I’ve been looking at the UC system for now, but I am wondering whether I should try for UVA or one of the Ivies.
So here is my info:
Demographics/Geographic Location: Asian male from the central valley of California
Intended Major: Physics
GPA: 3.95 UW/ 4.51 W; for UC 4.0 UW;4.28 W capped, 4.65 W uncapped
SAT: 1520 (800 Math/720 English)
SAT Subject:
Math 2: 780
Physics: expecting 760+
Chemistry: 750
Spanish: 740
AP Scores:
Calc AB: 5
Human Geography: 5
World History: 5
Lang: expecting 3 or 4
APES: expecting 4 or 5
Calc BC: expecting 4 or 5
Physics 1: expecting 4
I have also taken around 10-11 community college classes with more coming at a later date
Awards/Activities
Collegeboard National Recognition - Small town
National Merit Commended Student
President of Academic Decathlon Team (also won individual awards)
Science Fair participant (1st place at norcal Sacramento region in physics/math category; honorable mention at state competition in sophomore year)
Science Olympiad participant (won awards at invitationals and regionals, states were canceled due to coronavirus)
Viola, I play for church choir and for high school orchestra; county honor orchestra for past two years
Band: was part of the marching band for two years, first chair tenor saxophone at my high school in senior year
Library Tutor: tutored younger children from communities with non-English speaking parents...however, the library was closed for renovations and now COVID.
Ivies will be a reach- maybe Cornell if you apply ED. I don’t think your EC’s will blow any Ivy admissions people away.
UVA for out of state is not much easier. Not sure why you picked it but you might have a chance- depending on your school’s UVA track record.
You have good but not crazy good scores and grades. Maybe take it down a notch for some good match schools.
Univ of Rochester, Brandeis, NYU, Lehigh, Stevens, Maryland…
our school has decent track record with UVA… no rejections… according to our Naviance system there have been 10 acceptances and 2 waitlist in the class of 2024 group.
Based on your interest in pursuing physics, consider undergraduate-focused schools with excellent support for research activities such as Pomona, Hamilton, Harvey Mudd, Williams, Swarthmore, Amherst, Haverford and Reed, of which several have produced Apker Award winners or finalists in recent years (selected news articles below). Though most of these colleges obviously represent reaches for most of their applicants, you would seem to have a reasonable chance of admission at at least a few of them.
It looks like Gumbymom provided you with UC stats in your other thread. UCLA and UCB will be a reach although the community college classes (depending on subject and grade) could help. If you haven’t already, I would look at Cal Poly SLO.
Note that, proportional to enrollment, a school such as CP–SLO registers about one fifth the physics majors of some liberal arts colleges. You may want to research similar relationships across your potential college choices. IPEDS can be a good source for this (e.g., https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?q=Pomona&s=all&id=121345#programs).
I like bigger schools where I can disappear if I want to… with lots of variety in student population both in viewpoints and ethnicity. Big LGBT culture.
Based on those criteria, consider the University of Rochester, which enhances its diversity through a large international enrollment, and which would offer an intermediate level of selectivity in the context of your tentative choices. I’m not sure about LGBT culture there, though it’s likely to compare to that of some of the other schools you have listed.
What about NYU which was mentioned at the start? moderate selectivity… especially in CAS… has the LGBT culture (NYC) and yeah… only problem with that is also cost but I think I can get some good aid…