HOW TO GET INTO STANFORD: My Stats, Essays, and Advice all right so hi guys it's Erica and as you saw from the title of this video I am will be attending Stanford University in the fall and so recently I posted on my Instagram and I was like so close to go to Stanford basically and I use the hashtag stand for 2023 and ever since then I've had like a bunch of people in my DMS just asking me questions about my stats and kind of what I did so I made this video because you can only say so much over a DM and hopefully maybe I can help more people so this I just want you guys to know that this isn't like a flex video and it's not me saying like oh I got into Stanford like I'm so smart I'm so cool like it's just me trying to help you guys because I was so overwhelmed when I started my application so I pulled up my common app I'm spilling all the tea for you guys today I'm literally gonna tell you everything on all my stats all my extracurriculars and then I'm also gonna tell you what I wrote my ​stanford essays​about not so you can copy them but just so you kind of have like an idea so I think I'm just gonna get started um my name is Erica I'm a female obviously and I'm obviously african-american my parents are immigrants from Ghana so that's just a little bit about me and then I live in South Dakota and the school I go to doesn't really offer that many AP courses but I did take advantage of like all the ones I could I took AP stats ap bio ap Literature and then AP Calculus and those were the four AP classes I took because my school only has 5 or 6 for honors I put that I had the scholar athlete award I did cross country soccer and then I did track for two years in high school and I always had a 3.5 GPA so I got and the word for that I was in National Honor Society are these insights Olympiad I got word for that and then I was also DS list and then I'm also the first in my class and I'm tied with another girl for valedictorian and so now we're gonna move into testing for testing I only took the SAT Subject Tests and the a CT so on the ECT I got a 35 and on the SAT Subject Tests I took biology molecular and literature but a 7/10 on the biology molecular and a 650 on the literature and I did not make the SAT because like I said early I live in South Dakota and no one around me like no one near here text takes the SAT like the nearest testing center is about like two hours away there's no prep classes nothing like we don't really take the SAT out here so I just didn't take it so like I said earlier I did sports and I listed a bunch of those I was in Spanish club I was in Xhosa I don't know if you know if that is it's like a feature health professional club and then I had some leadership roles at my school level and then I was also secretary of South Dakota's hosted like at the state level I worked at a grocery store for three years and I just started working at a different one this year I was in FBLA which is Future Business Leaders of America it's just like the business version of Xhosa I was in NHS like I said I was president of that I was in a youth group at my school I had a summer job at a law firm in 2017 and then I also did the end and those were the extracurriculars that I put on my common app so now we're going to delve into the essays so from my common up I say if you don't know what that is it's the essay that you send to almost all the schools you apply to with the Common App and in my essay I wrote about how I grew up in South Dakota and how there's not a lot of diversity here and when I was younger I really really struggled with fitting in and it was something I was super super insecure about and then I thought about how I overcame that in my life and how it's affected me so that was my coming up essay and that wasn't really important to me that's actually like that's a really true story like I didn't just make that up to get into college next we have the Stanford University question so basically what I just told you I tell us everything I put in just my common app and then Stanford has its own specific questions and essays so I'm gonna tell you guys about those I did Regular Decision I wasn't sure if I wanted to commit to Stanford so I did not do II D I decided that I wanted to major in human biology I think that's what I'm gonna be doing so the first essay is talk about your extracurricular activities so in that I say I talked about how I was president of NHS and how that's was a really major thing in my high school experience and how I loved being the leader of such an amazing group of people my next essay was short questions so the first one was most significant challenge society faces and I talked about how a modern society suppresses individuality next one was what did I do my last two summers I talked to a hybrid thought my traveled and the one after that it was a historical moment or event that I would like to have seen and I said the Great Depression because we had just read the basis of wrath in my AP literature class and it was super interesting so I wrote about that and then five words to describe me I'll list the ones I put out because that's a short one I said diligent and then I said hilarious and then in parentheses I said at least I think so and then I put compassionate optimistic and authentic and then the next essay was what do you read listen to or watch and I said I find Jane the bridge in very intriguing and then I talked about how her family strengths or American socialization was similar to mine because my pants are also immigrants then one thing I'm looking for to it Stanford I said exposure to diverse perspectives because I live in a small town and that's not something I'm used to and I said the next one was if I have an extra hour in the day and I said if I had lecture the day I would like probably go shopping because I love clothes I love fashion I love makeup and just like dressing up and that's something I would I would like to put outfits together next ones were a little bit longer they were short essays an idea or experience that makes me excited about learning and for this one I put travel because travel has been such a big part of my life um and I just kind of elaborate on that and how would I learned through travel and then you have to write a letter to your future roommate that's the next short essay and I said hey roomie and then I talked about how I apologize all the time and how I have these weird quirks because I grew up in the Midwest and I talked about how I love clothes and my question is will probably be like oh do you think this is cute or do you know how to find the second derivative of this equation because I like math and I just talk about like what I want to study and just like how I'm so excited to room with them and then my next and I think the final one it was something made of meaningful to me and why and I talked about how I kind of never know big family I have three siblings I don't know if that's good big but I talk about how my house is always so loud and how I used to hate it but it like guru on me and now in my house is it as loud I feel like alone so I think that's all of the essays yeah I think that's it so that was my application to Stanford um that went way faster than I thought it would but basically I don't know if you got from that and your comeback essay the really really long one you want to have a message that's truly like important and like something that's really like a strong message you really want to have a strong message in your comment I say but in the shorter ones just like help them get to know you and talk about yourself and the things you love and like what you like to do but don't be like I say don't be a too over-the-top too crazy to 40 like I mean I don't know if you couldn't tell in this video but I don't think I'm like I don't think I'm super I haven't posture syndrome and I don't think I am going to succeed that's a afraid but um I don't think I'm super intelligent or super smart and I think I just like really like to have fun and I just like to enjoy myself but anyway thank you guys so much for watching I hope you really liked how that helped you I hope that like helped you with your applications and if you guys want me to make a video on like all the schools I applied to and whether or not I got in I would love to do that if you have any other ideas that would be great I probably do some more videos like uh Statesman movement belong and just other like things like that I wouldn't really consider myself a youtuber so it probably won't be like an every week thing but I just wanted to make this video to help you guys so thanks for watching see you guys later you [Music]