I've known I wanted to go to Stanford since I was 11 years old when I read a book that said something like "having a degree from Stanford University is a big deal." From then on I had an almost problematic obsession with doing well in everything so that I would be admitted.Because I knew I wanted to go there, I worked really hard in high school to stand out from my classmates. I went to a moderately wealthy high school, and competing academically and socially with people that have access to generational wealth takes strategy. I chose to take on 2-3 extracurriculars each year. Freshman year I was the president of the freshman class and captain of the freshman basketball team and played volleyball, Sophomore year I was a chair in the same student government, on varsity basketball and JV volleyball, and participated in the competitive mathematics club. Junior year I cranked up the AP courses, taking essentially everything AP, still playing on Varsity Basketball and Volleyball. Senior year I was captain of the Basketball team along with my other extracurriculars and APs. There probably were other things, as this was over a decade ago. In terms of academic performance, I was ranked #8 in my class upon graduation with above a 4.8 GPA.Even though I had a strong record, I was still nervous to apply, and so I decided to apply to the Restrictive Early Action round, which means you cannot apply early to any other school, although you are not forced to attend upon acceptance. Luckily I was accepted, and decided to not apply to any other school While I put myself in a good position to be accepted, nobody else at my school was, including those that had better academic records than me. This could be because of my application essay, in which I told the story of why I have 9 siblings in my family and how that has helped me grow as a person. I think the academic performance and the uniqueness of my story were helpful in standing out from the crowd of perfect transcripts.