Be a Senior as a Junior by Frank

Be a Senior as a Junior by Frank - April 2016 Scholarship Essay

As a senior in high school, a younger student might expect me to be a master of sorts of the high school experience. While I cannot give universal knowledge on what should be done, I do have experience with what should not be done. My best piece of advice for those younger than I would be to accomplish all tasks typically associated with your senior year in your junior year.
Let's establish what activities people assume occur in the senior year. The largest, by far, is applying to college. You may feel that you still don't know what you want to do, or where your dreams truly lie, and because of this, you may feel that you should wait a bit before starting to put yourself out there. I can assure you, this feeling will not go away in but one short year. Sure, some people may have a life-changing event that reveals to them their innermost aspirations, but the majority of us are simply unsure of what we enjoy until we finally try something that we like. The best place to try many different areas seriously is, in fact, college. So apply! Dream big!
Many people don't know this, but most prestigious, Ivy League universities offer full rides to students who are accepted and earn a household annual income under a certain amount, typically $100,000. For some, even the application fee is waived. Nothing is stopping you from applying to Harvard just to see what happens. The worst is a "no".
By applying early, you have put yourself ahead of the curve. Most people do not apply in their junior year, so you have just successfully beaten all others in the race, with no extra effort required. This applies to scholarships, too. College can be expensive, depending on the situation. Apply to as many scholarships as you can. Billions of dollars go unclaimed year after year. It's thousands of dollars that are thrown at you for doing little more than what I'm doing right now: discussing something I've developed a passion for. Find targeted scholarships that deal with topics that interest you, personally. Someone who is inebriated by the very thought of medical sciences would be more inclined to feel elation rather than frustration at the thought of writing a paper on such a subject.
Whatever your plans are in life, or even if you don't have plans, start the preliminary work towards your future in your junior year, rather than your senior. I wouldn't really recommend starting earlier, however, as starting too early may not truly demonstrate the best you that you can be. Some things should, of course, always be done. Right from your freshman year of high school, right from day one, you should be striving for a 4+ GPA. Take those AP courses. Once you've ruined your GPA, you can almost never bring it back. The only thing you'll want to do during your senior year is be done. If you've been done for a year already, you'll be sleeping in while your friends struggle to meet deadline after deadline.