Rejecting Elite Kids

More positively, choosing the cream from the cream of the crop

Hope you had a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, wonderful holidays and enjoy the last hours of 2024!

I recently volunteered to review applications for a highly competitive American merit scholarship with a <1% award rate among thousands of applicants. The several dozen I graded contained over 100 essays and letters of recommendation.

Winners often attend elite American schools and win elite international scholarships too, like the Fulbright or Rhodes.¹ Among the alumni are federally appointed judges and founders of multi-billion dollar companies. (Now, if they were really any good, they’d be on Substack writing to ~100 people).

Since I signed a confidentiality agreement, I can’t identify the scholarship, how I became a reviewer, or anything about the overall review process or specific applicants. This essay reflects my perspective as one reviewer and my personal process only. Any examples I give are generic or fictionalized to illustrate a point.

As I promised in my last short essay about my Substack name, the 2,000+ word assaults are resuming now. Buckle up cheerio!

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I pity kids these days. The competition is just too fierce.

Over a decade ago, I won undergraduate scholarships like this one, but I doubt I’d even be competitive if I applied today. I took maybe 6 AP classes,² achieved a ~1500 SAT score, and led a few programs and volunteer activities. Today, kids are cramming 12 AP classes, acing their SAT and ACT scores,³ and winning tournaments as Division I athletes. Oh, and they’re Olympiad champions and published in 10 neuroscience journals and personally awarded by President Obama to boot.

So how did I pick the winners from such a winning group?

Well, I didn’t really pick. With many, many reviewers involved, each of us played but a small role overall. My guess is that each reviewer brought their own lens to the process. Some reviewers may have focused on diversity, some on adherence to scholarship goals, still others on objective metrics of success. We likely balanced each other out, which whew, I needed. I bear no sole responsibility for subjecting these poor kids to my whims.

Quit being pedantic, you’re thinking. Okay okay, you’re right. I still picked “my” winners.

My picklist criteria: the quality of the written portions. I personally weighed their essays about 85%, and their letters of recommendation about 15%.

Below were the 5 steps I took to whittle down my list, envisioned as a funnel:

Michelle Obama was not a 2025 applicant. Neither was Chris Best.

Step 1: Remove bog standard mistakes (~5%)

Before I immersed myself fully, I looked for places where objective facts dinged an application.

Examples:

• Not meeting basic criteria for the scholarship

• Forgetting to attach transcripts or other key pieces of info

• Recommenders writing against the applicant (yes, this happened)

These were so obvious that I sighed with relief when an application failed the test. One more into the easy “no” pile.

Step 2: Remove poor quality writing (~20-30%)

This part was still easy but marked the first step into the subjective gray zone called “poor quality.”

Examples:

• AI word vomit

• Poor writing ability on a technical level

• Letters of recommendation are generic (and possibly also AI word vomit)

There’s a certain cadence/style to AI writing where you’ll clock it instantly if you use a tool like ChatGPT a lot e.g. my right eye twitches whenever I see the word “delve” in an intro.

On the other hand, some students 100% wrote their essays because they were terrible. And while I give them props for their own words, they did not advance beyond a participation reward. Honestly, they could’ve used some AI help rather than forgoing it entirely. (ChatGPT does great structural and line-by-line edits if you put in the prompt engineering work.)

As for letters of recommendation, most of them unsurprisingly came from teachers. Unfortunately, a good chunk of these felt formulaic/templated/AI word vomit-y. In contrast, letters from non-teachers—such as sports coaches—were genuine. While I read a few mediocre coach-written letters, their fresh content more than compensated for any awkward grammar.

For teacher-written letters, common verbiage like “when this student was absent, we missed their presence” gave me pause. First, it suggests the student was absent often enough to leave an impression. Second, it reads as filler—a fallback for teachers who lack meaningful stories to share. Everyone contains stories about people they truly know. If they lack stories, they don’t have a relationship or just don’t care enough to tell a story. A strong recommendation is a rich tapestry, not vague pleasantries.

Step 3: Remove essays with lack of detail (~30-40%)

By now I was fully floating in the morass of subjectivity. In this murky place, insufficient detail is synonymous with shaky reasoning and logical leaps.

Examples:

• Unclear why applicant chose their area(s) of study

• Cliches and using quotes as stand-ins for their own story

• No stories or justification for how they represent scholarship values

Many students explained their choice of major with clear reasoning, or had self-explanatory choices. Future lawyer? Political science. Future doctor? Chemistry.

But there were others whose choices veered away from their bread and butter. Take a kid with a portfolio of writing and art who declares a Computer Science major—my curiosity is piqued. I sense an interesting story behind the shift. But many stories went untold, which left the impression that they yielded to external influences e.g. expectations from parents or “learn to code” culture. Tellingly, zero applicants declared an English major after stuffing their resumes with STEM projects.

Cliches and overused quotes such as “Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars” served as crutches for original thought or personal reflection. Essays have word limits, and using someone else’s words can signal an over reliance on platitudes, especially if there’s a lack of compelling narrative around the quote. Done poorly, the quote approach misses an opportunity to reveal something striking.

Beyond tropes, some essays “told, not showed” that an applicant represented scholarship values. Claiming an ideal like leadership is one thing, demonstrating the trait is another. For instance, an applicant might write, “I led a debate team of 5 who won 10 championships” which is a waste of 11 words. I’ve already read the awards section. Show me how leadership came alive through your hard choices. What did you sacrifice? Who transformed under your tutelage? Breathe life into abstractions. Shape blurry outlines into vivid portraits.

Step 4: Remove essays with bad vibes (~20-30%)

This is where I courted real controversy. I flew beyond subjectivity and into subconscious pattern recognition and judgment of unsavory behaviors. You know how you can tell in a text message if your friend is lying or being passive aggressive, but they won’t spell it out? It’s that sense, but with a stranger’s words.

Examples:

• Writing that feels overly self-focused/shouts “me me me”

• Conflicting narrative between essays or between stated values

• Inconsistencies that veer into lying or traits like selfishness or spite

An obvious example of too much self-focus is failing to credit others for what is clearly a group effort. Subtler examples are essays detailing the minutiae of a hobby without relating it to a broader picture, especially if that hobby is stereotyped as self-absorbed. For instance, there are at least two ways to write about Pokémon Go, a game I was once obsessed with. I could write about how good I felt playing it and all the steps I took to achieve top 1% in the world (fyi this never happened, I suck at games)…or I could explore how the game fostered community connection in an era where we increasingly bowl alone.⁴

Other applications lacked a coherent internal logic. Someone who says they care about climate change, but writes about their glorious private travels and cruises around the world, strikes me as unaware at best and disingenuous at worst. An environmentally conscious person interrogates their own carbon footprint. Without a dialogue between those two warring loves, I’m left cold.

With lying or other red flags, I suspected some applicants exaggerated trauma to sell a brand of overcoming hardship. Picture an applicant who witnessed their mother suffer through poor medical care, which made them determined to become a doctor. Very moving. But then in a later essay, they toss in a line about how studying for the biology section of Academic Decathlon inspired them to go to medical school. Mixed messaging raises questions about heroic origin stories.

One essay bluntly stated: “I wanted to help others, but decided to become a lawyer for the pay instead.” I laughed and said “What the hell” out loud when I read it. First, nearly everyone works for money, so this reveals nothing unique about the applicant. Second, it conveys a craven opportunism that clashes with scholarship values. Third, it implies a worldview where applying the law is antithetical to helping people—how grim!

Authenticity alone isn’t enough. Authenticity requires discernment and invites judgment within a certain context. For instance, if the applicant arrived at that conclusion because they grew up poor and abandoned their dreams of joining nonprofits as a result, that context is far more understandable than a rich kid saying the same thing. And in the hands of a comedian, that statement could’ve been a riveting satirical critique. Alas it was played straight, so it fell flat. Thus my judgment was no.

Step 5: Finding my favorite candidates (~10%)

Identifying the top essays from my top candidates was simple, as easy as removing ones that failed the basic criteria.

Top candidates leap out from the page. They carry with them a certain levity that balances out high-strung achievements. I noticed each had a highly developed sense of self, whether forged under fire or through great support.

Examples:

• Generosity of spirit present; candidate inspires the people around them

• Clear sense of purpose where values, actions, and future goals are connected

• Outstanding writing not only technically, but from a place of emotional resonance

These kids expressed themselves as incredible writers and community members. Even in essay prompts asking about their story, they wrote about their family, friends, and community. Nothing they did felt like resume line items or aggrandizing self-promotion—all were windows into their stake in the world.

Some of these incredible kids suffered unbelievable hardship, such as poverty, foster care, and war zones. Not only did they still achieve plenty, they emerged with zero chips on their shoulders, even though they’d be more than entitled to resentment and despair. One application caused me to take the day off from grading as I was moved to tears.

Their unique letters of recommendation revealed characteristics beyond what was expressed in their own essays, such as a teacher praising a kid for tutoring a classmate who was out sick for months. My favorite letters also showed curiosity in the form of rebellion. Some of these kids questioned everything around them, including their adult mentors. They pushed back against accepted conventions, asking why, why, why. What moxie at such a young age! I’m impressed by courage. I also gravitate towards disagreeable people since I am one myself. “All progress depends on the unreasonable man” as George Bernard Shaw once wrote.

For the few borderline cases, I considered other factors like whether the applicant chose to skip over optional essays, or whether I got a sense that they would decline the scholarship if awarded to pursue other opportunities.

My final funnel. Very scientific.

Going into this review process, I felt pangs of nervousness. How could I judge kids who are already operating at such a high level under so much competitive pressure? They’ve all achieved extraordinary things. I could’ve randomly picked names from a basket and still ended up with strong candidates.

But as I dived deeper into their essays and letters, I realized this wasn’t just about picking winners; it was about discovering what sets the truly exceptional apart for me. It became a process of discovering what qualities drew me in with a magnetic force.

For me, the best didn’t just achieve—they showed greatness beyond the self. These candidates didn’t pursue success for its own sake; they sought to make the world better, often in quiet, unflashy ways. Their words distilled raw experiences into stories that transcended the page and touched a total stranger like me.

I was most inspired by magnanimity and ambition fueled by empathy. Loud and proud awards are impressive. But I preferred the pitter patter of raindrops in a still pond—actions spreading outward in ripples, touching families, friends, and communities with quiet but profound impact.

If this process taught me anything, it’s that these candidates aren’t the lucky ones.

We’re the ones lucky to have them.

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Thank you to the following for feedback:

v1:

Becky Isjwara

,

Maksim

,

Amit Bhatia

,

Danny Oak

,

Celeste

v2:

Dolores Lucero

,

Promise

,

Davide Bruzzone

,

Ved Shankar

Funnel from a presentation template by Hislide.io

1. Fulbright is a prestigious program that funds international exchange for students, scholars, and professionals to promote cross-cultural understanding. The elite Rhodes scholarship supports postgraduate study at the University of Oxford for exceptional students worldwide

2. Advanced Placement (AP) are college level courses that allow high school students to earn college credit through scoring a 3, 4, or 5 on a standardized exam. American students also take International Baccalaureate (IB) classes, which are internationally recognized courses that promote critical thinking with a global perspective

3. Perfect SAT score is 1600 (reading + math), perfect ACT score is 36 (English + reading + math + science)

4. Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam is a book about the decline of community engagement in modern society