Sohae discusses her application process with the added factor of being a QuestBridge finalist and how her college process was a bit different because of that. 

Part 2 is here.

Transcription

Kamila
welcome back to my podcast. Who cares about college? In today’s interview, I’ll be interviewing so Hey, so could you please introduce yourself? Hi,

Sohae
my name is Sophie Yang. I am a second year sophomore at Northwestern University. I’m from Los Angeles, California, currently majoring in Biology and considering sociology and global health.

Kamila
Oh, all of those are like majors or like

Sohae
minors. Um, so I’m considering sociology as a major and global health as a minor.

Kamila
Okay, so we’ll get into like college and like majors and stuff a little bit later. But let’s start from the very beginning. So can you tell me a little bit about how, I guess education in college was viewed in your family? When you were young? Were you expected to go to a prestigious university? Or were you like, did you grow up in like a competitive environment competitive school that kind of pushed you to work hard in your studies?

Sohae
Yeah, so I’m pretty sure from a young age, I was expected to go to a good college, whatever that may mean, I started, or my parents told me to restart researching colleges when I was in like, eighth grade. So I was pretty young. And I think I just kept looking at every college that I could to see which one I wanted. Um, but yeah, there was I was pushed, hard. I mean, I always did well in school, like from a young age. And like all like my elementary years would be like, Oh, she’s a bright student, like all those basic, maybe not basic, but all those kinds of comments on report cards and whatnot. But ironically, my parents weren’t the ones who were particularly concerned that I go to a top college, but it was my sister. And she’s nine years older than me, which is a big age gap. And she really wanted me to like reach for the stars and go to the best college that I could. So yeah. And as I went to like three high schools, actually, and so the first and third high school were pretty competitive. Not so much so that it was completely stressful, just because of the fact that I’m competing against my classmates. But a lot of people from those high schools get into really good colleges, like the top 30s. A lot of them. So yeah, I feel like some of that was healthy competition. And that kind of motivated me to keep up, I guess.

Kamila
And so if you started researching colleges and universities, you said about eighth grade, going into high school, was it very analytical? Like did you know, okay, I’m going to be taking, you know, this many APS, or at least trying to aim for this many APs. I’m gonna make sure I start my extracurriculars early and like try to get a leadership position. So was it analytical? Or did you kind of just go with the flow?

Sohae
It was pretty analytical, I would say. So the fact that I went to three high schools kind of mess that up to a certain extent, because not all there all public schools, but not all public schools, even in California are like, are the same. But I did, I took like 12 APS, and I, but I also wanted to hang on to like choir, I feel like that was my main, like, extracurricular, that extracurricular that I did out of enjoyment. And so I kept I did choir for 10 years. And like, I tried to maintain that for the entire what is it? My entire high school career, I guess. But, yeah, other than that, my extracurriculars, I knew that I had to get like a leadership position. I’m pretty sure I’m, I’m not I’m pretty sure I was. Um, my friend and I, like made a club started a club that was called Eco Club, and we ran the recycling program at school. And, yeah, it was just a lot of high school was the only purpose of high school for me was to get into college. There was no other except for the social aspect, I guess to make friends like there was no other purpose of me going to high school other than to get into college.

Kamila
Do you regret kind of going approaching it more analytically, rather. then picking stuff that you may be more enjoyed rather than getting a leadership position, just being like a member of a club that you enjoy. Do you regret that? Or do you think it was the right decision because you did get into Northwestern.

Sohae
I don’t really regret it. Because I feel like high school. But this is just how I was raised. I feel like there’s a time for because because I was raised with the goal of getting to college. Until I get to college, like I can have fun later, is basically the mindset that I was in. In high school, I didn’t really go to any parties, like there was definitely no drinking or smoking or anything like that for me. In high school, like much of American teens do. But even my friends, my friend groups, they like my friend group. Some of them partied, some of them drank some of them smoked, like they all had their fun. But I I don’t know that just having friends was enough, I guess and going with the flow. It’s not like, I don’t know, I feel like I did my job. Because for me, I was raised. Like your job is to be a student while you’re still a child, you that’s your only job, you’re not going to work. Like. Luckily for me, like I didn’t have to work any other jobs to like make have like a roof over my head and food in my stomach. But um, yeah, the only purpose of me going to high school, again, was to get to college. And I think I did that. I completed my job. I did my job. Well,

Kamila
of course you did your job well. So, okay, so let’s quickly go back to your like high school transcript. So can you tell us the GPA you had in on what scale because every school has a different skills for their unweighted GPA are real high

Sohae
school, I went to all three of my high schools had a 4.0 scale. And the high school I attended for the longest and graduated from was also a 4.0 scale, but it was the AP classes and the honors classes were waited. So out of it was five out of four instead. So my GPA was I think it was a 4.7 When I was applying to colleges, and then senior year, I kind of relaxed and got a few B’s. And it went down to like 4.5. But I was not a straight A student by all means I got B’s in both freshmen and sophomore year, and then I kind of kicked into right college. Like the college mindset again. So I like managed to get straight A’s junior years with all AP classes. But I feel like for for universities of this caliber, that’s pretty normal. Yeah, I would say it’s pretty normal for like top 10 colleges, top 20 colleges to have that kind of perfect GPA. I do have friends who had like a 5.0. Maybe not a 5.0. But they were certainly all straight A students and took as many AP classes as I did. But yeah.

Kamila
And with that GPA, where were you in terms of the rest of your grade? Like what was your class rank if your school did that?

Sohae
I think it was like 16th or something. Wow, my, my school was I was in the top 3% For sure. But excuse me, it was my school. The school I went to for the longest and graduated from it was kind of weird because I was a transfer student. And so like the value of it, I’m pretty sure I had a higher GPA than some of the valedictorians we had, like 12 valedictorians, it was it was really weird, and nobody really liked it. But I wasn’t able to be in the ranking for valedictorian, because I was a transfer student and also I feel like that affected my rank. But yeah, that it was also the same for a few of my other transfer student friends who are who had the same grades as me. But yeah,

Kamila
do you think it would have made any difference if you were valedictorian? Like if you had a high school? No, you don’t think

Sohae
I valedictorian? It doesn’t matter if your valedictorian salutatorian or your rank I, honestly, I don’t think that matters at all, when we’re talking about college. So I don’t really know why people stress over it so much. Maybe it’s just like a pride thing or like, you want it for like I want it for myself think but I don’t think it’s that important.

Kamila
Interesting. Okay, so let’s move on to another kind of more, I guess, high school transcript, statistic kind of thing, which is sad. t versus AC t. So which one did you take? I took the LSAT. I say T and can you tell us the preparation that you had for it? Was it last minute again? Or was it like analytical? You did a bunch of practice, like started maybe sophomore year preparing. So how did you approach the process? And then eventually, what did you get on the LSAT?

Sohae
For the LSAT, I think I started studying the summer after sophomore year. So the summer before junior year, I had a family friend who was able to just like tutor me for free, because he’s my family friend. So that was really lucky. And I also used so after that whole tutoring summer I took the LSAT and didn’t get the score that I really wanted. And so I was like, oh, that’s kind of a shame. So I actually did Khan Academy, and that helped so much Khan Academy was for LSAT prep, I recommend that over getting, like a $5,000 tutor to anybody to everybody like Khan Academy as long as you because the LSAT is all about just understanding the types of questions. Not like the actual content itself, in my opinion. So as long as you practice a lot, and I did practice alive, pretty sure I completed it, like every practice has available on Khan Academy. And after doing that, I knew exactly what kind of questions I would be tested on. And I think that helped a lot. And the great thing about Khan Academy is that it’s free. So anybody with access to a computer, and like internet can can use it to prep for the LSAT. And I ended up getting a 1540 on the 16 point scale, there are 1600 skill, right? So you said I want to wait. Yeah, 16 Yeah. 1540 on the 1600 scale, sorry.

Kamila
So Han Academy said it was really good. Because I mean, first of all, it’s free, which is amazing. And then it helped you the most. And you also had a tutor that you had for free? I’m just curious, did you have the option of? Or at least maybe your parents or your sister? Because she’s older than you? Maybe she was in the workforce already? Did you have the option of like getting a bunch of books, maybe hiring a tutor yourself? Did you have that advantage at all?

Sohae
Um, my, I mean, I probably could have, but it would have. I’m just glad that I didn’t because it’s better to have someone do it. I don’t know, it’s better to save money. And again, like I’m from the fgli community anyway. So I wouldn’t, like coming from a Korean household education is highly valued, I would say in our culture, and in many East Asian cultures to begin with, or in general. So they probably would have took on that financial strain, just to put me like, just to get me like good grades. But I’m glad like they didn’t have to.

Kamila
Okay, that’s great. And let’s move on to AP, which I think is the last thing before we discuss extracurriculars and such. So, again, you said coming into high school is very analytical. So I’m sure you knew you’re going to take a lot of APs. So when you were taking these APS Did you again, did you take them like on your major subjects? Did you try to do like, I don’t know, calc BC because it would look good? Or did you just, I guess, see which ap you could take and took as many as possible.

Sohae
Um, I took calc A, B, and I’m not good at math. So I didn’t pursue BC because I just didn’t need to I guess, for most universities, calc A B is enough to get you like college credit for math, or at least a portion of it. So yeah, I don’t know. I, I feel like I just took every for my school, the last school that I went to, I started their sophomore year. So there was already a system in place of like, what AP is the norm to take? Because we have an AP program and we had an AP program and an IB program. And so already, just based off of that system, I basically took what was the norm for that school? But yeah,

Kamila
okay. And a question about that IB system. Did you take the IB as well or did you just stick to the AP program?

Sohae
No, but um, a lot of my friends were in the IB program. And I feel like it’s the same thing kind of are because AP pro it’s not really a program. It’s just the fact that They have a lot of AP courses available to the students. But the IB program is a program program. So it’s a set number of students that have to take a set number of courses and have to complete certain examinations and, like certain requirements to to obtain their International Baccalaureate diploma. So I think that’s it’s, I don’t know, I guess it’s a bit more stressful for that reason, because it’s, there’s less freedom to do what you want when you’re in the IB program. But yeah, I’m glad I didn’t, I wasn’t a part of it.

Kamila
In the college application process, is taking IB and AP at the same time in advantage like does it show the college admissions officers like something or rigor?

Sohae
I don’t think so. A lot of my IB friends did take AP classes, because I don’t think I don’t think there was IB English or anything. So they took the AP Lit literature and AP Language, whatever that is. AP Lit in AP Lang with with the rest of the AP kids. I don’t think that necessarily shows anything. Just the fact that you’re taking the most rigorous course available to you is what colleges really like? I guess. So I don’t think it’s so important to be able to take both of them at the same time. Like that’s a lot of unnecessary stress. But it shows rigor, I guess. But I I only took APs and I still did relatively okay, so,

Kamila
okay, fine, you’re interesting. And on these AP tests, what was the overall score that you got? On the AP test, if you took them,

Sohae
I got a lot of fours. That’s all I remember, I don’t really remember a lot of my grades. I think I got like, I took AP Chemistry my last my senior year. And I just stopped trying at like second semester, and I think I got a two and that was the lowest score I ever got on any of the AP scores, any of the AP tests. But yeah, I mostly scored fours, and like a couple fives, maybe like one, three. Okay. And I feel like Sorry, but I feel like a lot of students really stress about the score that they get on their AP tests. And I don’t think that matters at all to colleges. Unless you’re trying to get credit. I know for the UC system, I don’t know if you’re from California or not. But the UC system, as long as you get a three, you get credit for that certain AP that you took. So you don’t have to take that college in college. But the fact that you’re taking the AP class, and the grade that you get in the AP class is more important than the score that you get on the AP test. Like the fact that I got a three on one of those tests did not matter to the admissions officers, here at Northwestern, for sure.

Kamila
Interesting. Okay, so let’s move on to the more fun stuff, which is extracurriculars. And again, you said this was I mean, your entire college application process High School, you said was very analytical for the most part. So can you take us through how you approached extracurriculars and just get take us through the process? Which ones did you choose? How did you choose them? And then how did you work yourself up to a leadership position.

Sohae
So I know, I knew from the beginning of high school that I wanted to go into medicine. And so I just drifted towards the sciency clubs, I guess. However, because I moved around a lot, when I was a kid, I wasn’t able to really like set my roots down in any certain organization, like a lot of my friends did. For example, a lot of them did Speech and Debate like took lessons for that since they were a baby, not a baby, but like since they were in I don’t know, middle school or elementary school, and they work their way up to be at like a certain level in high school. And I wasn’t afforded that opportunity because I moved around a lot and I wasn’t be able to really, like just develop with one organization I miss. But once I got to my last high school, I just went to the American Cancer Society club, the Red Cross Club, and the one club that my friend and I made. I didn’t have a lot of outside, like outside extracurricular, extracurricular activities outside of school, which is cool. kind of surprising, because a lot of people who go to Northwestern tend to, but I feel like it was okay. Um, as for the clubs that I went that I was a part of in high school. Two of them just were kind of informal. And so it was easy to get a leadership position. And so I didn’t really sweat it. And for Red Cross, I wasn’t actually I didn’t actually get a leadership position. I just really liked being like part of the like doing the blood drives and all that. I think that was just really fun for me. So that’s why I did it. And also, it was kind of like an insider club, I guess. So the leadership positions, people would, a lot of people would apply, but mostly, they would only get it because Oh, like, we’re in yearbook together, or we’re in like, something together, or Oh, I like her because she’s my friend, or she’s my friend’s little sister or something like that. So we’ll just find like, I didn’t really care. But yeah.

Kamila
And what were the two clubs that you had a leadership position in.

Sohae
So the Eco Club, which was the one the club that I like, started with my friend, and the American Cancer Society Club, which was a club that we were a part of the Relay for Life in our community. So that’s like, it’s just a big fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. And they hold it every year. And so we were just in charge of that chapter, but at our school, and then we would go to like town meetings at the city hall. For the the bigger like City Chapter, and the Eco Club, my friend and I, we were just managing the recycling on campus. And also we tried to get a we got solar, solar powered charging stations that were like weatherproof, so they can be out on campus. Like we got that things started for our school. And like, eventually, our district, I’m pretty, we presented the idea to our principal. And the principal basically took the idea and took it to district and got it. But yeah,

Kamila
that’s pretty amazing. And you said that coming into high school, you knew you wanted to pursue something in medicine, in the college application process when you’re applying, I guess, do you think it’s important to make sure the major that you apply us in they ask you, it’s not always certain, but they asked you like, what your intended majors? Do you think it’s important that that major aligned with your extracurriculars? Like at least matches with some of them? Or is that really not that important?

Sohae
I feel like it should reflect upon what your passions are, if you’re not passionate. If you’re not passionate about any of your extracurriculars, I feel like colleges just don’t like that as much. They’re like, why are you doing it if you don’t like it, and for a lot of the time, because I went to a competitive high school that was in like a relatively upper middle class area, a lot of the kids knew that they had to do like some sort of community service. So they did it just to get the community service. And they didn’t actually enjoy what they were doing, if that makes sense. And colleges can kind of see through that. And so it’s important to really demonstrate your passion through your extracurriculars. And I think for me, that was through choir for me, because I did choir for like 10 years. And so the fact that I stuck through it, and kept on doing it, even though I was moved around, a lot of the time kind of showed some sort of passion. And I wrote about that in some of my college supplements. And so your major colleges, there’s some statistic that says around like, 60% of undergraduate students change their major at one point, at least one point in their college career. So a lot of admin, know that what you apply us isn’t what you’re going to graduate with. And so honestly, I, I’m not sure. I feel like the only thing that is important when you’re considering your major is how competitive that major is. If that makes sense.

Kamila
Yeah. Because I don’t know about other schools but doesn’t Northwestern have like one major or maybe there’s another school that I went to but Northwestern has like a certain amount of people that they can admit to a certain like college or Yeah, certain college and then after that, it’s kind of like you can get into our school but not into the specific college.

Sohae
I think I don’t think there’s any school like university or college in the United States that has a set quota for that. I don’t think that’s I’m not sure. Like they even if they do, they probably wouldn’t publicize it. And I don’t think that’s like public information. So technically, yes. Like, just physically, a lot of class sizes aren’t able to accommodate a large number of students. So they obviously can’t accept every biology major. That applies. But yeah, I don’t I don’t know. Precisely, but I don’t know. I hope that made sense.

Kamila
Okay, because maybe it wasn’t Northwestern. I swear, I don’t think it’s no, no, probably not not. Yeah. Okay. I could have sworn there were some school that was like, we have like a kind of limit for this, like a specific school within our university. Interesting. Okay. So let’s move on to another part of your application. So is that like all for extracurriculars? Like, that’s the kind of broad?

Sohae
Yeah, surprisingly, I didn’t do as many as a lot of like ivy league student applicants, or Ivy League applicants do because I know a lot of my friends had a bajillion extracurriculars. And I honestly just thought it was kind of a waste of time, because a lot of them were doing it. Just to put it on their resumes. If, and, again, like I said, colleges can see through that. So I don’t know. I just thought it would be better to fill my time with something that’s meaningful, and something that I actually cared about slash enjoyed.

Kamila
So yeah. And throughout high school, if, um, you said you didn’t do a billion extracurriculars, but you did have leadership positions in some and you were still academically competitive. So were you like really stressed throughout high school? Were there constant nights where you would just stay up writing an essay? Or stay up late? Because you had extracurriculars? Or was it? Do you think you had it more easier than your friends that were like, constantly doing a bunch of extracurriculars just for the application?

Sohae
I feel like the extracurriculars themselves didn’t take as much time as the classes and the homework did. I’m pretty sure. Honestly, I don’t remember High School as well as some of my other friends do. Because I remember I was having a conversation with one of my friends. And she was like, I remember in like, junior year, you would always you would never be up at like 5am writing the essays while the rest of us were. And honestly, I don’t remember. Yeah, I don’t remember the specifics of high school like, but I guess I did. I do remember staying up late to finish an assignment at the last second. Yes, I was stressed, because I just had a lot of pressure coming from my family, mostly from my sister. And like, I was just kind of stressed about the grades I was getting, because sometimes, like, I would have to be in like the middle of the court in the middle of the semester. And I was like, Oh, my God, am I gonna be able to make that an A, and stuff like that? But honestly, I feel like I kind of have selective memory. So the bad parts, I’m just kind of blocking out mentally. But yeah.

Kamila
Okay, let’s move on to another part. actually move on to another part, which is the application essays. So you mentioned earlier that you went on quest Bridge, which is the scholarship awarded to first gen low income students. So doing quest bridge, how is it different from doing common application coalition app?

Sohae
It’s earlier, it’s way earlier. I’m pretty sure I submitted the application for quest bridge sometime in November. And the results come out. I did the results come out earlier than early decision or early action? For sure. So there’s that component, the fact that if you so there’s the entire application process for quest bridge is kind of long. Like you have to admit, submit your initial application. And then if you make the finalist cut, that’s the first cut. And then from there, you after you make finalist, you submit your supplement three essays to all the separate colleges that you apply to. And through there, they decide in tandem with your like, FAFSA and your financial aid forms. Whether you get into the university or not. So the quest bridge application, it’s like 30 or 40 partner schools I don’t remember I’m all across the country of all levels like I, there are a few colleges who are part of crossbridge that I’ve never heard of. But you only get to apply to a maximum of 12. And you rank them. And if you get into one, like you’re stuck, so it’s the same thing as early decision where you, you’re bound. So a lot of people don’t apply, like to 12 colleges in total, because I don’t know, I guess it’s just a lot of work. I have a few friends who only applied to like five got in, like, was done with the college application before second semester of senior year started. But yeah, I it’s just, and having the questbridge like name attached to your application, because I remember in the common app, it one of the questions is, are you affiliated with quest bridge, or any of these other programs? And you click yes. If you have that name associated with you, it’s kind of like, it tells the college admissions officers that you already went through a round of of like applications. And if you’re good enough for questbridge, you probably are at least like you should be like in the running for the call that college if that makes sense.

Kamila
So it gives you a sort of advantage.

Sohae
Kind of like I wouldn’t say it’s concrete I this is all just me theorizing. But the fact that I’ve been involved with like researching colleges since like, eighth grade, and just talking to a lot of admissions officers, and such, like, just throughout high school, I went to a lot of like, presentations, I don’t know, you get a lot of emails and mail from colleges saying like, Oh, you should visit us we’re going to be in your city like you can you can answer all we will answer all your questions, etc, etc, etc. And I also have like the family friend who helped me with the PSAT was also a former USC admissions officer. So, um, like, I learned a lot about that. And so I’m pretty sure like having the quest bridge name attached to you is a bit of a leg up, because, again, like you’ve already went through one round of applications, and they said, Oh, you’re good enough for questbridge there to be like a, like a finalist for questbridge. Uh, we should consider her for Northwestern, because like, if she’s good enough for questbridge, maybe she’ll be good enough for Northwestern. And it like, makes them read your application more thoroughly. I remember, I was talking to someone from UPenn, an admissions officer at one of those conference things. And he was like, there’s a, like, GPA doesn’t matter so much, just that if you meet a certain threshold, maybe like a 3.8. unweighted, then we’ll read your application more thoroughly. If that, but if you have like a 2.7, we’ll read your application, but we won’t read it as thoroughly as we do someone who has a 3.8. Like, Well, if that makes sense. So that says a lot.

Kamila
Yeah, so that’s the same with questbridge. If you haven’t, though, read it more thoroughly. Like if you have,

Sohae
I don’t think they will read it. Like it just catches their attention more.

Kamila
Okay. Interesting. So, in your, I guess the first round of application that you did, what was what were your essays about? Or what were they like kind of centered about if you could give like the general topic, you don’t have to like go into specifics. It was

Sohae
about my, like, just growing up, and my family. And just all like what that put me through. To put it very general like I don’t want to get into it to be it’s yeah, I wrote a lot about my family. But for the those for quest bridge and my common app, I had to prepare my common app, just in case I didn’t get into quest bridge. Anyway. Getting with quest bridge. So I had my common app. I also did my UCS. But yeah, pretty sure like the main essay, which was around like 800 words, I guess they were all this like, same topic, just different variations to match the word limit. And for the, for the supplementary essays, they’re just random. Like, I just went with whatever prompt they gave me. Um, maybe like, Oh, I remember. There’s like a Northwestern question. That’s like why Northwestern? And for that I kind of looked up a bit of like Northwestern traditions that happen, etc. And like, I tied it in with like, Choir I remember and I tied it in with like, oh, what I want to do at Northwestern and just what I think is great about Northwestern And I don’t know if that makes Yeah, yeah, that makes sense and tying in tradition, and like, what makes Northwestern Northwestern into what I like? Yeah.

Kamila
And with writing your essays, did you? Were you particularly stressed about them? Or are you generally do you generally consider yourself a good writer that you thought like, Oh, my application essays, both the big like, 600 800 word one, and my supplementals will be fine, or were you kind of worried about, like, how they would turn out.

Sohae
I didn’t really realize what my writing level was, until I got to college. I think my essays were what made my application like, yeah, they’re what made my application. It’s not my extracurriculars. And like my grades were just kind of the bare minimum. I think I worked on my essays for a long time, I had my common app essay. And like, like my, what is what is it called the the main essay, right for the common app,

Kamila
just personal space called the essay. Yeah, but my personal

Sohae
statement for the common app. I finished by summer like I start, I started working on it the summer, after junior year, and then it was finished. By the time I got, I started senior year of high school. And I don’t know I wasn’t just breezing through, I spent a lot of time on it. Because that is like, I think it’s where I could make up for stuff that I lacked in. Because I knew I wasn’t on par with a lot of the other candidates who are applying to Northwestern. Like, they probably have so many other extracurriculars. And like some of them probably have done research with certain professors at a university. Some of them probably took advanced courses, like another community college, because what they offered at their high school wasn’t enough for them, or just something like that something extra or like, oh, I, they studied abroad or somewhere. But um, like for what I lacked, I made sure that I caught up through my essays, so I didn’t breeze through them at all, like I wasn’t, I just rewrote them until like, I thought they were perfect. And I had multiple people read them and get feedback, got feedback from them

Kamila
as well. Okay, so use if you say that you started after the summer of your junior year and finished by that summer, that’s almost a year of like, writing your essays. Right?

Sohae
No, it’s just a summer or, Oh, the summer of after the summer after junior year ended. And like between, so junior year ends here, summer and then senior year starts here. And then the applications are due towards the end of first semester senior year, right?

Kamila
That makes so much more sense. I thought you spent like so. And like, no,

Sohae
no, not a year. Like, oh, my God. My UC application and my personal statements were finished by the start of senior year. And then I worked on my supplementals until like they were Do

Kamila
you see and Okay, so we’ve basically done every kind of component will actually let’s get to recommendation letters, and then we can talk about the colleges that you selected on quest bridge like you ranked. So can you quickly walk us through how you approach recommendation letters and who you ultimately got them from?

Sohae
So I got it from that history teacher who also taught AP Human Geography. He was my teacher for AP, human geography, and a push. And he was also the club advisor for the American Cancer Society club that I was in. I everybody hated him. Nearly everybody hated him. But for some reason, I just like, thought he was a nice old man. He, I don’t know, I guess we, I don’t know. I wouldn’t say we got close or anything like that. But he, I think he knew I made a really good first impression on him is what I think it was and then from there, from then on, he just expected a certain amount from me, like as a student, because he knew like he was able to gauge my level of I don’t know, he just saw something in me, I guess you could say. And, like he I just liked history as in high school, and I was engaged in his class I would answer all like, raise my hand participate to all these things. Talk to them after class every so often. And once I took AP Human Geography, I was like, he knows that I really liked this class. So I’m pretty sure he’ll be willing to write me a letter of recommendation. But yeah, and then, and then I asked for a letter of recommendation from my AP biology teacher. She and I were very close, even though I only had her for a year. She what is it? She’s, she’s a Korean lady. And so I feel like that was already a step up because we spoke another language other than English together. And like I would ask her things in Korean every now and then. And like, from there on, it was like a small little bond. Even though a lot of the kids in my school we’re Korean. But I expressed my interest in biology to her. And I told her, like, why I wanted to be a doctor, and all that. And I ended up like, tutoring her kids, like she has little elementary school aged kids. So I went over to her house, and like, tutored her kids. We went out to lunch once like, it was great. She was like, like a second mom, basically, like, maybe a third mom, because my sister is also a second mom. But she was great. And that was a close personal connection. And I was like she she can, even if she’s probably not the best writer in the world, because she’s a biology teacher. She’ll be able to like, she cares about me enough to like, try to make the letter of recommendation. Good. So that’s something to consider when you’re asking for a letter of recommendation, I knew the history teacher would be able to write a great letter of recommendation, because he’s a history teacher. And he writes essays all the time. But I did have to worry about like, it was like a balancing act. The bio teacher cared about me enough to work hard on that essay, the history teacher did it probably liked me enough to write a good one, but also didn’t have to work too hard to write a good one. So he wrote it anyway, if that makes sense. Yeah. So you probably even beyond high school. Like when you’re in college, when you are applying for a job. And you’re asking for a letter of recommendation, it doesn’t have to be from a teacher like they I’m pretty sure the common app, a split explicitly says that you can get it from like, I don’t know, your boy scout instructor or like somebody who an adult figure who you are close with. Probably not family. But anyway, just like make sure that they like the writing capabilities are at least okay.

Kamila
Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. So we’ve basically looked at kind of like all the components that you would put on an application or that an application requests of you. So let’s move on to actually selecting colleges. If questbridge had a limit and a ranking, how did you kind of approach? First of all, how did you find out like about the schools? And then how did you rank them? What appealed to you most about the schools that you’ve ranked at the top?

Sohae
So for me, since I’ve, I was looking into colleges, since middle school, I was pretty, I pretty much knew where I wanted to apply to because I’ve already done all the research. And I’ve like, written in notebooks about the pros and cons about each of them. And with the quest bridge application, I guess, I looked into the ones that I hadn’t heard before. And like from there, I don’t think I applied to the ones I hadn’t heard of before, even though I did research about them, because they just didn’t really click with me. I’m pretty sure I used their websites online that like, filter out. I’m pretty sure the college what is what is the LSAT, the company that does the LSAT and the AP College Board, College Board. Yeah. I’m pretty sure the College Board has this feature where you can put in like certain aspects of a university or college you want to go to and they’ll filter out all the ones that check those boxes. So like, oh, where in the US Do you want to go to college? If you just picked west coast, it would only show you West Coast colleges, public or private, like good weather, bad weather. Like liberal arts or university. Like all those kinds of things. And so from there is probably where I picked my top choices. Which were you Chicago, Duke, Northwestern Yale, Columbia. And I don’t remember To be honest, but just along a Dartmouth like just top colleges like the basic ones I kind of didn’t want to go to Harvard, which is surprising. And I I was going to apply to Stanford, but I decided not to because There were just too many supplements and I couldn’t get them done on time. But yeah, I don’t know. I just feel like you, you just need to know what you want. And I know that’s hard to decide, especially when you’re only like 17 818. But I just had kind of a gut feeling. And Northwestern you, Chicago and Duke checked all the boxes that I wanted. But yeah.

Kamila
And that answer, yeah, that sounds my question. So And you lived in California, and, and obviously, the UCs are in California. So did it ever appeal to you to like, were you ever strongly thinking about going to one of the UC colleges?

Sohae
No, I the UCs, I applied to the UCS as safety schools as like last resort because I did not want to stay in California. I, like I mentioned before, I moved around a lot. And it was only in Southern California, but I’ve just seen enough of California. Like, it’s all the same people. It’s all the same, like, Los Angeles culture is just so unappealing to me. Um, and so I just wanted to leave and get as far away as I could, basically. And yeah, I, the UCs, I only applied to, just in case I didn’t get into anywhere else. But I applied to UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Irvine. And I think UC San Diego, and maybe one more that I don’t I think UC Davis Yeah.

Kamila
Okay, so, and you said that questbridge is also binding, and I’m trying to understand this. So you got into Northwestern, and that means you are bounded, but what about the other colleges that you could have? Maybe you did get into them, but that you could have potentially got into? Like, do they just do it by rank? Like, which ranks the highest and you get into?

Sohae
So yeah, basically. So if I say I went, you Chicago, Duke, Northwestern, Columbia, Yale, if I did that, they send my application to you, Chicago first, if you Chicago doesn’t want me, they send it to Duke, if Duke doesn’t want me, they send it to Northwestern. If Northwestern does not want me, they send it to Columbia, and so on. But if you Chicago wants me, they send me there. And they don’t send the application to any of the other schools that you ranked. Oh, that’s so you won’t. So if you get your top choice, you won’t know if you would have gotten into any of those other schools. But quest bridge works. Like you enter the finalist stage, and I was a finalist. So they accepted my quest bridge application. And now I had to do the supplements for the schools that I ranked. And then they see to send those that application to those schools. But none of those schools wanted me at that point. As a quest bridge student. In my opinion, the fact that I ranked Northwestern as the quest bridge student, but didn’t get in as a quest bridge student and got in as an early decision student has a lot to do with the financial aid aspect of it, because quest bridge is paying. Because Northwestern is paying for my education in full through quest bridge, if that makes sense.

Kamila
Okay, that’s interesting. Yeah. I mean, this is the first time hearing so I’m like,

Sohae
yeah, like, I don’t know, it’s a lot to explain. I’m sorry. But like, I feel like, yeah, it was my financial aid process. My FAFSA was really complicated because of my family situation. And yeah, I’m not going to get into it. But I feel like there was a little bit of a difference between the financial information I put in for quest bridge and the financial aid for financial aid information I had to put in for the FAFSA that made them end up like not giving me the quest bridge match, but and like, they encouraged me to roll over into early decision. So I did. Yeah,

Kamila
okay, I get that. That kind of makes sense. I know I’m missing pieces because this is my first time hearing about this. But yeah, that makes sense. That concludes part one of my interviews so Hey, make sure to subscribe so you know in part two comes out. Also check out my blog, a college kid.com for various college related articles there. But other than that, hope see you in the next one.