from anything from one week to one month. Meet loads of new people. Start filling in forms from your university, which will begin collecting a lot of information about you to prepare for your arrival. Book for housing. Begin visa application. Get medical check-ups done - you need to satisfy certain medical requirements before being allow to enroll in a US/ UK school. Book your air tickets. Realize that it all adds up to quite a bit of time and effort when you put it together. Realize that the admin work and form-filling didn't end after January 2nd, post High school year, after the deadline for the Common Application.
  
• July: Scholarship award rehearsals and ceremony. Shop for everything you need. Laptops, warm clothes, clothes that don't need ironing, clothes that can be machine washed, luggage bags, more underwear, shoes, bedsheets... goodness gracious me, that's a lot of money! Find out that shopping is a pain in the a** when you really need to get something but can't find what you need because the shops don't stock it, the price is too high, or it just isn't what you're looking for.
• August: Select courses to take in your first semester of university. Sign the final contract with your scholarship organization. Realize that you only have two weeks more to squeeze everything into your travel bags. Decide if some things can be shipped instead of carried personally by you onto the airplane. Figure out how to get from the airport to your school. Change money to the currency you will use in your college. Some colleges have a "local orientation" for admitted Singaporeans going there, before they even leave familiar grounds.
• September: Fly away from Singapore. Sign for a phone subscription. Set up a bank account. Set up your new room... Hasn't happened to me yet but that's what I expect will happen from talking to seniors. Let the reality that you are now wholly and solely responsible for all your laundry, meals, classes, room, and finances hit you proper. You've probably known this fact intellectually but not personally for a few months now. Buy all the stuff you need but couldn't bring from home. Go for orientation.
• October - December: Honeymoon is over. Begin mugging... again. Application cycle repeats in your senior undergrad year, I guess, for those aiming for grad school.

Internet Postings

Vanessa wrote about her Cambridge interviewer looking at the facebook profiles of candidates. Whatever you choose to think of that bit, don't completely turn a blind eye to the implications of that article.

With regards to the debate on the chatbox.

Hi everyone,

First of all I would like to apologize to all readers who may be offended by Srinath's comments on the tagboard, I understand it might be offensive and uncalled for to some readers and by virtue of that I apologize for not making the following clear before:

We will be happy, glad, even thrilled to have debate about certain issues on this blog. As one parent pointed out, it is good to have a variety of perspectives on this blog because juniors, parents, etc can have a more balanced viewpoint of the situation to consider everything as a whole. However, multiple opinions will undoubtedly lead to some disagreement and heated exchanges. Let's not forget that first and foremost, we debate because we want to share our perspective on the issue and learn from other perspectives. Underlying all this debate is the basic respect that we should accord each other, not to put down each other but to understand each other's opinions, and perhaps we, as students sometimes get too caught up in the exchange and let our emotions carry us away. That is, however, no excuse to be offensive to others and if any of us cannot abide by this principle, I kindly ask that you refrain from posting.

We dont want to be censoring anything or deleting anything because we want this to be an open blog/forum where everyone can feel free to interact with each other, share their honest opinions or concerns about the school without feeling that they can only "say the good stuff" without acknowledging some of the shortcomings of our school, be it our diploma or curriculum or anything else. That would require respectfulness on everyone's parts so that no one gets offended within our small NUS High community.

On the issue of parents and students. I dont know how fit I am to comment on this because I have never been a parent. My parents never did fully understand our school curriculum, the idea of APs or how much of a crapshoot the college admissions process was, perhaps because of the fast-changing trends in education. Nonetheless, my parents always made it a point to find out what was happening in my life, to give me good advice despite never getting the full picture, and I always appreciated that. There is nothing in my life that I would not tell my parents, because I know that eventually they are there to share their life experiences with you, not to harm you, and even if they may be slightly outdated, some of them still apply.

I believe that all parents would do that because they are concerned about what is happening with their children - and that's why we have such a large number of parents visiting this blog. It does not reflect utter ignorance (all of us are ignorant to some degree, haha) but rather it reflects a concern and a want to be involved in the challenges that nushs students go through. Let us not be so quick to dismiss the opinions and concerns of parents because they do have some truth even if not in its entirety. The better way, in my opinion, would be to understand where these concerns are coming from and address these concerns from your point of view in a respectful manner.

And as always, each of our posts are only representative of our own opinions (unless stated otherwise) and not representative of any organization or anyone else, and do take everything with a grain of salt. The only exception is this heartfelt apology on behalf of collegetalk that I wished had come earlier with regard to making guidelines for postings clear.

Cheers,
Ying Zhen

Everyone out there

If you're a student in whatever place, I'll suggest making electronic copies of all your certificates, testimonials, school transcripts, awards, whatever not which could potentially give you bragging rights in a scholarship or university application, as soon as you receive them. And store them all in a place where you can find them in your computer in an organized way. You can scan them in and pdf your documents, or take photos and arrange them on Word of you don’t have easy access to a scanner. Doing up a proper resume will help also; it will come in handy if you’re applying for internships and the like. Some organizations would appreciate it if you’re sending a huge pile of papers, so they can have a summary of everything in one glance.

Over the years, you’ll be asked to make copies of your school results, testimonials, to apply for all sorts of things, from exchange programmes, JC scholarships, internships, etc. It’ll be a lot easier if you have the soft copy of everything and can just click “print!”, instead of laboriously standing in front of a photocopy machine for hours and painstakingly inputting the pages one by one, not to mention having to take your documents out of their folders, putting them back in the right places, making sure you haven’t missed anything out. Or even better, some organizations now allow applicants to email them electronic copies of their certificates. And if you are so unlucky as to lose an original document, having the electronic copy would probably make requesting a new certificate a lot easier from whatever awarding body.

When I applied for scholarships, I had to send in copies of my schools results, NUS High School Diploma, Award certificates, CCA records, University acceptance letters, ICs, Passport, testimonials, and O-Level certificates. This added up to a huge stack of paper, so for each application I made, I wasted about ½ a stack of standard A4 paper ream. One day I was so tired of photocopying again and again that I spent one whole day scanning everything in properly and organizing my stuff.

Read the guidelines carefully when mailing in documents; some organizations request applicants to use only paper clips and not staples. If you’re sending a thick stack of paper in, like a copy of your NUS High diploma, you’ll rather use bull clips, not the twisted metal ones which can only hold a few sheets. They're available cheaply in most bookstores.

Mindmapping

I came across "The MindMap Book" by Tony Buzan. It was about how to improve your memory and harness the power of both sides of your brains. The left brain deals with logic, structure, numbers, and the right with creativity, spatial awareness, and rhythm. Mindmaps are about putting a central image in the center of a blank piece of paper and mapping out the key concepts there using color, creativity, exaggeration, and pictures. Buzan claims them to be effective for learning, planning, recall, for everything we do. He believes that conventional note taking using a pen and paper causes people to forget things easily due to the monotony of the linear structure, and that mindmaps help utilize both sides of the brain to greater efficiency.

I did use them. I found that for me, they were very effective on content heavy subjects such as biology and geography, but not really necessary for subjects that heavily emphasized conceptual understanding, like Math or Physics. Once for a physical geography course, I mindmapped out all the notes the teacher gave. Since the exam schedule was so packed, I didn’t have time to revise for geography. Only on the day before the exam, I took out my notes and reviewed them twice in the space of one afternoon. Inside the exam hall, I realized I could remember so much content that I wrote nonstop for the whole time, getting hand cramps because my only limitation was not being able to write fast enough. I scored an A in the paper. So I’ll recommend them to anyone who feels crushed by the amount of memorizing they need to do for certain subjects. They can make your life easier.

Sometimes, I also use mindmaps to plan things, like an essay, or a term paper, and they’re been helpful to varying degrees.

It’s up to you whether to decide to use mindmaps or not. Some people do perfectly well without knowing what they are, but for those interested, here’s a useful website. http://www.12manage.com/methods_mind_mapping.html

How much more can you achieve if you reduced your sleep debt?

This is an article that I wrote recently for my assignment in a course that I am taking this quarter at Stanford, called Sleep and Dreams. I learnt so much from it and I cant wait to share it with NUSHS students when I come back, but the biggest thing is the importance of sleep. I cant stress this enough. I am obtaining so much sleep this quarter and I am still so happy, enjoying every minute of my life.

-----

The time is 2 a.m., but it could have been 3 a.m. or 4 a.m., and you couldn’t care less. What you care about is finishing the homework that is due a few hours later in school / completing the report that your boss wants you to turn in / partying and dancing with the cute guy or girl a few steps away. Sleep is the last thing on your mind, because it is really not that important, it is a waste of time, and really, if you keep sleeping people will think you are plain lazy.

Sounds familiar? This is precisely the reason why we are constantly tired in the daytime, why 5 alarm clocks and 20 snooze alarms are ineffective in getting us out of the bed and why dreamland beckons when we least expect it. To cut the long story short, each of us has a certain amount of sleep requirement every night that we need to keep us functioning at our optimal level. By not making sleep a priority and cutting back on it, we fall short of the minimal sleep requirement every day, thus incurring a sleep debt that prevents us from functioning optimally.

For instance, if I need 9 hours of sleep every day, but I decide to sleep for only 6 hours every day for a week, I would have effectively incurred a sleep debt of (9-6) x 7 = 21 hours. If I did that for 2 weeks, I would have incurred a sleep debt of a WHOPPING 42 HOURS!

So what happens when you incur a high sleep debt? It starts taking over your life and your mind. It causes you to be moody and grumpy towards everyone around you. It consumes your mind with thoughts about beds, pillows and bolsters at times when you badly need to concentrate on what your boss is telling you. Most importantly, it shuts down your eyelids when you least expect it, putting you at risk for accidents that can be fatal.

You wouldn’t close your eyes while biking or driving, would you? No one in their right mind will do that consciously, but many people do that subconsciously when they are deprived of sleep. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, drowsy driving has resulted in “100,000 automobile wrecks, 71,000 injuries and 1,550 fatalities” (http://www.sleepdex.org/deficit.htm). Imagine the lives that could have been saved if each of these people had gotten more sleep. Imagine that anyone, including you, could have been like them so long as they did not get the amount of sleep they needed.

Sleep debt is like real-time debt on credit. It is cumulative, and it never dissipates over time. If you owe $5 a year ago and you never paid up, you can be sure that the credit card company will chase you down for every single cent of it. It is the same with sleep debt; it does not disappear…

…until you pay it back. Yes, by sleeping more than the daily requirement, you are essentially reducing the amount of sleep debt you have. It is that simple. After reducing your sleep debt, you will feel your productivity increase by volumes (so much so that it outweighs the amount that you would have done otherwise slogging through the night in your sleepy state), your mood uplifted and a much more optimistic outlook on life.

“But I don’t believe you”, I hear you say, “I tried to catch up on my sleep by sleeping for 12 hours yesterday and I don’t see any significant change”. Well, that only means that you should sleep MORE. Assuming that you have a sleep debt of 30 hours and your daily sleep requirement is 9 hours, an increase in 3 hours of sleep would reduce not reduce your sleep debt by much. The only solution is to try to catch up on your sleep more often to reduce your sleep debt further. You will know it when you have reduced it enough because you will feel yourself being much happier than you used to be.

I used to be a skeptic of this theory about sleep debt. I did not believe that it was possible to achieve more by sleeping less. I used to be a college student who felt that I had not enough time to study and get good grades, let alone join student groups. I survived (miraculously) on 5 hours of sleep per day. I would drag myself out of bed every morning, entertaining thoughts on skipping class just for that day in exchange for more time with my pillow and bed.

However, over the break, I tried catching up on my sleep, and it has worked wonders. I am taking the maximum courseload right now, much more work than I used to have, but I am always seen with a smile on my face. I am a week ahead in my readings, and I finish my assignments at least half a week before it is due. I feel so happy every single day doing my work and being able to concentrate on what I am doing. Most importantly, I am getting my 8 hours of sleep every day and am not prone to potentially fatal accidents that may be a result of my sleep deprivation!

You can be like that too! If you are still skeptical, I say try it for a week. Just sleep more than what you think your daily requirement (typically 8-9 hours) is. Do that for a week, and then you will notice the drastic change in your life – simply due to a simple yet beneficial step of sleeping MORE.

After all, why would you, or anyone for that matter, want to live a life that is tiring, miserable, and potentially fatal?

College pranks and rivalry

http://www.harvardsucks.org/index.php (Yale for Harvard)
http://www.stanfordrejects.com (Stanford for UC Berkeley)
http://www.harvardrejects.org (Harvard for Yale)

College learning materials available for download online.

Just wanted to introduce you all to MIT Open Courseware. For those of you who dont know what it is, MIT puts up some of their lectures online so that members of the public can access them and learn more - be it about knowledge content or about how MIT conducts their classes.

You can access it at http://ocw.mit.edu.

On that website, you can download course materials and/or lectures, depending on each course.

Of course, MIT isnt the only school which puts up its course materials online for people to download. If you use iTunes, go find iTunes U in the iTunes store (or access it here http://www.apple.com/education/mobile-learning/) and you will see a whole list of universities and each university up there has courses and lectures that we can download and listen to on the go. The list of universities include Stanford, Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, Carnegie Mellon, etc

So have fun with this website! If you find yourself frequently on the bus with nothing to do and feeling very bored, it's time to download these lectures into your mp3 and listen to them on the go!

P.S. I highly recommend Introduction to Psychology by Jeremy Wolff from BCS at MIT! (Considering that a prospective psych major wrote this, this comment may not be very objective haha)

Check this out! A great website with wonderful links.

http://usapps2009.blogspot.com/

Testimonials

I am in Year 6 Sem 2 now, my last semester of school. Which means I'm currently in the process of sorting out my uni apps, and I'd just like to share about some aspects of my (currently limited) experience.

Testimonials. Start writing your testimonial early. For those of you who don't know, a testimonial is written by your mentor and included in your graduation package. It's basically a list of all your achievements in prose form, and some good comments about your character.

In Year 6 Sem 1, teachers will start telling you to write up a list of the achievements in the past few years that you feel are the most important and beneficial. This will be used later by your mentors to write your testimonial. Some mentors will allow you to write your own testimonial, because it makes their job easier, they just have to edit it.

Whatever it is, write it before the end of Sem 1, because it not only gives you good practice, it's also the simplest "essay" out of the way. If you think writing your testimonial is difficult, trust me, application essays are much worse.

Testimonials are also a very good way for you to reflect on what you've done in the past few years, which will make it easier when you write your essays later on, because the examples will be fresh in your mind and you can use to them show your interests.

If you have a lack of material to write in your testimonial (it should be about 3/4 page long), then it's good to start doing something to put in it. This is another reason why you should do it early, because if you wait until Sem 2 to do it, you'll realise you have no time left.

In summary, a testimonial is one of the easiest things you have to write. Yes it seems difficult at first because most of us find it difficult to blow our own trumpet, which is basically what you're doing in a testimonial. But it will definitely make it easier for you to write about yourself in your essays for uni applications, so do start early, and give your mentor enough time to edit it.

Food for thought for the juniors.

The reason for this title is because amidst the wonderful impression that everyone has been getting about our school, I want to raise some points so that you arent misled thinking that everything is nice and rosy if you are slack and merry.

Okay the post may sound as though I am attacking the school but I am not. I just want to paint a realistic picture for our juniors out there, in the midst of the wonderful stuff, there is some stuff that I feel you should know and again, this is my own opinion, not anyone else's, and I write this not with the mindset of criticizing our school (we are a new school after all) but to tell you of some potential pitfalls that can come about. These are just some points for you to think about.

5 things for our juniors to note:
1. Dont assume that it is easy to get into top universities just because our admission statistics seem to say so.
If you are wondering, yes the 2 people who got admitted into Harvard, Princeton, Yale, MIT, etc were the same 2 people. So not many people from our school really got in - please remember that we have a small pool of people = small talent pool, compare to RJ/HC which have larger pool of people = larger talent pool. You are fighting against these people, so please try to stand out.

2. Do not underestimate the value of NUS modules.
I regretted not taking NUS modules. NUS modules can help in your college application and during college days, when you can transfer credit etc to fulfil the requirements of a major. This is especially valuable if you want to do > 1 major but despite maxing out the units of classes you can take in 1 quarter/semester you still cant fulfil the requirements.

3. READ THE NEWSPAPERS. YES PLEASE READ THE PAPERS THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT.
Often said, rarely followed. Dont throw your Time/Newsweek aside after they hand them around during English lessons. How would you like to be caught in a situation where they ask you about things out of academics and the only reply you can muster is "I dont know"? You will be surprised at the number of top students in my batch who have admitted they cant hold a conversation about current affairs.

4. Dont assume that just because people see us as an 'elite school', we are really up there.
Fact is that we are still a new school and yes, we will work our way to be up there, but we are not there yet. And getting up there depends on you! That's why it is important to be humble and work hard. Please dont assume the world revolves around you, go out there and interact with more people from other schools and you will find that you learn a lot more.

5. Languages are important.
Just because you think you can speak English doesnt mean that it shows. In top schools, 2200+ in SAT is the norm. Some juniors from our school (if you arent one of them, I am sorry) apparently think that if you get 2200+, you are crazily good. My response to that is that everything is relative and that you should compare yourself against the rest of the big fish in the big pond. If you think that the essays that you get now in school is tough (the revised 'GP' style essays), please remember that this is what others do on a regular basis.

Mother Tongue may not seem important (not in terms of submitting your applications etc), but I will tell you that it can be a sore thumb in the midst of a wonderful application, e.g scholarships, etc. If you are a person deciding whether or not to admit someone and you see that this person cant even speak/do well in his own native language, what is the impression you get?

5 things I wished a senior had told me before:
1. Science is not always the best policy.
While science is indeed very flexible and there is that argument that if you take science you can still go back to arts but not vice versa. But if you know that you dont want to pursue a career in research/medicine/engineering/whatever else, is a science major really better than an econs major? Personally, as someone who doesnt intend to go into research, I have yet to find more than 3 practical jobs that require a degree in chemistry. That said however, most jobs dont require you to use what you learnt in your degree anyway.

2. Being good at subject =/= passion
Important to make this distinction clear when you decide what kind of career and course you want to pursue in future. Do you really want to spend the rest of your life doing chemistry research even though you are good at it? More food for thought.

3. It is better to be a specialist in one area, than a jack of all trades and master of none.
Joining an activity for > a few years = committed
Jumping around from one activity to another = uncommitted

At least, that's how it is interpreted (not by me, but by the people deciding the status of your application).

4. Be proactive
If you see something that you are interested in, enquire about it. Asking about it doesnt just give you more information about how to achieve what you want, but also signals your interest in the event to the teacher i/c.

If that is not a good enough reason, think of it this way. I cant see how being quiet about what you want helps you in any way.

5. Be careful
Be careful. About what? Everything, from the things you write about to the type of opportunities you seek, to the work that you do.

Be careful about what you write in your blog and what you upload on facebook, because once uploaded, you can never be sure if you can ever erase it away permanently (many sites have the policy that once you upload stuff they get to keep a copy in their cache).

Be careful about the type of people that you work with outside too, especially for those doing internships and sourcing for your own. I had the unfortunate experience of working for a company that employed many morally questionable practices, and when things dont go right, you only have yourself to blame for not being more alert early on.

Be careful about the quality of work that you hand up, because every piece of work is reflective of your character. A teacher would probably be more pleased to write you a recommendation letter if you always hand up work that show that you have put in some effort.

Last but not least, to end off this post, be careful about what you tell your classmates, because you never know who are your friends and enemies. Word spreads quickly, and you dont know who it spreads to. Sounds political, sad but true in the competitive school environment of ours. I can only count myself lucky that I made a few true friends whom I can count on in our school, and I also count myself lucky that I learnt this lesson when I was in school than when I am not. I have heard of friends who tried to discredit me without me doing anything, friends who make accusations about me to teachers/etc, even some who tried to sabotage my college applications.

Of course I dont know if they are really true or not since they wont come and tell me and that's what I heard, but my point is please watch what you do and what you say and how you act.

Try to be genuine to everyone you meet, and remember the Chinese saying "真金不怕火". It translates literally to "real gold isn't afraid of fire".

Timeline for the juniors out there.

So it's the June holidays and you are very free! You dont feel like doing your homework so what other constructive things can you do?

Well, 1 thing that you can do is to start planning for what you want to do or where you want to go in a few years time!

Here is a checklist of things which you will have to do en route your college admissions:
1. Do the SAT/IELTS/whatever standardized tests you need
2. Collate your academic portfolio
3. Come up with a list of extracurriculars which mean the most to you
4. Shortlist schools that you want to apply for
5. Write personalized statements/essays
6. Shortlist scholarships that you want to apply for

So let's go through each one before we do a summary of your timeline.
1. I am not so sure about the other standardized tests as I have never taken them but I will talk about the SAT.

Collegeboard holds the SAT on the 1st Saturday of October, November, December, January, May and June in various testing centres in Singapore (such as ACJC, St Francis Methodist School, etc). You have to sign up for them yourself, our school does not make it mandatory for you to take it.


From the collegeboard website: http://www.collegeboard.com

The SAT is compulsory for you to apply to most US colleges. There are 2 types of SAT: The SAT reasoning test (SAT I) or the SAT subject tests (SAT II). You cannot take the SAT I and SAT II in the same sitting, but you can take multiple SAT IIs (up to a maximum of 3) in 1 sitting. Again most universities require 2-3 SAT IIs so it's always good to do 3.

Dont take the SAT last minute because you never know if you want to take it again and you want to be in time for the scores to be sent to the colleges! Since the deadline of college applications are typically on 31/12 or 1/1 the following year, December is the last SAT score sitting that they will accept.

I would recommend that you do your SAT I from June/October in year 5. If you dont like the result, give it a period before you take it again, because you might want to re-evaluate the way that you have been preparing before you waste that ~$100.

For SAT II, most colleges expect a math SAT among the 3 that you take. Math I or Math II? Take math II - and you shouldnt do too badly in it. For the other 2 subject tests, given that you are in a math and science school I think chemistry, physics or biology would be easy. If you dont know whether to choose physics or biology, I'd say physics because physics has a gentler curve - i.e. easier to do well because there is more room for error.

When to take it? Math II is simple math, chemistry covers things that are slightly easier than AP syllabus and biology covers things that are less detailed (I didnt say easier, I said less detailed) than the AP biology syllabus. Physics covers concepts that are simpler than Physics B syllabus. So taking it during your AP month would be ideal because you are already studying for AP anyway. Trust me, taking it in October or November means that your studying level is not as high as May and you dont do as well. You shouldnt need to take SAT II more than once...or twice.

Of course you can choose to take other subjects, it's up to you. Don't bother taking Chinese if you are thinking of that because everyone who takes it gets 800 and you have your O level results anyway which are more valuable.

Biology E or M? Take M if you are good in your cell biology, take E if you are good in ecology. If you are good in both, I would say take M because the options are more clearcut whereas in Biology E the options can be vague at times and you may get confused.

Dont think that the environment and mock tests dont mean anything. The 1st time you take SAT I, you will find that after a while you can get very tired and unfocused because it's 4 hours of testing with intermittent breaks. Get used to it! Bring a jacket or sweater if you think you will need it, biscuits, buns, etc. The school you choose as your testing centre matters too! Proximity is often the 1st consideration, but different schools have different 'styles' of conducting SATs. For example, ACJC conducts it in a hall (with everyone taking it together), while St. Francis holds it in air conditioned classrooms - if that makes a difference to you.

Time required for SAT: 2 mornings of your time. SAT I will be from 8 (reporting time) to about 1, while SAT II will be from 8 - 12 assuming you take 3 tests on that day.

2. Collate your academic portfolio.

This means that you have to have on hand the following:
a) Overall CAP
b) Subject CAPs
c) Standardized test scores (SAT, APs, Chinese/Higher Chinese O Levels, IELTs, BMAT, etc)
d) Modules taken, subject combination
So ideally you have your transcript at hand and your progress reports. However when you apply for college you wouldnt have graduated so you wouldnt have your final transcript, so you will need to get your results from the college counsellors.

3. Coming up with a list of extracurriculars.

Most colleges want to see that you are not just an exam smart person, so be prepared to think of some activities to show that you have a passion for something else (e.g. sports, music) other than studying. What motivates you?

4. Shortlist schools you want to apply for

Already mentioned in other post. Check out the choosing a school label.

5. Essays and statements
Yes this is the most *^(@$%!@* of your application. Start EARLY. What are the advantages to starting early?
a) You get more time to make modifications
Dont assume that just because your english is good you dont need the extra time because your essay will be good. Similarly, dont assume that just because your english standard is bad your essay will be bad. Since your essay is not graded on language proficiency but on the impression it gives to the reader, you will want to write the essay with all your heart and thought. I know of people who made up to 20 drafts, and yes, I had about 10 drafts before I finalized my essay. Every sentence makes a difference, especially when you have a character limit.

So when do you start? As early as possible. I started in June. There are often > 1 essays to write, so you will need a lot of time to make sure all of them really reflect who you are! Remember, you = your essay, not your essay = you.

You can write about anything at all, from what inspires you, to what you like, your favourite holiday, etc. The best advice that I can give (from Mr. Allan to me and now from me to you) is to show, not tell. Meaning instead of saying "I am a cheerful person" say "There is always a smile on my face" or something like that.

b) When you start early you end early, and you can submit your application early. Admission officers read your application the moment it comes in as they have lots more to read as time passes. When college admissions officers read your application first, lesser people have submitted their applications then, which means that they have more time to look at your application as compared to if you submit it last minute.

I submitted my Stanford application 1 month early, if you want to know.

c) You never know what you might need to add to your essay last minute. Maybe you came across an essay that gave you more inspiration than your current one. Etc. More time, again.

Get as many people to read your essay as possible, but take each comment with a pinch of salt. You'd be surprised at the variety of comments - the trick is to have a good balance because you dont know how your admission officer will think. I had someone telling me that a particular line is the crux of my essay and it made the whole essay funny. Another person, however, told me that line made me sound pompous and arrogant. Another person told me that line was unnecessary. Etc.

Ultimately it's your essay so you have to make the decision on what you want to retain and what you want to cut. I eventually decided to leave that line as it is.

6. Shortlist scholarships - I will talk about it another day.

So this is what your timeline should look like:
June, Year 5 - shortlist schools and scholarships
June - December Year 5 - take SATs
1st half of year 6 - take SATs
June Year 6 - start on essay
June - October Year 6 - Collate academic portfolio and extracurriculars
October - November Year 6 - Finalize applications and nitty-gritty, SUBMIT!

Updated google map.

The google maps have been updated to reflect the universities that my batch got into!


View Universities and Locations in a larger map

http://tinyurl.com/qkd5l3

Check it out.

A blog that you all should go read!

http://milkoracle.blogspot.com

This is a blog by Mr. Kevin Sim. Who's that? He is a very experienced college counsellor who used to be from NJC but is now working in RJC. He gives tips and stories about college applications and I think it's helpful! :)

Addresses of universities.

I have done up a google map of some universities and where they are located so that you can see it at a glance.


View Universities and Locations in a larger map

or you can go to this url: http://www.google.com/maps/ms?source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&ie=UTF8&near=&split=1&msa=0&msid=106797461264975655320.00046895a8969f47dca90&ll=31.952162,-32.695312&spn=119.910492,225&z=2

You can add more universities if you want. First, save the map to your google account. Then click edit and you can type in the search box what you want to add, click the placement sign on the top left corner of the map and then click the place which you want to add.

National Society of High School Scholars?

I heard that some of you received an invitation to join the National Society of High School Scholars, supposedly a very prestigious organization.

Well I have my doubts about any organization that expects $45 from you to join and pays out a few scholarships to a few people, but you can make your judgments. In the meantime I have sourced for a few urls with regards to this for you to make your conclusion:

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/39022-national-society-high-school-scholars.html
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060806195245AA0pIzr
http://www.nshss.org/