New York University

 Habiba Ali

Recently you guys might’ve seen my post regarding my acceptance to New York University(Main Campus), Stern School of Business which has around 8% acceptance rate and ranked among the top 20 business schools in the world. I got full-ride scholarship and applied in RD. 

I received an overwhelming amount of DMs after posting on BBB where I was asked about my admission journey so here it is: 

\ About my background /

I come from NCTB English Version background. And I got GPA 5 in both SSC and HSC. 

\ My ECA profile /

1. Model UNs: 

Multiple Best and Outstanding Delegate Awards. 

I also served as a director of a committee. 

2. Debates: 

Me and my team were the open champion of 20th BDC pre-worlds, 2023.

I was one of the top 10 open speakers and final’s best speaker. 

I was consistently the best speaker in all 3 rounds of Inter Cantonment English Version Schools and Colleges Parliamentary Debate Competition, 2022(Dhaka area). 

My team became the regional runner up. 

3. Clubs:

Vice president of my institution’s debate club(MCPDC), English Wing. 

4. Other competitions:

Champion of Science Moot in Intra Science Festival. 

1st Prize in Turn The Coat in 8th DRMC Language festival 2023.

\ About test scores /

I went SAT optional. 

\ About writing essay /

The process of writing essay can be quite exasperating because there is no set-rule of writing one. Always remember that you could do 100 ECAs and none of them might matter if it doesn’t add value to your essays. ECAs show them that you went out of your academic way and did something outside of book-ish knowledge. As long as you can put it in a way that they see how much hardwork you’ve put into it and what you’ve achieved, you should be good to go. My essays were very last-minute, wouldn’t recommend obviously but I made sure I was being my raw self in my essay. No sugarcoating words or anything, only brutal honesty. The magic of writing essay is to make it engaging, you could write a few punchlines or tell a story, that’s absolutely your call. I personally read more books in my US admission phase than I did in my entire life just to make sure I was working on my vocabulary and my words. So that’s one tip that I will give you. 

Lastly, a little clarification: 

Few people have asked me if I took help from any agency or anyone. No, I didn’t. I did everything by myself and the only source of help I received was from watching random youtube videos and doing my own research on universities. And aside from personal essay, make sure you focus on university-tailored essays which are supplemental essays because this is where you show the admission committee that you truly did your own research on their universities and not just being generic.