how THEY got into the DUAL BA with Columbia: ESSAY, ACADEMICS, EXTRACURRICULARS

I know it's been a while I've been moving between cities and adjusting to Colombia and adjusting to its cold weather now but uh here's another video the two Opa admissions process I know

the there's so many different applicants from so many different educational backgrounds however I have compiled the most three common educational backgrounds which is Lisa Frances with

my dear friend Melissa then you have the American kind of track American High School track with Lisa also my dear friend and then finally with bajim I also dear friend with the IB Program

again if you have any questions feel free to comment them or just DM me on my Instagram and I hope this video is helpful to anybody out there that wants to apply to dual ba this program is

amazing and just this video will show you three amazing girls hi Melissa hey how are you doing I'm good thank you so much for having me

so Melissa's biggest takeaways she's from a franchise go in Canada tons of extra curriculars her biggest approach to the essay was just to clear outline and the biggest tip is find what

attracts you to the Dual ba and you should watch the whole interview no of course thank you and for helping fellow and incoming students so let's talk a little about you uh tell me about you

like what major did you do was campus 82s where do you go to high school okay so maybe we'll start from the beginning so I went to high school in Ottawa in

Canada I went to an international French High School francaise so I did the back in high school and I chose so it doesn't

exist anymore but at the time I did the economics and sociology like major in high school um and then in Singapore I majored in

political Humanities and here I'm doing a major in human rights and I went to the luav campus um like what about your statistics like you as a student when it comes to a more

of an academic perspective to the admissions office sure so I don't know how this will make sense to like maybe our International applicants but for

those who are in a DC francaise um my cumulative GPA over the three years of high school was around 18 over 20. and

my thank you and my back score was 20.

and I did take the SAT although I do believe it's optional for the Dual ba yeah but I took it I got a 1470. oh my

God those are amazing styles thank you what about your extracurricular it's like what did you do as a student um yeah I was doing too much honestly kind of like at sunsfu like actually

what I really liked about salespeople was the fact that you could really be involved in like everything and it's not that committal like well it depends but you really get the chance to explore a lot and I did that as well in high

school um I did Student Government I ran the feminism Club um and I did mun those were my main

activities inside of school and then um outside I was a figure skater and I played the piano

but let's say like in terms of activities that were related to The Dual ba in particular it was mostly I mean the three like more like activists

um activities which were a student government feminism and mun oh my God that's amazing I did not you were a figure skater that's so cool um and what do you think that from your

student application what do you think that made you like kind of stood out to the admissions office do you think there was something specific or was just like your student profound General

um I think uh so I don't want to generalize but I do think that um the Dual VA admissions committee prioritizes people who have a unique

story and one that they feel connected to like if you talk about your personal experiences in your essay which we'll get to I assume um you also need to like feel connected

to it like it's not just about selling yourself it's more like playing a very personal story so I think that was what stood out I I feel like

um the way I grew up really fit with the mission of the Dual VA which is to make you explore different cultures different school systems

I had you know I when I was growing up I tried I lived in different countries and I did switch multiple times between the French and American schooling systems even though I ended up going to

a French high school so I talked about those experiences and how that made me want to explore different University schooling systems as well so I think for me yeah it was just the way I grew up

and how like I felt connected to it and how I wanted to um kind of explore that like International side of me more in the Dolby um so back to the question

um how did you approach your assay dual ba essay question um I approach it from a very like um practical point of view like I just

wrote down the question and I underlined all the key terms as if it was an exam basically I was like okay here they're asking about like your experience or like why do you want to do this program okay whatever the question is like I

kind of Define the terms and how I wanted to talk about them um and then I did some research on the Dual ba website picking out specific things that stood out to me from the

program and licking it to my personal experiences so for example I wrote a bullet point like I basically did this chart and I on on one side I wrote about

the specifics of the Dual VA and on the other I wrote about my like how it related to me so for example I wrote Euro Asia program which is the one I did

and then I wrote like my culture like how I'm already familiar with Asian culture because I'm also Chinese right so I did this like matching of what's special about the Oba and then how like

I think it relates to me how I like it like you know why it draws me to The Duality and then I wrote my essay elaborating on these different connected points

oh my God that's so elaborate thank you so much for explaining kind of how you approach the question and do you think there's something anything that now

three years after you've been in this program background noises or helicopters um do you think is is there anything you would like kind of change in the way you

wrote it or I don't know or maybe you will not change it I don't know I wouldn't to be honest because it was successful so I don't even want to think about what else I would do differently

I'm happy with it as it is oh no that's great um and are there any tips you will give to anybody that's like writing their essay um yeah I think I mean this is a general

sort of advice for any I think um college application essay is to be specific um because obviously more people apply than can get

in so there is it is the selective process so you need to find out what in the Dual ba attracts you specifically so

either like do research on the campus like Are there specific courses that you want to take is there like a particular um issue that you want to explore in your studies that like can be linked to

Something in the Dual VA or yeah you can also talk like I did about my experience growing up and like the overall mission of the Dual VA how it's International maybe the friends you want to make yeah

like specific things that you want to get out of the Dual ba and that show that you're a great fit for it that you're going to benefit from it oh that's amazing thank you so much and I

don't even remember about your interview is there anything specific you remember like how was it uh because I know it was kind of a long time ago yeah um I actually had a really good

interview experience some people um so there's not a lot of information about the Dual VA on the internet but I did like some research on the internet and I found some Reddit posts about it

and I like all the info I had about the interviews were from like the internet and some people said that um especially the salesbow interviewer asked a lot of specific questions about

politics and so on that maybe someone who's not from France wouldn't know so I prepared quite intensely like I read the news a lot apparently you had to be very

informed about current events which you do so I did read the news especially about the region that I wanted to study which was Asia and at the time covid was like exploding so there was a lot to

talk about in terms of like economics IR or whatever um so I'm sorry what was the question again no it's like oh interesting yeah no that's it yeah so like I did a bunch

of like I just read the news and then um yeah what I'm trying to get to is that the interview was fairly easy I wasn't asked any questions about like knowledge like politics or whatever I

was just asked about what like was my opinion on the news and otherwise um it was just a more traditional College interview like why do you want to go to the Dual ba

um like talk about your extracurriculars and yeah very basic questions yeah well thank you so much I was kind of a very nice answer so thank you Bob those are my questions but thank you so much and

I'm pretty sure everybody that watches this video will be super super helpful with information okay thank you bye hello how are you doing

I'm doing well did I be in Spain she also did a lot of extracurriculars her dual PA essay was about her life experiences and the

internationality offerings of the program and her biggest tip is that Tian sport is also super cool and there's a lot of international opportunities in there thank you so much for agreeing to

let me interview you so thank you so much of course any day um tell me about you like what campus were you from what majors are you doing

and all that okay so my name is value I am come from so I was in the Asian campus in South Pole and there I did politics and government which is kind of

the legal track that sounds for us to offer at least that's why I saw on it and then uh right now in Colombia I'm doing the new major which is cognitive science

um so it's basically a mix between like Neuroscience Linguistics philosophy a little computer science and I'm missing one of the branches but you got the idea yeah actually she's the only one on the

major right now so that's impressive yes but I'm trying to convince another person to join with me so and why um tell me about like your type of high

school like how was your high school experience like the type of high school did you do normal high school where did you do it was it like AP IV Etc okay so first of all I come from Spain I did my

high school in Spain so their High School is just the last two years of school not the last four so there's already a difference versus the American system and then I actually switched schools right before going to high

school because there is this really like old uh public high school in Madrid which is the Ramirez one so I really wanted to switch

there because there's a lot of history there's this whole movement that came from there like artistic movement of the like residents that used to be it's a really cool history it's also the

institution in Madrid that has done the IB I think it's either the longest or the second longest for 40 years and so I knew I wanted to do the IV because I had

an international background and so it was kind of like if I'm doing it I want to get it as best as I can um and the weird thing about that high school was

that because it was a public high school in Spain all public high schools are mandated by law to also uh have the normal Spanish track so I basically had

to do two uh high school systems at once I did the Spanish one and the IB but obviously like the subjects that you do where most of them were the same obviously each kind of high school

system has its own specifics but it was kind of the same program just the same classes just from like the two different programs so it was a very interesting makes you see a lot about different

lenses of analysis and whatnot and I actually did the science one because I really liked math and so if I still want to do math that meant I also had to do chemistry which was fine but I also had

to do physics which I didn't like that much and then I had to do technical design I had to do um yeah all these really technical subjects

which are kind of in the back of my memory now but yes so that was my high school and how it worked out oh well and if you mind talking about like statistics about your high school like I

know IB has a grade um what was your grade in IB my IV grade was a 45 45. oh wow and uh how did you

get your connect that more Science Background to do ob-a uh with xion support yes so um once again I went into the Science

Background not because I was a hardcore science person but because I really liked math but just like I really liked math another of my favorite subjects when I was in high school was philosophy

and so um for me the Dual VA was a great way to kind of get those two sides of me where I knew and like if I went to a Spanish University that would just not be an

option I would be like box day one into a major that I didn't even know if I liked and one of the reasons why I didn't know that I would like a major is because I'm very interdisciplinary so I

like Humanities and I like math at the same time and so for me salespeople was definitely fulfilling more of my Humanities side um I discovered I really like law uh and

it was okay because I just come to the experience of like really intense stem subjects so I really appreciated getting to do a lot of readings uh and writing

some essays and then now in Colombia I'm doing kind of a mix of both oh it's so nice and um can you tell me about like what did you do outside academics during your

time in high school like what were your extracurriculars yes so extracurriculars I was in The Debate Club I first year I was a participant that night who I we

just came back from like this debate thing at Columbia so yeah I was in The Debate Club um mostly I also just uh formed part of

like cool side projects so I was like in the recycling club we made this Association where we like um gathered gifts for Christmas for

people uh That Couldn't otherwise have access to uh these gifts during the holidays uh we also did a project for sustainability

um during when we were confined actually that was our way to make confinement better and I got my Mac as a result of that so um I would say yeah I was pretty engaged I know of course dance and Chinese yeah

right [Laughter] yeah so buy it by the way I don't know if you knew but the Dual ba essay question is still the same from when we

apply to the Dual ba oh um so so I don't know I don't know if what do you remember of it or what do you

vaguely remember of it but do you remember like how did you approach your essay like what did you talk about a little bit because I know the Dual ba essay talks about like connecting your

high school experiences to the Dual PA and why the Dual VA so I know is there anything that comes to mind that you wrote on your essay

yes so um I was also applying to other American Universities at the time um and the Dual way was kind of the most different one because it even had a different portal it wasn't through the

Common App application um and so the one big difference that struck me from that essay was that it was a really large essay like it was it

was like what like a thousand words or something where it's like a lot of other universities we had like the Common App essay and then maybe you had like the shorter response ones um which allowed you to glean on

different sites and then the dual view one was all concentrated into one um I think this was kind of like a little intimidating but exciting at the same time because I felt like you know

all those different sides of me that I'd Incorporated for other universities in the smaller essays I had to combine them all into one and so um because as you can tell I'm kind of a

very diverse person I was like is this gonna fit together nicely um so that was kind of my Approach I already had you know all of I always talk about making little Frankensteins

with my essay so I had all of these uh parts that I knew I wanted to incorporate and it was like about finding a story that made them fit together and I actually love American essays for universities in the sense

that I think it's really just telling a story and um and making it very biographical but also reflective and you know you can have a lot of fun with your essay which

is something that you know coming from a European system is very appreciated because we don't really have that chance um and then what did I actually talk about well

um obviously I highlighted a lot about you know my background I haven't shared this but um I've I lived in France and in the

United States briefly growing up so the Dual VA was kind of like a perfect synthesis of you know my life location wise and then also because I

was able to study Asia in Seattle school and I had this interest with Chinese and in Asian politics um then it just matched up really well together and so I think the late motif

of my essay was languages and how um you know languages uh each language what it taught me about the world and um and and that way you could glean and

you could see that I lived in all these places but I remember I think something that I made different about uh child support essays I kind of started as like uh it was a bit more political maybe not

political but it was a bit more um kind of self-aware of the world it wasn't just like looking at me it was kind of reflecting into the world so

um yeah but I'll remember that for myself no damn you remember a lot and I don't know some people have said and I don't know if you agree with this that because this is you're also applying to

a French University you should make it less reflective and less the American way will you agree with this or uh or not

um honestly I would say that each person should write in the style that feels most natural to them and the great advantage of the Dual baby program is that if you're more like you know

French style than the French person reading it will love it if you're a more American you'll have someone that would love it too um because I wrote it more American style but I also can tell you that I had

friends that I think kind of approached it a bit more in the French style and it really worked for them because that's kind of the voice that they have that is the most eloquent so um I would kind of stick to that also

when you have the interview it's the same like there's gonna be the you know person from Colombia and the person from South spoon I don't know uh I felt like the person from Colombia liked me more

of course but I remember myself yeah my mom was in the other room because this was with covid it was online uh I would have done it online either way probably though because I was

in Spain and I remember my mom being like I really think the French lady didn't like you at all so um I mean I got in in the end but yeah just you know I think just use your

voice and you're in a great program because you're probably gonna find someone that's gonna like it so and any tips for the interview

the interview okay so the interview it's first of all the interview I I have an understanding that they give it like once you know there's been a selection so it's not like these there's a lot of

universities that you know everyone gets an interview it's not like that so that usually means that you know there's a little bit more job required like you should actually read up on the news and

everything and I was actually really bad at reading the news I still am it's it's something I'm very self-conscious about but I just kind of try to cram as many

news as I could in the end personally I didn't even get that many questions about politics I kind of just spoke about myself and I kind of wove that in with kind of first but I did compare my

interviews with most of my friends that got in and I think I was kind of an outlier in that sense I think just you know kind of take things to your place that's what you should be doing interviews like make it sound natural

but you know like don't try to speak of something you don't know just you know add what you think it will contribute I had a very uh sensitive time period

where my interview was happening which is when covet exploded and because I was applying to the Asian campus any news that you could find about Euro Asia was obviously coveted so uh I felt like you

know the weeks prepping into and reading about the news was just reading about kobit which weirdly I think more than actually helped me for the interview helped me become like the advocate for

like be careful coven's coming and like I was kind of the person that weren't everyone at my school when no one was taking it seriously but yeah I don't know how much influence that had on the actual interview but I would also say

yeah just read the news it's okay you don't have to um and just be yourself yeah no thank you so much that's super helpful and is there anything you would

change looking back your essay or after three years or um oh

I I would change one thing actually um I when we were confined in France for our first vacation uh me and my friends we sat we started

like rereading each other's essays and it was a very embarrassing experience especially the point I had this whole paragraph dedicated to life

um and so uh I think that's the only paragraph that really stemmed the laughter but um I'd never been to the city where I was in and so Leaf is a very unique

French city because it was bombed during the World War II so it's not your typical French quaint Town it um you know the the buildings are very

modern they're even kind of like Soviet style architecturally speaking it it has the UNESCO world heritage which is a very interesting architectural spot but it's definitely not what you expect

effect so I did some very superficial research and then I kind of talked about this architecture in this town like it was you know uh the most beautiful place in France

um and so yeah that definitely made a lot of my friends laugh at me but I still think you know like I don't know if I would take it off because yeah yeah I mean you got it but I got it it's

a good reflection it was a very fun moment but yeah it's just sometimes you don't have to you know over hype every single aspect of the program it's fine

to be a little realistic sometimes so and for the final question any tips you will give to the people that are currently like applying and writing their essays okay I have a big tip for

you which is something I wish I'd known because it would have like taken so much stress out of the way for me if you're really interested in the Dual VA like I was cool amazing apply for it

if you're still not 100 sure or even if you are you should also apply just to salesport especially if your profile fits more like this just one you like

more readily like will get accepted into that you can always apply to Colombia when you're a salesperson student and just like you can apply to Colombia they also have a really interesting opiate

program with Berkeley and other universities so really like this would have taken so much stress out of me like knowing you know if you don't have the

program right off the bat that doesn't mean like you will not have it one day and so many of the friends that I have here today they got in through the 3A entry access and that makes you no less

of a dual VA person so uh it's okay if you don't get in the first time there's always a second chance and it goes a lot with kind of the philosophy of you know a double opportunity uh that you get

with this program well thank you so much value I believe this will be super helpful to anybody out there that's looking out for help and information

bye hi Lisa how are you doing great how are you I'm doing well doing well thank you so much for agreeing to do so before we start with Lisa there's a lot of helicopters backgrounds in the noise so sorry about that

um the sound got messed up but I got a new microphone so yay for Lisa I went to an American High School she has a very strong language background which is amazing and she had a clear connection

between her and the program and vice versa and her biggest tip is to have a clear resume now go watch these sounds he has so much to say do this and help fallow incoming students of the Dual pa

um tell me a little bit about you what campus did you do um what year are you in right now okay so hi everyone I'm Lisa I'm a

junior at Columbia right now and I'm in the Dual degree so my first two years were at snow School in France and the campus I was on was house dreams if you

will um in the Europe North America program and over there I majored in economics and society and I minored in what was

called thinking like a lawyer and it's essentially pre-law and now that I'm here I'm studying political science

with the subfield in IR international relations and part of politics and then on campus I'm joining the ski team it's

really exciting um I'm in the women's Network I'm giving tours for I found this out like a couple

days ago I'm giving tours for the GS the Dual VA so anyone have this to take a tour I might be there oh that's so fun yeah I will take a tour

well Lisa let's talk about a little about your high school experience and your admission process so Lisa let's talk about your high school experience and your admission process through the

two will be AF um what high school were you from like where did you grew up and where do you go to high school so I grew up in Westchester

um New York which is the suburbs of New York and I went to an American public school my elementary school was actually in French at a private French school and then I

switched to public school okay and did you take when I came to high school because that's like the most important thing for admissions in college what would you say like what

courses did you take Etc when it came to layer academic profile okay so academic profile in terms of

stats I was my senior year I did five AP classes I did AP Spanish AP art of government AP

Lang AP Lang language arts um AP environmental science oh my God you took so many um and then

my junior year I took two or three um and then my SAT I had a 1470 super

scored oh wow my SAT subject test I had an 800 in French I know these are like very specific but I took I took math one and then I took I

took literature but I don't remember what I got on oh no but that's oh thank you so much for sharing those stats and what about your GPA uh GPA was 95

. something or like a 96 around there

. something or like a 96 around there like 3.95 96 like out of a four oh no she buys out of

100. oh wow okay wait I I have I don't

100. oh wow okay wait I I have I don't remember exactly at 90 a 95 or 93 so let's talk about extracurriculars and all of that so what do you think that

you did that made you stand out to the Admissions Office Team I think because I have such an international background which is very

common among people in the Dual VA that that helped a lot um I speak three languages French Dutch

um Flemish from Belgium and English and Spanish pretty decently as well actually um and then in high school

oh I did I did um Dutch summer classes and French summer classes outside of school so I was able to prove that I knew how to speak them that way and then

in school I did mock trial I was the president of we had a key club which is in in some Public Schools um so that's

like a volunteering Association so involved with the community if you will and then um I don't think this helped that much

but in my free time I really like skiing and I ski competitively so wow fun fact now let's talk about one of the most popular questions that I received the

admissions essay and how to structure it so how did you approach the question because by the way this question is still the same as when we applied so how did you approach the Dual ba essay

question okay so I approached it very clearly actually because um since admissions was half like the

American process and half the French process I knew that in Europe they don't really want a whole story they just kind of want the facts of who you are essentially and why you're a good fit

like without making it into a story um so I can walk through the structure of my essay which is oh that would be great clear cut my first sentence was I

want to major in politics at uh Colombia and um politics at Stone school like I just said it right off the bat um

then I said why I wanted to major in them it was because I wanted to be a diplomat I don't anymore but that's all right um and then I talked about being like an internet like International students

growing up in international environments and then wanting to continue that and have an international lens on um my college experience and so my first

paragraph spoke about courses I wanted to take at strong school so I would essentially say I want to take this course at Stone school I actually I researched them very well because I really wanted to go to this program so I want to take this course at

Stone school um by this professor and I want to read this book by them why because I took this course in high

school or I did this like in sir blank in high school that kind that prepares me for this next step in at snow school so I talked about mock trial oh that's such a good formula

um I talked about there was an essay that I had read in AP comparative government that I really liked and so I spoke about that

um but essentially I I went through everything and then I did the same thing for Colombia um again specifying my major I want to do this major because I'm interested in

this blah blah blah and then my last body paragraph if you will was on languages and because I did a lot of

like Works um like I followed French classes and Dutch classes outside of school I spoke about that I actually I volunteered at them as well so

I talked about how knowing multiple languages kind of prepares me for going to France and passion of languages that I have which I actually really do so I wasn't making

anything up um and then like a small conclusion paragraph summing everything out oh my God that's great thank you so much for telling us why you're asking about the structure I know you've helped other

students do obas and they're always super grateful with you for fixing and giving your tips so thank you and by the way now that you see your assay three years after you got admitted to the

program is there anything you would change about it there actually is not and I don't know why I wrote such a good essay in my

opinion such like a clear and concise and guys we put together essay for this Julia because I certainly did not for the other what was it 18 schools

it's kind of applied to the same amount but for this one I I like I wrote it all very well and I really wanted to go to the program so I researched it a lot beforehand

um and so I I wouldn't change anything that's great and Lisa any tips you will give to people that are currently

writing for essays um make sure you leave enough time if that I wrote all of my essays like two nights before they were due and this

one I left a week and I was looking over it every once in a while and it came out really well and I was really proud of it I left more than a week that's when I actually started working on like three weeks in advance but all the other ones

I was last minute and I would do it the week they were due um and I would spend a lot less time on them and then this isn't about the essay but make sure your resume looks decent

when like your resume is everything I just spoke about in this essay essentially put into a resume so if you don't know where to start Maybe put that together once it's done you don't have to look at it again and it's like you

send it to every single school so it's worth working on and question do you remember anything about the interview what's the answer and how does how was

that like I do remember about the interview really how was it okay so well the the dubia is different than

other schools because any other interview you would have done didn't really matter as much as like for this program specifically it matters because it was with an

admissions counselor of stone school and one of Columbia wow and this was like the second stage they they rejected a whole bunch of people after

the first stage of reading the essays and whoever was left they had a bigger chance of getting into the program so you had to do well in the interview and that was like your last step um

I it was 15 minutes long or 10 15 minutes long it was right before coming actually like two weeks before um and since I live nearby I came here and there was one admissions counselor

of Columbia one of stone school and they asked me tell me about yourself so you got to have like a three minute recap of who you are in life ready um

and then they asked me what what job I wanted to have after I graduated and I said I wanted to be a diplomat and then he asked me um how does that work like what would

you have to do and I explained that a little bit he's like do you want to be a diplomat for the US or for Belgium because I'm doing that nationality and he said um and he assumed I want to do it for

the US and I was like no I want to do it for Belgium because um it's merit-based as opposed to um like appointed and then they asked me what I thought about

an ongoing something like brexit what I thought about it what is your take on brexit at the moment and

I actually had to take God so I got really lucky with that question um but I think that was about it wow you remember so much I don't I don't

remember my interview I've been asked to remember it before um but for for the interview a tip I have is the week before you have your

interview read current events and know what's happening in the world because they won't they won't necessarily give you if you apply to for example our program which was uh

um Europe and North America they won't necessarily give you a question specific to those regions of the world you could get something about like anything was happening in Iran at the moment so make sure you know exactly

what's happening in the news for like the past month-ish I would say and then you'll be decently prepared to answer any current events questions I'll go through on you

well thank you so much Lisa for all of your tips your insights and I believe this will be super helpful for everybody thank you so much you're welcome bye Lisa bye