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Putting Competitive Pokemon in College Application?...

Cloggerdude said:
And see, this is just stupid.

Why is race even required for application in the first place? Like Syberia said, student's should be judged on their abilities and not their race.

Who cares if 99% of students at a college are Asian? If they were better than everybody else that applied, then they deserve to be there.
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College politics, minorities, affirmative action and lots more.
 
I was under the impression that colleges see your extra-curriculars as a way that they can improve their standing. For example, if you're a Varsity 1 in a sport in your high school, you may just play for the college. Playing Pokemon certainly doesn't benefit them in any way unless you can start a Pokemon movement or something. :P In any case, I doubt Pokemon is going to make you sound mature. As far as extra-curriculars are concerned, you're best doing something academically related (Clubs, State Competitions, Robotics etc.), community service based (and internships), or sports based stuff (Varsity mainly).

BTW, do you guys think some competitive video games may be more appealing to colleges than others? I mean, stuff competitive Super Smash Bros. Melee (I loathe Brawl) seems a lot harder than competitive Pokemon.
 
Lol, I put "competitive gaming" on my USC app in the little place for extraneous stuff, and I elaborated a bit. And it didn't help me at all. I only got the 17K/year scholarship for National Merit Semis, while my friend, with similar stats, got the 35K/year trustee's one. In short: it probably won't help. Don't even think about putting it on your resume.

But if a college such as USC gives you an option to put it in an area for extraneous information, go for it. It can't hurt.
 
The average 40+ adult does not equate pokemon with chess the way we do. The average 40+ adult equates pokemon with the video game that their own child mastered at the age of 7.
 
Listing competitive pokemon on your college app is a terrible idea.

If you find someone in a position to read your application and accept you that actually plays and takes pokemon seriously you'd be amazingly lucky.

It's just not going to happen. It's much more likely they will view it as childish or as you not taking the application seriously. If your lucky they will just skim over that part and ignore it entirely or find it a bit amusing, but as it's been said by a few others it's more likely to backfire then benefit you.

Pokemon just isn't something you brag about playing. No one outside of the competitive community see's it the same way as the players inside who plan, calculate and build there teams do.

If you had said the words competitive pokemon to me just a few years back before I found out about ev's, smogon and how far you could take this game I started playing when I was a kid I would have laughed a bit or rolled my eyes at how ridiculous it sounds. Back then it was just a kids game I played for fun and nothing serious and that's just how most people see it.
 
Only put it if you could explain it, and be sure others could understand it.

But seeing all the other stuff you've got on your list, I'm sure you won't need it.
 
What aspect of competitive Pokemon you include could be crucial. Nobody cares if you play 'Competitive Pokemon', but if you say 'Owner of Smogon', or something along the lines of that, you might have more of a chance.
It also depends on where you are applying. It would be rather pointless to include this to a college that focuses on, say, cooking.

I wouldn't include this simply because I am not destined for any great role in the Competitive world of Pokemon, and because I do, in fact, plan on applying to some college that deals with the culinary arts...
 
My feeling is that you should definitely not mention Pokemon on your application. When Ivy League admissions people read your application, they're looking for someone who fits a specific profile. They have so many people with perfect SAT scores etc. applying that having good scores doesn't mean much. (Obviously, you need them, but they won't get you in.) Playing Pokemon competitively won't tip the scales in your favor, but perceived immaturity may very well tip them against you.

Oh, and to some of the other posters: no, Pokemon is not as complex and strategic as chess. I enjoy playing Pokemon competitively as much as anyone, but they're really not even close.
 
Caelum said:
Heh, to be honest it depends on who is going to read the application. Some people will think it's cool you have a hobby you're committed too and some will read it as you wasting your time hours a day on a stupid game.

Frankly though, if you can't get in where you are applying with near perfect scores; your collection of clubs; and two sports - listing Pokemon isn't going to help.
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I'd pretty much have to agree with what Caelum said. It does matter who reads it, and if they aren't so serious as to see this kind of thing written down, then I could see it for someone to see a whole different side to me.

It would definitely separate you from the rest of the asians (or whoever) have many things like that, because I have a few friends who have done pretty much what you've accomplished, so putting something like this in your essay, it'd give a twist to who you are.

I guess it's what you believe the reaction will be like. Best bet would be to know who is going to read your essay, and read that person with your eyes on how they act, and if they're serious, probs best not to add it, and if they have a sense of humor, then I don't see why not.

Putting something like that would be me putting down 'I'm a professional MTG player.' I doubt me coming in 2nd place in a national tournament in Seattle winning $175,000 smackeroonies would really get their attention. Considering that prize money is pretty much going to college funds anyways lol. Again, it's up to you, and it's really a 50/50 chance on whether they'll take you as a joke, or another person with a 4.0 GPA but just with a twist with a hobby not many others would have or enjoy doing.

If you ask me, if I wrote that down in my college essay, or even put down my success at MTG tournaments, it'd be a real awkward moment. If the person reading my essay sat down to talk with me, and didn't find it very well and saw it as me taking the College essay as some kind of joke, then I'd crap my pants lol.

~ Aether Nexus
 
Honestly, don't put it.

Of course it depends on who's reading it and which college you're applying to, but overall, there's really no need.

Besides, most people put fake things as hobbies and it works out.
 
TVboyCanti said:
Did you actually win $175,000 at a MTG tournament?
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Yep. In Seattle not too long ago. It wasn't a big tourny as you can see, because coming in 2nd place at a really big one would get me like half a million as the 1st place prize money is around 3 million (and for a card game, you know? And my Mother use to say it was a waste of my childhood, ha! lol).

It was last year, during the Lorywn/Shadowmoor cycle block. I was playing a straight out affinity Artifact deck (then again, so were 1 out of 3 players in the tournament). With a good hand, I'd win on the 4th turn, and if I didn't pick up a few key cards, then roughly around the 6th turn. But sadly my opponent had a much greater start-up hand than I did, and he beat me by 4th turn and then we got 1/1 next game, and then he beat me on 6th turn and came out as victor with 2/1.

I haven't had time to play since then, and so many new sets come out for me to keep up much anymore. It's not cheap to keep up either; my tournament decks range up from $500.00 to $3,000.00 a year (then again, that's just a small chunk in a annual salary). Only if it was a bigger tournament, but anyways. I believe the small tournaments this year in California already ended in May, so it seems I'm a bit late for them lol. Oh well, next year.

Even though I've gone completely off-topic, but have you or anyone else, seen the new MTG Planeswalker Jones drinks? They're pretty awesome; I bought me a case yesterday. Well, I'll end it here before I rant on more.

~ Aether Nexus
 
i could see pokemon making a decent essay topic that would if nothing else at least seperate you from the crowd. if you were to do your essay about it, you could outline exactly what makes it so strategically demanding and complex and then you could highlight your involvement in it and how much it has meant to you/improved you/whatever. if you were really good about it, you could probably spin it to be pretty funny too, which is so so ideal and helpful, like maybe you could talk about the discrimination competitive pokemon players experience in your community and your struggle to explain that it's not just a kids game.... i mean it would work if you were really desperate for essay ideas, and if you did it really skillfully it could actually turn out alright
 
You would need to be really desperate in that case. It's one thing to write a sob story about how your Mexican heritage made you an outcast in your white high school. It's quite another to do the same for competitive pokemon.
 
Just for the record, because I was his doubles partner, I'm going to be a jerk and claim that I pulled him through. :naughty:

That will be all.
 
IMHO if you put that on a resume it screams immaturity. According to most of the admission people probably, if they know about pokemon they will think it is for 10 year olds, because idk their kids played it when they were, 10. I don't think that even throwing it as "top 15 internationally" is going to help either, since that means "obsession", and it's also like, an ILLEGAL simulator >.<. as far as things go it's not even the real thing, if it were WiFi battling i'd maybe have a different opinion. not saying being internationally ranked at a children's card game or something is bad, i have a friend who got into Stanford and he was internationally ranked at Magic the Gathering (go figure) (chen you know about him =p) but you, just stick to your physics/math/violin


Quote:
Originally Posted by Fat chenman333
Thanks for all the advice guys. I am not putting it down. But I feel like I should address this.

This is very wrong. Asians have it the worst when it comes to college admissions. It is true that schools want diversity, however, they wish to reflect the diversity of America, and try to match up the % of white, black, asian, etc. in their college as there is in the US.

As a result, asians are called "overrepresented minorities", as there are more asians in most top selective universities than there are in the actual united states. If not for the affirmative action that most schools have, which keeps the number of asians between 10-20%, schools would look more like MIT, with more than a quarter of their students being asian. The UCs are similar in that they can't account for race (though they are trying to fight it), and as a result, often have 40% of their population being asian, with UC Irvine topping out at 54%. Whites are affected by affirmative action, but nowhere near to the degree that asians are. In effect, asians are the "new Jews", as Jewish students used to also face quotas when applying to elite universities.

There are plenty of schools that want more asians and do wish to seek them out, and asians do get an affirmative action boost there; however, at the nation's top universities (where most Asians want to go), being asian sucks, especially because asians do often fit the stereotype of excelling at math/science, playing violin/piano, etc.

And see, this is just stupid.

Why is race even required for application in the first place? Like Syberia said, student's should be judged on their abilities and not their race.

Who cares if 99% of students at a college are Asian? If they were better than everybody else that applied, then they deserve to be there.
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yeah this is really going to stink when I write my application, I have really nice standardized scores, and I do a lot of physics tennis and math related stuff at my school, and I'm actually really good at that stuff. The only problem is, I'm not going to get matched up against white people, they will compare me to other Asians, which by the way is a pretty rigged race here in the US >.<.
 
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