Chance Current HS Junior: Future International Relations- Ivy's and T20 Schools + Georgetown

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Demographics
US and German Citizen
Indiana Resident
Large Public High School (Middle Class Suburban)
White Male

International Relations/Global Affairs
3.998 UW
5.08 W
Rank: 1/848
Taking SAT in March (Got a 1390 PSAT w/o studying)

15 AP classes at end of HS (3 sophomore and 6 Junior and Senior)

Awards:
Civics Unplugged Fellow (Fellowship focused on Civic Innovation and Policy with an 11 % Acceptance Rate)

Rising Star (4 chosen in each Junior Class at my high school)

NSLI-Y Virtual Turkish Learning Scholarship Recipient

NSDA Honor Society: Degree of Distinction

Speech and Debate Nationals Competitor: Selected to represent district by local coaches in World School Debate

ECA’s:

Varsity Soccer and Volleyball

Target Employee

Philharmonic Orchestra Violinist: Since 6th Grade

Speech Team: 4 years, captain, 4th place in state for international Extemp

Model UN: 3 years, President

Civic Engagement Council (Work w local Government to bridge gap between students and professionals) : 2 years, VP, Inaugural Member

Coach for a large international business competition: 3 Years, Lead Coach, I host webinars, coach high schoolers around the world, and grade reports submitted by high school and uni students, also started a newsletter for this organization:

Cultural Newsletter: 2 years, founder director and editor, sent to 10,000 people each month, team of ten teen writers from around the world writing about culture

English Tutor: Online volunteer English tutor of underprivileged children in South East Asia

Planned: International Policy Essay Contest Outreach coordinator: Finding and contacting professionals in policy field to judge essays and run contest

Looking for decentish financial aid
 Probably max would be about $20,000, which seems to be what I would get at most Ivy’s

Safety:
IU (I would have free tuition through a local scholarship)
Target: Georgetown, Northwestern, USC, Cornell, Dartmouth
Reach: Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Stanford

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In my opinion, these are reaches. The admissions are such a low %age at these colleges that you really can’t call them matches.

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This. As strong as your profile is, these are reaches for everyone. The numbers just aren’t on your side. It’s great you have a safety - you might want to broaden the search and include a few true targets/matches just to have a back up plan. Having said that, you look solid and I wouldn’t be surprised if you got acceptances from a few of your reaches.

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You have a shot for admission at any college. But I do agree that your targets are actually reaches for all unhooked applicants. You have a great profile but there are simply not enough spots at these schools for every strong applicant to be accepted. IU is an excellent safety to have.

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Thanks! Obviously a little early in the true “college search”. I might add a couple UC’s and a couple good public schools like UMich, UT, and UVA for targets, but tbh with the tuition situation at IU, I have a hard time choosing a school like Michigan over it

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I doubt these three are targets for OOS students. At least, I don’t think umich is

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UC’s don’t offer FA to OOS students.

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So
your family is willing to pay $60,000 a year for your college costs?

Remember, you won’t get any need based aid at the UCs as an OOS student
and their merit aid is a drop in the bucket. @Gumbymom

UVA and Michigan largely give need based aid. They do have some highly competitive merit awards, and you could be in the running for those
maybe.

Since you have some OOS publics, what about Pitt? If you apply early, you would hear early
and could receive a decent merit award.

tOSU is another option where merit aid could happen for you.

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Personally, I don’t like the term “target” schools. With our daughter’s experiences (with stats similar to OP), all her so called “target” schools (Duke, Vanderbilt, WashU) she was rejected, given this issue of weighing “affordability” for parents vs. “protect yield” for schools.

I get safety schools, and would only include in-state schools and schools in the vicinity of our state (Pitt, MSU, UK, Purdue etc), that have a history of students from our state (OH) attending there. Everything else is likely a reach. Saying this because I wouldn’t want OP to be surprised at “defer”, “waitlist” or “reject” outcomes from his so called “target”.

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Since 2020, with test optional policies and an increased push for diversity in all its forms - there are hardly any true “targets” for high stats unhooked kids. There are safeties, reaches, and unpredictable schools.

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Paging @AustenNut who can give his “labels” and explanation to the varied levels of schools.

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Although the actual label names get tweaked, I usually classify schools by my best guess at the chances for admission. A school’s admission rate is not necessarily an indicator of its quality, just the likelihood of being accepted. I also prefer to avoid the term “safety” because in common usage, it’s often thought of as a school of last resort. But in reality, a safety should be extremely likely to accept you, be affordable for your family, and that you would like to attend. It should matter if the school’s acceptance rate is 8% or 80%, just that those three conditions are met.

Additionally, which you have done, I believe in starting lists with the schools that meet those three conditions for a “safety.” Many people in real life stop at that point. But, if there are other schools where your odds aren’t as high that you’d be happy to attend and that could be affordable for your family (note the could, as either the Net Price Calculator shows it would be affordable or there is sufficient merit aid available that you might get to make the price affordable), then those get added afterwards.

Extremely Likely (80-99+% chance of admission)

  • IU (great option if you like it, by the way)

Likely (60-79%)

Toss-Up (40-59%)

Lower Probability (20-39%)

  • UMich
  • UVA

Low Probability (less than 20%)

  • Georgetown
  • Northwestern
  • USC
  • Cornell
  • Dartmouth
  • Harvard
  • Princeton
  • Yale
  • Stanford
  • UT (because they guarantee acceptance to the top 6% of Texas grads, it’s super-competitive)

Apart from IU, all the schools you’ve mentioned I would classify as Low Probability or Lower Probability.

If you would like additional suggestions of schools where your odds of admission are greater, what are you looking for in a school? Do you prefer large schools, as that’s mostly what you’ve listed, except you also have some mid-size ones. What areas of the country are you open to (or opposed to)? What’s your preference for urban/suburban/rural? How do you feel about the importance of campus athletics, Greek life, etc? Are there any particular interests that you’d like to pursue in college (whether starting something or continuing)? What are you hoping to get out of your college experience?

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SFS or the College at Georgetown?

IR is famously over-blessed with highly motivated students, and thus gets away with some of the most egregious misuses of them outside the entertainment industry. That means that 1) the coin of the realm is unpaid/barely stipended internships followed by poorly paid roles before getting actual grown-up paychecks and 2) you will need another (most likely expensive) degree at some point.

Therefore, when you are doing college budgeting you need to factor in the cost of doing the internships that are crucial to getting jobs post-graduation. In weighing your options, weight no/very low debt as a really important metric.

Not sure why you have Cornell & Dartmouth, unless it’s that you have bought into the idea that they are the ‘easier’ Ivy league schools to get into (and no, neither are targets). I would put Tufts and GWU ahead of either for you (I would put GWU as a strong option, but I am not sure they would be debt-free for you- run the NPC to see).

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@collegemom3717 agree. Do the NPCs.

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Wouldn’t Michigan and possibly UVA be less than 20% for an OOS student?

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Have you considered American or GW? I won’t try to classify them, but if you want a more probable option than your non-IU schools, they seem like they would fit that bill and have have an appeal because of your intended major.

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These are all reaches for oos.

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Do you walk on water too ??

Wow very impressive.

Have you run net price calculators at your reaches (and all but IU are) to see if they are affordable?

Hamilton Lugar at IU is a fantastic option so if that’s your affordable fall back then you are in a great place.

If the list you have can’t get you to your amount you would need other schools - example you can try a W&L and the Johnson Scholar, SMU Presidential or others out there. Or you can try and become a Charleston Scholar and International Scholar at College of Charleston. My daughters scholarship is more than tuition.

Make sure you can afford where you apply so that you don’t waste time and money (hence use the NPCs) but with IU as an affordable safety and it’s a home run in IR - then sure you can swing for the fences. Most on your list are need based only, so no merit (only usc I think)

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Thanks! I have been looking at Charleston actually, as I have friend who goes there and really enjoys it. Would you recommend that over Hamilton Lugar/ O’Niell SPEA, or is IU considered more prestigious in DC?

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Matter of opinion. I’m not sure either is more ‘prestigious’ per se but I’m also not sure prestige matters. Look at key players in the trump trials. Christopher Newport. Kent State.

I think you need to find an affordable school. If your budget is $20k but Gtown is $50k, it’s useless. Hence you need to run the NPC.

Contrary to belief, the feds, states, politicians and agencies don’t just hire from GTOWN, GW, AU and the Ivies.

You may have to work harder coming from certain schools but you will have to in life to win anyway.

To me, IU is a tremendous gift at full tuition.

Surprisingly my daughter has had wonderful opportunities at Charleston via her special programs. But there’s no assurance on $$. It’s a true safety for you too.

Find the right school for you. Affordability is the first part of fit.

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