Education in San Antonio

One of the hardest things to do for the Common App is editing your resume to fit into a 500-character brag sheet. How is an Ivy League school supposed to get a complete picture of you in so little space?

To put your best image forward, you need to break down your resume and pick out your best accomplishments from the merely good ones.

The first thing to do is categorize everything on your resume: your awords, leadership positions, volunteer positions, and anything else.

Then group by interest: academic, artistic, employment, athletic, community service, misc.

Use a Venn diagram to map out the resume visually. Then pick the best of each category (subjective, yes, but put yourself in your reader’s shoes).

Never repeat information on your application- for example, your GPA or SAT scores are stated in other areas of your application, so there’s no need to include them on your brag sheet. Also, leave the brag sheet for things that don’t need a large amount of description- for example, one-off awards.

Here’s my brag sheet, that I wrote starting from a three-page resume. This wasn’t an easy task, but I did while keeping the above principles in mind.

IB (7 SL Calculus/6 SL Chemistry), AP (all 5′s), AP Scholar with Distinction, National Merit Semifinalist, Forensics President/Junior Representative, 7th Public Forum Nationals 2007, Two Time Qualifier NFL Nationals, NFL Academic All American, Quarterfinals Nationals Extemp Com, 4th ASU USX (US Extemporaneous), State Champion Public Forum, State 2nd USX, NHS Treasurer, 3 year Varsity Softball Letterman, Team Captain, Scholar Athlete, Outstanding HS Junior Mathematics 2007 GVHS, Varsity Quiz Regional Champions 2007, Radio Show Co-Host

I put academic-related achievements first, making sure they touched on different aspects that painted me as a well-rounded student. I used acronyms like IB and AP because it saved space and an admissions officer would have no problem understanding the acronyms. I got a good score on both IB and AP tests so I included both. If this isn’t true for you, list the one that you got a better score for.

The second part talks about my forensics career. I was Forensics President as well as an Academic All-American, and I felt that listing these two went a long way in painting me as a well-rounded academic who was accomplished in extracurriculars as well.

Since I had so many speech and debate awards, it was difficult make the decision to cut out the majority of them. A good rule to follow when thinking about listing awards is to prioritize your awards as international, national, state, and local. I ended up listing everything I had accomplished at the national and state level, dropping the local awards. Even though I had won many awards through Rotary International and Lions club, I left them out because they were not as well-known competitions.

The third part lists things that sound great but weren’t so important to me. This is a good area to put impressive-sounding things that round out your resume. For me, it was NHS, Varsity softball, and my math award. I also listed that I co-hosted a radio show to end the brag sheet with a bang.

Finally, the things I left out. Tough decision, but I decided to leave out my classical piano training and National Music Teacher Association tests, since I wasn’t the most competitive pianist and I knew other people applying would have much more impressive achievements in music. I also left out Mu Alpha Theta, IB Honor Society, and doing statistics for our Varsity Football team since in these activities I was just another member and hadn’t done anything outstanding. I cut out my numerous local speaking awards through Rotary International and Lions Club, since they were mere local accomplishments. Lastly, I left out being the president of the “Caucus Club” (a club I started senior year that encouraged students to vote) since it would require too much space to explain what it meant. Again, tough decision.

In writing your brag sheet, you want to create many titles that speak to a lot of different parts of your achievements and interests. List items that you don’t touch on in the rest of your application.

Visit ivyleagueadmissions.org for tons of articles, guides, and examples written by students just like you who got into their dream schools!