By Alice Liu
The recent COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 brings lots of uncertainty and unpredictability for those applying to colleges. So many big changes are happening all at once, including the application process, testing, tours, student housing, and a lot more. Luckily, Kalven Goreal, a college advisor and professional writing coach, has answers to the questions of many students regarding college this year. Mr. Goreal’s presentation video clips and slide deck are shared at the end of this blog post.
The impact on college application plans
Goreal starts off the panel by discussing the general impact of this pandemic on college applications. While schools are unable to provide in-person on-campus tours and open houses, there are still many virtual options and tools out there to provide the best experience possible for prospective students.
Another big change is that many schools, such as the UC system, have gone test-optional. However, Goreal states that “it’s highly recommended if you can take a test to take the test” as it is still a major deciding factor in a college application.
Q&A – Impact on college application plans
How do I visit schools to determine the right-fit when campuses are closed? What’s your advice on campus touring during the pandemic?
Goreal: It’s going to be a challenge – you can’t. What you can do is try and get a virtual tour. A lot of schools can provide virtual tours. If they don’t already have them on their website somebody is probably making one as we speak for those campuses. If you can’t access a virtual tour and official one, there’s always Google Maps; there’s always Apple Maps; they have street views and they’re very accurate. People can get to know an area based on those resources but you’re gonna have to do the research.
How does pass/fail impact transcripts and admission chances?
Goreal: We can’t really compare apples to oranges but we can compare apples to apples. I’m sure a lot of people will receive pass scores versus the amount of people that get fail scores and so compared to last year – where there’s A B C D F – it’ll be more difficult to discern who got an A, who got a B, and who got a C but within your application there’s teacher recommendations, counselor letters, letters of reference, and you have essays to write. They get to know who you are and they’ll know if you worked very hard and you’re probably a successful student in that subject then not. I don’t think it’s really a concern too much as long as you’re involved and other people can say “yes, I was involved in class and I was a successful, curious student”.
How do I reshape my narrative when test scores are optional and extracurricular activities are going virtual?
Goreal: Excellent question. It’s going right to the meat and bones of the issues. Your essays have to be extremely expressive of what you’ve done during your high school years and the time before your high school years, how you’ve prepared as an individual for college – not necessarily just professionally but internally – how you work with other people, how you overcome challenges, and how you’ll do in the future to connect with resources that the college has to offer you. So outside of test scores there’s a lot to say. Extracurricular activities – you should have plenty of background experience to express what you’ve done and how deep you’ve gone into certain activities and if not, you’re gonna have to start reaching out to people immediately and thinking about what we can do during this time to make an impact in other people’s lives and to do something that’s memorable that can be shared.
How do I craft my story and showcase my portfolio (internships, capstone projects, community service, extracurricular activities)?
Goreal: This is extremely important. When you apply they’re going to ask a lot of students if there are gonna be links to share. Some do some don’t –– you should have a LinkedIn page and you should be active on social media sharing the activities you’ve done and the projects you’ve worked on with other people and how they’ve impacted other people. If you have something to share that’s presentable, then you put it out in professional channels and connect with other people. They’ll be impressed with what you’ve done and they might engage with you in projects that they’d like to accomplish as well. How would I craft a story? Well, that’s a very complicated question – it relates to your greatest impact and what you plan on doing in the future. When you go into college they would like for you to have a plan and they would like for you to execute it well with the resources that they’ve shared and you’ve probably expressed how you would use those resources ideally working with certain professors or researching certain topics. They expect you to showcase – much like a job application – how can you fit in right away and succeed? And that’s what you would express to them in your essays.
Will COVID-19 help or hurt the class of 2021 college prospects?
Goreal: It’s difficult for everyone. You’re neither better off nor worse off and you want to give something your best effort – that’s the most important thing regardless of how it may or may not have affected you. You want to be in control of what you can do and that’s putting in your best effort on your essays, your application process, and what you present to those schools.
As for college tours, Goreal suggests that it’ll be difficult to tour colleges if students don’t know what they’re aiming for. College prospects should start looking into their safety, target, and reach schools as well as figuring out which programs, clubs, or activities they want to be involved in. Goreal discusses anecdotes regarding his own journey as a high school student looking into colleges and talks about how he first started out Googling the surrounding area of colleges he was interested in. This is really useful especially if the location and environment of the schools are really important to the student. Goreal also emphasizes contacting students or alumni because they often have the most experience with the school and could provide good insight. Researching and reaching out to professors for certain majors is also a very useful approach to finding out more about certain programs and courses offered at colleges.
Because of the new pass/fail grading system introduced during the pandemic, Goreal states that there will be a lot of grade inflation in regards to most people getting a higher passing grade and less people getting a failing grade. Goreal says that the application process is when students must show who they really are and “unclump” themselves from those who got pass/fail grades in order to truly stand out. “The things that stand out are the classes you take, the initiative you take to educate yourself outside of school, and your activities outside of school,” Goreal states.
“As I always say, if it’s optional, it’s actually required. If you can do it, do it.” Goreal recommends that students should definitely take standardized tests if they’re able to even if schools are test-optional. According to the article “University of California system can no longer use SAT, ACT test results in admissions, judge rules” written by Alexa Mae Asperin on KRON4, the University of California (UC) school system will no longer be considering SAT and ACT test scores for the undergraduate admissions process. This is a big change for many students and may come as a surprise. However, essays are still a very critical part of the admissions process.
Crafting your story
Colleges are looking for certain traits in a potential student. By establishing an identity, building a narrative, and showcasing those skills in capstone projects, internships, extracurriculars, or community service, applicants are able to strengthen their application and show colleges who they are. Make sure to add in components regarding innovation, leadership, community involvement, teamwork, collaboration, problem solving, soft skills, and more.
When writing essays, it’s important to take note of certain requirements or limits based on each school’s application. For example, the UCs require 4 350-word essays, the Common Application has 1 650-word essay, and the majority of competitive schools require 1-3 essays with 100-700 words each. In general, students should expect 5-25+ prompts to answer for applications. Goreal’s advice for students preparing to write the UC essays is to have them first start out writing 1,000 words and then showing them how those 1,000 words can be rewritten into something shorter.
What colleges love to hear
“The level and depth of activity is the most important factor,” Goreal says. He suggests that students should showcase how involved they were in a certain club or activity and what their role was in it. Many students join too many clubs and are not specialized in a certain field they want to go in. Successful applicants usually commit to a handful of organizations, volunteer heavily for a few select causes, and truly hone in to specialize in a certain field of interest. Goreal also recommends having a blog in order to showcase any projects or levels of activity. By doing so, individuals are able to share what they’re involved in and accomplishments they’ve achieved.
Writing the essays
For UC essays, Goreal recommends choosing the prompts that relate and represent the individual’s story the best. In general, the topics that should be covered in application essays include experiences in A, B, and C, what to be pursued in college and why, what the individual does to help others, what a problem is that the individual solved, and how the individual will continue to grow and learn. However, don’t recycle the same/similar subject matter in the prompts as individuals need to have multiple activities that showcase passions in order to stand out.
During the current pandemic, a lot of students may write in their essays about how it has affected them. If an individual chooses to do that, Goreal advises to stand out. He advises against being negative and instead to focus on the positive effects of the pandemic. Don’t focus on the negatives, although mentioning them is okay. Goreal says that “you have to show how you’ve made the effort, you’ve been dedicated, you’ve persevered through the challenges, and you’ve wanted to see through your journey.”
An acronym Goreal came up with for creating a narrative is VIVID.
V: “vivid” – makes the reader sense a student’s illustration.
I: “interesting” – keeps the reader interested in the story.
V: “very”.
I: “informative” – 650 words means 650 words, inform as much as possible.
D: “descriptions” – describe all plans, emotions, results, and experiences.
The details that matter
Some important details that could really enhance an application process include having a LinkedIn page and being friends with teachers. Goreal strongly recommends setting up a LinkedIn page in order to connect with professionals and others in the field of interest in order to collaborate on projects or gain insight and advice. Becoming friends with teachers is also something that should be considered. By doing so, positive experiences can be gained and they’ll have more to write about on letters of recommendation.
As for when to apply to certain schools, there are 3 options: early decision, early action, and regular decision. Early decision is binding and students can only apply for 1 school with this while early action is not binding and students can apply for many schools with this. Goreal advocates for applying as early as possible.
Speaker Q&A
Most colleges will be test-optional for 2021 applicants. How heavily will these colleges weight test scores in their admissions process, as compared to before?
Goreal: Very heavily. If you have a test score to submit, hopefully it’s good. If it’s not, you can work on improving it. It is very heavily weighted – it’s a parameter that they can judge you by.
Some colleges are test-blind for 2021 applicants because of COVID. Is it possible to still communicate test scores to these colleges?
Goreal: No – that would be very frowned upon. Don’t do that – not even in your essays – because it’s like what are you trying to get across? They don’t want to see your test scores, they want to judge everybody fairly based on these other parameters. That will not represent your character well and it misrepresents your decision making.
Will spring 2020 pass/fail grades be weighted any differently vs a standard letter grading scale as used in other semesters?
Goreal: Absolutely – why not? It’s only a pass. It’s not an A, B, or C. But, how do you compare to other people? If they also got passes, don’t worry about it. It’s your trajectory that matters. All of your grades in whole, not just this moment right now.
What common mistakes do you see kids or parents making as high schoolers prepare for the college admissions process?
Goreal: They’re not heavily involved in things, they’re taking things easy, they think just getting good grades is going to get them to the colleges that they hear about and want to go to. That’s not going happen – it’s super competitive. Even the students that I work with that are heavily involved and really putting in an effort because what else are you going to do? Waste your time? Do something! That’s the mistake.
What is the difference between getting a CS degree in a liberal arts school versus a more STEM-focused school?
Goreal: Fantastic. So for any degree major, an arts-based degree is going to go into the theories more so than the practical applications and the actual projects that you have to work on. There’s gonna be interdisciplinary work that you have to do. So for a STEM-focused school for a Bachelor of Science degree, rather than a Bachelor of Arts degree, you’re gonna be expected to use your knowledge in physics and mathematics and history, and other sciences and relate it to your subject matter that you’re majoring in. So be prepared to bring all of the goods. But for liberal arts, you’re not going to be as heavily involved as a science school but you will be studying a lot of the theory and researching a lot most likely.
I was wondering if I could please get your opinion on the current status of the SAT/SAT subject tests. Do you think College Board will provide an online alternative?
Goreal: I think currently they’re not providing anything for subject tests. They are planning to provide in-person testing for the SAT. The end of August and every month through the end of the year will be limiting testing sites. It’s probably going to be challenging. If you can, go for it. Subject tests – I don’t think they’re gonna offer online, digital versions because it’s so easy to cheat like that. They don’t want cheaters to get high scores. It makes the hard workers get low scores.
How many colleges would you recommend applying to this year given the uncertainty of COVID?
Goreal: I always tell students to apply to as many colleges as they can apply to. Of course that’s what I do – I help students apply to colleges so ideally I’m helping you apply to as many schools as you would hope to apply to. I have students that make lists of 20 schools. In the end they end up applying to 6-12 of those schools and that’s grouping the UCs all as one. So 6-12 is a pretty fair number. 12 is very high. 6 is pretty good. 8 is a lot and good.
Do you believe admissions will be made more difficult this year due to COVID deferrals?
Goreal: I think actually for a lot of the academic and studious students, it’ll be easier to get into the schools that you’ve wanted to get into because a lot of activities are being cut and those activities require high specialization like football for example. It takes a lot of work to compete at the highest levels and if they’re not providing scholarships to a lot of students, at certain times, it does open up places in colleges where they will accept students that will be studying either online or locally in what the case may be. It depends on what group you’re in but overall, if you’ve done a good job and you can show that, then they’ll want you, but if you can’t show that, they probably won’t want you regardless of the situation.
Student panel Q&A
The student panel consists of:
Sarah Yung
Kevin Gao
Zosia Stafford
Sarah Yung, rising freshman at Northwestern University, Media/Communications Lead for EqOpTech, 2019-2020
Kevin Gao, rising sophomore at UC Berkeley, President of EqOpTech, 2018-2019
Zosia Stafford, rising junior at Tufts University, EqOpTech LAHS club member
What was the biggest surprise for you during the admission process?
Yung: For me there were honestly a lot more essays than I expected. Besides the personal statement for the Common App and the 4 essays for the UC system, most colleges will have a few supplemental essays and when you apply to a lot of colleges those add up. On the flip side, I was actually able to “recycle” a lot of my essays with just a few revisions so that made it a lot more manageable.
Gao: I thought it was pretty difficult to write an admission essay. In English classes, writing a 10-page research paper or something like 2,000 words, I can crunch out in maybe a few hours. For something like a 300-word essay on the college apps, it is surprisingly hard to write one of those.
Stafford: One thing I found surprising was just how helpful it was to talk to other students. I definitely would recommend if you can get in contact with anyone at any of the schools to do so. Also I think, being on the flip side of it, when I was applying to schools, I was very very nervous to ask random people questions so for most schools I really didn’t, but being an actual college student I think we’re all really eager to help you and to answer any of your questions. Definitely reach out.
What aspects of college tours were helpful/not helpful?
Yung: Personally I liked talking to the student guides because they could tell me about opportunities that I might not have thought to look for. At Northwestern, when I did the tour, I was told about this program where you can take your professor out to lunch and get to know them and I thought that was something really cool that I probably wouldn’t have looked into otherwise. Unhelpful – a lot of admissions representatives try to present the school’s best foot forward and a lot of them will say pretty generic things. Just keep in mind whether you’re really gonna be happy there.
Gao: This might be an unpopular opinion, but I didn’t really find college tours useful. Most of my classes at school now are in 2-3 buildings in total and the tour shows us much more. Basically a lot of places we never get to actually go to. I think the most useful part of the tour for me was visiting parts outside of campus such as restaurants, dorms, things like that – like student life.
Stafford: I’d say that the most important or helpful part of a college tour is the Q&A section. A lot of the tour guides are gonna be giving you a lot of facts and things that are fairly easy to find online so I’d recommend trying to think of some questions to ask that you can really only gain answers when you’re there. In addition to a college tour, I’d recommend, if possible, to try to sit in on a class. I think that it can give you a lot of insight into classroom dynamics and interactions. It’s probably even easier to do now that it’s all online. I’ve found that really helpful.
Tell us about your college experience so far. (Kevin & Zosia)
Gao: There’s a lot of freedom in finding the right balance from all your activities – just something you don’t get to do in high school as much. The biggest thing is obviously academics. It’s harder, it’s more work, and when I’m busy with tests, or what we call midterm season, some Saturdays and Sundays I’m in the library from 11AM to 2AM the whole day aside from dinner. The work is a lot more interesting so for me, it doesn’t feel too bad. Libraries are really important. A lot of people go there to study and I feel that study groups are not essential, but they’re much more helpful in college. Unlike with high school, it’s a lot harder to study by yourself in certain classes. Another aspect of college I really liked is intramural sports. I feel like high school, if you’re not competitive, you can't really join the team, but if you just wanna play for fun there’s a lot of other people that also want to in college. Lastly, the dorm experience for me was probably my favorite part of college. I was very lucky to have good floormates but sadly we only get it for 1 year.
Stafford: I’d say I’m definitely really enjoying my college experience so far. It was a bit of an adjustment from high school – I think in high school I knew most people in the school and going to Tufts I really knew nobody so it’s definitely a bit of an adjustment to find your friend groups. I think clubs and organizations really really help with that to kind of get into a really nice group of friends. I’d say academic-wise, it’s pretty different where you have a lot less classes but a lot more work and there’s very little busywork so you might have less assignments but it’s all very important. Time management is kind of key for that. I’d also say I really enjoyed the opportunity to just explore college classes. You’re able to take classes at a higher caliber and it’s really nice to be able to explore that and to take advantage as much as you can of the cool classes that you see in addition to your major classes. I’d also say I really enjoyed getting to both know my classmates but also getting to know my professors. I think it’s really valuable to go to office hours and to kind of develop closer relationships to your professors so you can maybe get involved in their research or even just get to know them as people. I’ve really enjoyed college so far – I think it’s been really good.
How difficult was it to get your classes? (Kevin & Zosia)
Gao: This is college-specific and major-specific. I’m a CS major and getting my major classes was pretty easy mainly because a lot of our CS classes have over 1,000 people in it just because they’re online. General education classes are harder to get but they don’t really matter as much because you’re only taking it for the requirements so not too many people actually care about them as much.
Stafford: So this is very major-specific. I’m in mechanical engineering at Tufts and at Tufts at least, it’s not very difficult to get into your classes because all engineering students get to register first. The way that the registering order goes is senior engineers, junior engineers, and regular seniors in arts and sciences. So we kind of get first dibs on classes, which is really nice. You’re pretty much just competing with other engineering students. There’s definitely some competition but it mostly comes from getting the class time that you want or getting the professor that you want. Also, at least in mechanical engineering, we have one set track, so all the mechanical engineering students take the same classes every semester so you’re mostly just competing with people in your class who want the same classes. But even when it comes down to that, I find that professors are pretty flexible; this coming semester I didn’t get a time that I wanted and I just emailed the professor and asked if I could get let into the class and he was like “yeah sure that’s fine”. Most of the major-specific classes are a little bit smaller at around 30 people, so it’s easier to be flexible about them.
What do you do in your free time?
Yung: During quarantine, I’ve been getting into making music. I’m learning the ukulele, I’m playing piano, I sing, I’m also just learning more math and science on MIT OpenCourseWare and good YouTube videos and cool Wiki pages.
Gao: On weekdays, homework was basically half of my free time but I also joined 3 clubs: badminton club, an academic one for sports analytics, and a fellowship. Mainly, aside from that, I would spend time with my floormates playing boardgames or just talking to each other. On weekends, my clubs would host parties sometimes, I would play frisbee on the weekends with my fellowship, and the most obvious one is just videogames to chill on the weekends.
Stafford: I’m involved in a couple of engineering-specific things. I’m in the Society of Women Engineers, I’m the vice president of the Make Club where we just get together and make cool things, and I also work at Nolop which is one of the makerspace and machine shops on campus. I spend a lot of my time helping people build things and getting people instructed on the tools and stuff like that. I’m also involved among the Interfaith Student Council so I represent Hillel and Chabad and some of the other Jewish organizations on campus. I also play in the pep band and I play the trumpet and we perform at all the football games. I spend a lot of time just baking and cooking and making bread.
Are there any new classes or subjects that you were surprised to love?
Yung: I really enjoyed taking microeconomics in my senior year. I’m super into math and science and I didn’t really expect to enjoy a social science class that much.
Gao: I didn’t really know data science too well before high school just because you don’t have classes on it. I did know I was kind of interested in it so I took 1 or 2 classes this year and I really liked them so it’s probably going to be my second major now.
Stafford: I absolutely recommend exploring things and seeing what you love. In the fall during my freshman year, I decided to take a course in intro to ethics because I really liked English but I’d passed out of freshman English so I just wanted a class where I’d get to write a paper. I just absolutely loved it and now I’m double majoring in philosophy. That was really great and very unexpected. Last year I was also able to take a class in ceramics at the art school at Tufts and I just had a wonderful time and now I have a lot of cool new mugs and bowls.
How many colleges did you apply to, and what was the ratio of reach to realistic schools?
Yung: I applied to 16 colleges – grouping all the UCs into one. I had about a half-half ratio of reach to realistic schools and I applied to 6 colleges early action.
Gao: I had 20 schools if you count each UC separately, 7 safeties, 7 targets, and 6 reaches so it’s about one-third for each.
Stafford: I had 15, if you count the UCs as one, and 20 if you count all of them and I had a ratio of about 25% safety, 30% realistic, and 45% reach.
When did you start your college applications? How much time did you spend on your essays?
Yung: I started working on my essays in mid-summer or early July. I worked sort of on and off for those, especially when school started, so I’d spend maybe 2 or 3 hours a week on them. It sort of varied for each essay. Some of them were really easy to write and some of them were more challenging so I usually finished them within a month by doing 2-3 hours a week. I started my supplementals in late September and I was able to usually finish a college per 1-2 weeks.
Gao: I actually started in early October which is really bad since I also had 5 EDs or EAs due at the end of the month so I was really not in a good spot. It was actually Kalven who helped me with brainstorming and revising a lot of the essays and getting through multiple drafts. I don’t know how long I spent on each one exactly. – I just know that there were many many drafts for each.
Stafford: I started with my Common App, which most of it I did the summer before junior year. By early junior year I had the Common App question pretty much all done and then I just was refining my college list. I started the supplementals I think kind of over the summer or early senior year and basically just had to have at least 1 or 2 new drafts every week. Each essay probably had 3-5 different revisions of it. I don’t know exactly how much time I spent for each but probably like 5 or 6 hours for each essay.
Did you get waivers for your AP classes?
Yung: A lot of Northwestern’s classes are actually determined by placement tests so I have had to take a chem placement test, a math placement test, and I’ll be taking physics placement once I’m on campus. Qualifying for physics, I had to get a 5 on the E&M exam but I’m pretty sure Northwestern didn’t let us get a lot of waivers for our classes based on AP credit.
Gao: I know a lot of friends who were able to skip a lot of classes from their APs like physics, chemistry, stuff like that. For me at my school, it’s just Calculus and English, but I’m still able to save a full semester from that.
Stafford: For Tufts for the School of Engineering, you need mostly 5s for all of your APs and some 4s to get credit. I was able to pass out of freshman English, Calc 1, Chem 1&2, and then my AP Bio counted for a Natural Science class. I had the option where I could’ve passed out of Physics 1, but I decided I would probably benefit more from taking it again so I decided to do that.
College Talk & Student Panel Q&A Video Clips & Slide Deck
Introduction, featuring Kalven Goreal, College Advisor
Student Discussion Panel Q&A
Special Thank You by Trevor Smith, Contact Info
College Application amid COVID-19 Slide Deck
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