Many students dream of getting into elite schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, or Stanford, but how exactly to accomplish this is often a mystery. Lots of unhelpful and vague advice abounds, especially from people who have never gained admission to these schools.

In high school, I got into every school I applied to, including Harvard, Princeton, MIT, and Stanford, and I attended Harvard for college. I also learned a lot about my classmates and the dynamics of college admissions in ways that were never clear to me in high school. Now, I'm sharing this expertise with you.

I've written the most comprehensive guide to getting into top schools. I'm going to explain in detail what admissions officers at Ivy League schools are really looking for in your application. More importantly, I'm going to share an actionable framework you can use to build the most compelling application that's unique to you.

On the 4.0 scale, an unweighted 4.0 GPA means perfection. You need straight As in every class—not even one A- is allowed. In college applications, this carries a lot of weight. You're essentially telling the college, "High school classes are a cinch. I've taken a tough course load, and I'm more than prepared for what college has to throw at me."

In high school, I got a 4.0 GPA with a course load featuring 10 AP courses. I got straight As and 12 A+'s. This strong course load, along with a strong application, got me into Harvard and every college I applied to.

While it's flattering to say, "Well, Allen's just a smart guy," in reality I relied a lot more on high-level strategy and effective academic habits. These were the same strategies I applied to my undergraduate work at Harvard and that led me to graduate summa cum laude with a 3.95 GPA. This is the guide I wish I had my freshman year of high school.

College interviews are becoming increasingly common, especially among selective colleges. Many students go to interviews ready to answer questions but forget that it's important to ask interesting questions as well.

In this article, I'll establish the basics of how to prepare for college interviews and explain what questions you should and shouldn't ask during an interview, so you feel totally ready on the day of.

The college interview process can be nerve-racking. This interview gives the college you're applying to another opportunity to evaluate you and help determine whether or not to offer you admission. However, your college interviews won't be nearly as scary if you know what to expect.

In this article, I give you the 14 college interview questions you absolutely must prepare for. I explain why you're being asked these questions and how to provide great answers. Furthermore, I offer advice on how to prepare for your interviews so that when the time comes, you'll be ready to ace them.

Are you applying to a college or a scholarship that requires a community service essay? Do you know how to write an essay that will impress readers and clearly show the impact your work had on yourself and others?

Read on to learn step-by-step instructions for writing a great community service essay that will help you stand out and be memorable.

Touring your prospective colleges is a great opportunity to learn from the people who study, work, and teach on campus. By keeping your eyes and ears open, you can gain a strong sense of a school and its culture, far beyond the facts and figures on its website.

To make the most of your visits, you should prepare thoughtful questions to ask on a college tour. This guide will provide you with a comprehensive college visit checklist of questions for your tour guide, current students, admissions officers, financial aid officers, and professors. Plus, we'll offer some advice on what not to ask.

You may have heard that extracurriculars are an important part of your high school life. You've probably been bombarded with stories about how everyone who is successful in getting into college played a varsity sport and was student body president and built homes for the poor in Costa Rica.

But do extracurriculars have to be so overwhelming? What are extracurricular activities, exactly? And just how important are they when it comes time to apply to college?

Read on for a better understanding of this important topic.

In 2005, I applied to college and got into every school I applied to, including Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT. I decided to attend Harvard.

In this guide, I'll show you the entire college application that got me into Harvard—page by page, word for word.

In my complete analysis, I'll take you through my Common Application, Harvard supplemental application, personal statements and essays, extracurricular activities, teachers' letters of recommendation, counselor recommendation, complete high school transcript, and more. I'll also give you in-depth commentary on every part of my application.

To my knowledge, a college application analysis like this has never been done before. This is the application guide I wished I had when I was in high school.

If you're applying to top schools like the Ivy Leagues, you'll see firsthand what a successful application to Harvard and Princeton looks like. You'll learn the strategies I used to build a compelling application. You'll see what items were critical in getting me admitted, and what didn't end up helping much at all.

Reading this guide from beginning to end will be well worth your time—you might completely change your college application strategy as a result.

College admissions can be confusing, with a lot of contradictory information thrown around. It's hard to separate fact from fiction, which is frustrating since the stakes are high and you may not realize you made mistakes until it's far too late.

In this exclusive article, we decided to consult university admissions officers and counselors around the country to break through the noise.

We asked them a simple question: "What's the #1 fact you wish college applicants knew about admissions?" The results might surprise you. 

While you might think college preparation only happens during the summer before college, this isn’t necessarily true. In fact, you can start preparing for college as early as 9th grade! But what exactly does the process of college preparation entail?

Here, we explain how to prepare for college at every grade level in high school. Specifically, we take a look at what you can do on the academic, financial, and extracurricular fronts, providing you with advice and tips, as well as a helpful preparing-for-college checklist.

Does Georgetown superscore the ACT? Let’s cut to the chase: Georgetown University does not superscore the ACT, despite what you might read from online chat forums. But don’t despair! Even if you had your hopes set on a Georgetown superscore, you can still get into the school of your dreams.

As it turns out, there’s a lot to know about Georgetown’s admissions process. Once you understand what it takes to get into Georgetown, you can maximize your chances of receiving an acceptance letter!

In this crash course of all things Georgetown ACT, we’ll talk about:

• What is superscoring?
• Georgetown superscore policy & overall admissions requirements
• General ACT standards
• Plus, some tips on improving your overall ACT score!

Let’s jump in! 

Applying to colleges is a rough enough process on its own. If you're interested in a lot of different subjects that don't necessarily mesh nicely together into one major, then figuring out what you should go to school for can seem like an impassable obstacle on the road to figuring out where to apply to.

In this article, I'll take you through the same steps I (someone with multiple different interests) took back when I was looking at colleges to figure out what I should go to college for.

I'll also go through how, as a well-rounded student, you can narrow down what kinds of schools you should apply to.

Whereas fall means college application season, spring means admission notifications time. All high school seniors want to get a college acceptance letter to their top-choice school. But what exactly does an admittance letter look like? And what does it say?

In this article, we go over what information a typical college acceptance letter includes and show you real college acceptance letter samples so you can get an idea of what they look like. We also give you our top four tips for what to do after you get an admittance letter.

If you love our strategy guides, we have great news: PrepScholar is launching a college admissions podcast! It's hosted by PrepScholar co-founder and Harvard grad Allen Cheng and writer Melissa Brinks.

Download our podcast now at iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, and Libsyn (or wherever you get your podcasts).

So you’ve just landed a college interview for the school of your dreams. That’s amazing! Once you finish celebrating, it’s time to start preparing for the big event.

But the process of preparing can feel overwhelming. That’s why we’ve put together our top five tools for preparing for your college interview. Keep reading to learn more about our expert recommendations for the tools you must have to knock your college interview out of the park!