Building Your Skill Set for College

Years ago, I learned a very important lesson about job hunting. I paid little attention to my resume. It was three paragraphs long. *dusting hands* that should do it! My friend’s resume was exactly one page long, easy to read, and she rebuilt it for each job interview.

“Why re-do your resume for each job interview?” I asked naively.

“I want to give them what they’re looking for,” she replied. I gave that a lot of thought. If you are applying to a technical firm, then emphasize that part of your skill set. Tell all about your experience with computers and programming, if you have it. Emphasize that part of your skill set. If you are applying for a position with a marketing firm, then put your communication skills at the top of the list.

The same thing applies to getting into the school of your choice. Find out what their criteria is before you apply. You can usually do that by spending a few minutes online. How important are SAT scores to the school? It depends on the school. Did you know that many universities have a program of automatic admissions? That means that once a student has submitted an application meeting the criteria he or she will be accepted with no further review. Apply on time; meet the requirements and you are in! With some universities you are automatically admitted if you are in the top 10% of the high school graduating class and score (fill in the blank) on the SAT/ACT test. Other schools may simply say that if you are in the top 10% of your high school graduating class, that’s good enough for them and they view the SAT/ACT scores irrelevant. Still  others will automatically admit students with good SAT scores even if the student graduates last in his class.

I wonder how genius inventor Steve Jobs scored on the SAT. No one seems to know. We do know that he dropped out of Reed College in Portland Oregon after one semester and just hung around the campus, dropping in on classes that interested him. He told the 2005 graduating class of Stanford University that, while living on handouts and sleeping on the floor of a friend’s room, he monitored a calligraphy class. What he learned there, as a drop out, taught him all about the fonts and typefaces that are now available on computers around the world, thanks to him.

Occupying the other end of the admissions spectrum from the automatic are the schools that employ a wide-ranging admissions criteria: grades, extracurricular activities,recommendations, essays, interviews. The suggestion from the ABC College Planning think tank is this: Why not do it all? Prepare for the SATs. Develop a shining resume of extracurricular activities. Keep your grades high. Get coaching on essay writing skills. Learn a new word each week. Get a part time job. While you’re at it, care for a pet, keep your room neat, and find a hobby you enjoy. You may not need all of it, but what possible harm could any of it do? And it may just do you a lot of good.

Do you know what skills your dream school or dream job requires for admission?