<p>I'm a junior...and like many juniors on this forum, am quite worried about colleges/testing/all those goodies.</p>
<p>Background:</p>
<p>-1st generation college student
->$40,000 family income
-Asian american girl </p>
<p>School:</p>
<p>-In one of the most competitive private schools in the country (meaning 99.99% of the students go to college, and about 30% or more go on to ivies... yea... pretty intense.)
-the average test scores of students are ~720 V ~730 M
-yes, of course I'm on Financial Aid
-all classes are basically taught at an honor's level (so no designated honors' classes)
-few AP classes because, essentially, the regular classes prepare you for the AP tests</p>
<p>My info:</p>
<p>-~3.6-3.7 weighted GPA
-SATs: 800M 720CR 750W
-SAT IIs: most probably >700 (Math II, Bio, US History)
-probably taking 3 AP classes Senior year
-EC: started my own volunteering club soph. year, American Cancer Society club (founder/president), tutor elementary children once a week, debate team(most probably captain next year), black-belt karate student, soon-to-be senior coordinator, tutoring math for freshies
-awards: National Merit commended scholar, won one regional essay contest, and one state, awards for karate, one science award
-summers: taking AP Econ, AP Psycho; doing volunteer work; perhaps debate camp (been going for the past 2 summers)
-my interests: Medicine/Bio</p>
<p>Schools interested:
-Johns Hopkins
-Wellesley
-Yale (a long shot, I know)
-UCB, UCLA, UCSD
-Middlebury
-Northwestern (a big reach)
-Emory (once again, a big reach)</p>
<p>3 quick things that I forgot to mention:
-my club's starting a 'save the homeless' project that would target 2-3 cities.. so come fall of senior year, we'd probably have distributed 200-300 care packages (hopefully)
-most likely to become top 100 debaters (assuming that I can get my act together and stop psyching myself out before rounds actually start....)
-if, by some miracle, I can pull a high 3.7-low 3.8 unweighted</p>
<p>Does that change things? </p>
<p>And once again, thanks for all the help. :) :) :)</p>
<p>Are you at Harvard Westlake by any chance? They're in the top 10 high schools (in terms of # of students sent to Yale over the last 5 years; you can check the recent Yale Daily News article by Jacob Leibenluft to see more info if you'd like). If you're at a school of that caliber, then Yale isn't necessarily out of reach just because your GPA isn't a 4.0. </p>
<p>Seriously, kids coming out of the big-name elite college prep schools get in here with imperfect GPAs because these schools are, simply, more difficult (and no, I did not go to a college prep high school).</p>
<p>I, then, disagree with those who say you have no chance at Yale. Yes, of course it's tough to get in, but you're within the middle 50th percentile of admitted students. It's no match, but it's a legitimate reach.</p>
<p>Nashtynash-
My school is similar to Harvard Westlake. (Ahh! I'm still searching for that article) It's difficult- very few people get 4.0s+. </p>
<p>My question is: How much does the 'low-income' and 'first generation' college student aspect play into the whole college process? Considering the fact that I came from a crappy/poor CA middle school, immersing myself into the whole elite private school atm was fairly intense. My grades are not perfect; but I do believe that it's going to be above at least 50% of my class. I feel that my GPA will go up drastically come senior year simply because I shall be taking science/math classes + one English class. Math and science have always been my forte... so I don't know... I want colleges to see that though I have struggled, I am making improvements... </p>
<p>I do appreciate all of your help. Thank you so VERY much! It's hard to get a blunt answer from my college counselors sometimes... so keep responding!</p>
<p>I am a student at Emory. I am pretty sure you're in at Emory. Your SAT scores are great and you have excellent ecs. Make sure you show interest and have excellent recs and essays and you are in. Since you are at a pretty competitive private school, I'm sure they'll take your grade into account.</p>
<p>Johns Hopkins : Match/Slight Reach
Wellesley: Match
Yale: Long Shot, but you never know
UCB,UCLA,UCSD: Match
Middlebury: Don't really know
Northwestern: Match</p>
<p>I can say with a decent ammount of certainty that northwestern and emory are not nearly as difficult to get into as yale. The main issue that you will have to think about is financial aid. NU and Emory dont really give a ton of aid out -- but you may be a special case.
Goodluck</p>
<p>I'm viet-american (with ....say 1/4 chinese?). I speak+write canto, manda, and viet fluently(yes, parents were obsessed with language schools). </p>
<p>FA is going to be a big deciding factor. Ahh! But, hopefully, schools will see that I'm a 'special' person. -.-</p>
<p>And, let's add: cornell + swarthmore.... to my list. I'm going to assume right out that both are reaches. </p>
<p>Could you estimate your rank? It's hard for us (but if your school has a reputation, not for the adcoms) to tell what your grades really mean with these elite private schools. For example, my GPA was maybe .1 higher than yours with just slightly better test scores and UCSD was my safety with JHU and NW being low matches just because of my school's reputation.. we send about 20% of the kids to Ivies/Stanford/etc.</p>
<p>Honestly, I have NO idea. (Darn... this site's getting addictive... must check site... must check site...) The only rough estimate I could give you is that I'm >30 of a class of 90. Keep in mind that my school's insanely competitive. It's similar to gmman's school in that it sends about 22% of its students to ivies each year. </p>
<p>A question that no one has answered yet.... how does the 'dirt poor' status play into the admission process. I mean, sure, I don't have the uberly high grades, but I do have solid SATs and most probably, good recs and essays... so help!</p>
<p>Look at U Rochester, Rice, Boston College, U Chicago, and maybe a few LACs known for giving good aid. Yes, I was thinking Cornell and Swarthmore, too. How about Bates, Vassar, Bryn Mawr. Look at places like Ohio Wesleyan, too- they may throw a lot of aid your way.</p>