A Rising High School Junior Looking for Direction

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Alright, I just joined this forum about an hour ago, and I have had very little direction as far as college search and selection goes. I figured I would make this post just to get a better understanding of how I can improve as an individual with regards to my resume and extracurriculars. My expectations are low, trust me. So low.

  1. PSAT/SAT/ACT: Haven't taken them. I'm probably going to take all three of them this coming year, my junior year. I know it's difficult to "chance" someone without knowing their scores on these standardized assessments, but I don't have any idea.
  2. Courses for my first two years of HS (All of the grades below are unweighted)

Freshman Year:
German 2 (99)
Honors History (98)
Honors English (99)
Honors Geometry (98)
Honors Physical Science (100)
Symphonic Band (100)
Gifted (Passing grade, it was a pass-fail)
Two gym classes (just to fulfill my HS’s requirement)

Sophomore Year:
German 3 (97)
AP World History (98)
Honors Chemistry (98)
Honors Biology (98)
Honors Trigonometry and Precalculus (97)
Honors English (97)
Gifted (Pass)
Symphonic Band (100)

  1. Prospective schedule for my next two years of HS

Junior Year:
Personal Financial Literacy
Health
IB Physics SL
IB German HL
IB Math HL
IB History of the Americas HL
IB English HL
IB Theory of Knowledge
Symphonic Band
Gifted

Senior Year:
AP Psychology
IB Biology SL
IB German HL
IB Math HL
IB 20th Century History HL
IB English HL
IB Theory of Knowledge
Symphonic Band
Gifted
Another gym requirement

  1. AP Exams

I already took the AP World exam my sophomore year, and I’m pretty certain I got a 4 or a 5. Feelin’ pretty good about that one.

Also…
AP German
AP Calc BC
AP Biology
AP Statistics
AP Psychology
APUSH (maybe)
AP Physics 1 (maybe)

  1. Class ranking: I'm either #1 or 2 in my class out of 450.
  2. Extracurriculars: This is where I'm afraid I fall flat on my face. My EC's are poor, especially by the standards on this forum. I see other posts where people have made thousands of dollars working for charity. Most of my time is spent surfing the internet in my bedroom.

Alto Saxophone- I’ve played the saxophone for seven years now and I am involved in the following groups:
Symphonic Band
Wind Ensemble
County Band
Jazz Band
Marching Band
Pit Orchestra

I was on the quizbowl team freshman year, but then I quit because there were too many conflicts with my saxophone schedule. I am now an assistant coach to the middle school quizbowl team, but I am no longer on the HS team. I’ve never made district, regional, or state band (I’m nowhere near good enough) but I enjoy playing the instrument because it gives me an outlet to hang out with my friends.

  1. Demographics: Middle class. White. Jewish. Both of my parents have PhDs in organic chemistry. My father is a professor and my mother is an editor for a scientific journal.
  2. Other things: I took a philosophy course on Coursera once, and got a certificate. Not sure if that counts for anything. My real interest is in foreign languages, which I don't think is accurately represented by the rest of my transcript. I think that I may want to major in a foreign language and possibly teach English in a foreign country as an occupation after college. I have only explored this interest minimally, however. Basically, I've taught myself some Spanish and Swedish on Duolingo in addition to learning German in school. I think that immersing myself in another culture and travel are both things that I'm really interested in, though. I've also learned a lot about Japanese culture, and I've thought of applying to the JET program after college. Just a fantasy of mine, though.

I’m also going to be in the IB program, as is made apparent by my schedule above. I thought that the IB program would be a good fit, considering my interest in foreign countries and the rigor of its curriculum. My school has a pretty well-funded IB program (I go to a fairly affluent, white public school) and every other year there is a trip to a Central American country to help in an school in an impoverished area, or something like that. That would most likely suffice as part of my CAS project.

Let me know if any more information is necessary. Sorry for the wall of text. My expectations are so incredibly low right now, please don’t feel the need to be harsh with your assessment. I am basically interested in what I can do to beef up my extracurriculars and such. Given this information, what colleges or universities do you believe that I could be suited for? An Ivy League school would be a dream for me, but I understand that those are ridiculously competitive and, again, my expectations are not that high. I am mostly interested in a realistic estimate of what type of college I could attend.

2

Bump, I guess. What types of colleges would I be best suited for? Am I “ivy league material?” I really have no clue at all, which is why I’d like some sort of feedback. I live in Pennsylvania, so how are my chances for getting into a school like UPenn? Or, should I shoot for a slightly smaller liberal arts institution like Haverford?

A little more information about me: I also play the tenor saxophone and the clarinet in addition to the alto. I also am going to be in an after-school poetry club, NHS, and a student awareness club this coming year.

My dream school is Columbia University, but I know it is SO far of a stretch. I am really just looking for any direction AT ALL.

Thank you.

3

Your grades so far are outstanding and doing really well in an IB program would be great, but fortunately you’re aware that your grades are only a portion of your application.

Often juniors meet with their guidance counselors in the fall to talk about college options, SAT vs. AP, SAT subject tests, etc. See what the procedure is at your school. Once you have a score or two, it will be much easier to talk about options. Does your school have Naviance? That might be a tool for you to identify some colleges where students from your high school have been accepted.

I dislike the term “ivy league material.” Your combination of test scores, grades, and ECs may or may not put you in the running for acceptance at what are better referred to as “elite” schools (many more schools than the Ivies). With the minimal info you have now, there’s no way to know if you’d meet the baseline for consideration at these schools. Then there are essays, recommendation letters, interviews (possibly) to distinguish you from other (also very bright) applicants. Even if you end up with exceptional stats in all areas, there’s no guarantee that you will end up at an elite college.

I suggest that you ask your parents what the budget is for college, then do some research. Look for schools with strong language programs. Maybe International Relations would be an appealing major. Visit some schools (sounds like you’re in the Philadelphia area so you have a huge number of nearby options) and see what appeals to you. You say your expectations are low, but then the only schools you mention are Penn, Haverford, and Columbia. You will need safeties, so consider a broad range of schools.

4

Woah, buddy do not doubt yourself. Your first fan is yourself and you should start believing in yourself because I just met you and I already believe in you. Getting in an Ivy isn’t an alien or imaginary thing. Like it’s a fairytale or myth; it is very real and possible that you might get into one (or more) of them and many other stellar universities/colleges. You just have to pick your head up and see what you CAN do and not what you did not do. Your grades are something that I would kill for (okay not really maybe die I am not violent) but that is not everything but you have the brains you just need confidence and put yourself out there ( I mean by doing ECs). Don’t get me wrong I am not an expert since I believe all the clubs/EC’s in my school are unorganized $!@!%bags that are organized by popular kids to get elected president for their transcript, but I think you can find clubs that interest you enough to return weekly and contribute.
YAY, you’re in the P.A. Network like me! That’s cool because I’ve been considering UPenn but ya know my stats are not really worth much compared to yours but that’s okay! I am still confident I will go somewhere worth my hard work and time (something you should feel about yourself too)

That is great you enjoy playing an instrument that is a nice hobby and it shows you’re well-rounded…I would continue but I do not want to ramble. I think you should just focus on what you can do which is voluntary work and shouldn’t you be in like every National Society? And join clubs that interests you (avoid laundry list of miscellaneous clubs)

I think you are worrying over nothing.
P.S. What’s your Duolingo? I would love to be friends on there for friendly competition to see who can get more exp pts weekly and whatnot.
P.S.S I don’t know why you’re so insecure, your stats are stellar! Everyone has room to improve and for you it is just EC’s :slight_smile:

5

Sorry it took me so long to respond after my original two posts. I got my wisdom teeth taken out and I was out of it for couple of days.

“Your grades so far are outstanding and doing really well in an IB program would be great, but fortunately you’re aware that your grades are only a portion of your application.”

Yeah, no I totally get it. One of areas where I think I need to improve is in studying for the PSAT/SAT/ACTs. Standardized assessments aren’t really my thing, especially when there’s an open writing prompt. I’ve heard that there are a lot of writing prompts on the IB exams, which is something that I’ll definitely have to better prepare myself for. Quick question: Do you happen to know if colleges receive predicted IB scores for diploma candidates? I’m just rather curious, because I know that students don’t receive their final scores for IB until they are already in the fall semester of their freshman year at college.

“Often juniors meet with their guidance counselors in the fall to talk about college options, SAT vs. AP, SAT subject tests, etc. See what the procedure is at your school. Once you have a score or two, it will be much easier to talk about options. Does your school have Naviance? That might be a tool for you to identify some colleges where students from your high school have been accepted.”

Awesome. I’m getting a new guidance counselor this fall that supposed to be really great, so I’ll definitely talk to her about which SAT subject tests I should be taking. As far as the AP tests go, many of the classes at my high school are actually combined AP/IB, because we just have a really low enrollment in our IB program. In these combined classes, a lot of students take both the AP and the IB exams at the end of the year. I’m a little concerned about this, but my upperclassmen friends seem to handle it okay.

Also, yes we do have a Naviance. I’m not certain if Naviance is at all different at other schools, but at mine, it’s not all that helpful. Mostly our counselors make us take personality quizzes online to help us find which careers we would be best suited for. It does have the handy feature that gives information about past students’ acceptance to colleges, though. For Columbia, we’ve had 2 out of 23 applicants admitted over the past five years. For UPenn, we’ve had 8 out of 59 applicants over the past five years, and for Haverford we’re 1 for 5 over the past three years. Yes, I realize that these are pretty low numbers, so I’m also looking into several safety schools, as you mentioned. It would be great if I could get into one of those three that I mentioned, but I understand the reality of the situation. My expectations are low mostly because I don’t want to delude myself, but I still seem to manage to do that somehow.

“With the minimal info you have now, there’s no way to know if you’d meet the baseline for consideration at these schools. Then there are essays, recommendation letters, interviews (possibly) to distinguish you from other (also very bright) applicants. Even if you end up with exceptional stats in all areas, there’s no guarantee that you will end up at an elite college.”

Understandable.

“Maybe International Relations would be an appealing major.”

Interesting, I had never thought of this. I’ll definitely do some more research about it.

“Visit some schools (sounds like you’re in the Philadelphia area so you have a huge number of nearby options) and see what appeals to you.”

Cool, thanks for all of your help.

6

“You just have to pick your head up and see what you CAN do and not what you did not do.”

Thanks for the advice. I feel like this is particularly true for me; I always dwell on the fact that I could have done better in the past, but I guess I can’t change that now.

“Don’t get me wrong I am not an expert since I believe all the clubs/EC’s in my school are unorganized $!@!%bags that are organized by popular kids to get elected president for their transcript, but I think you can find clubs that interest you enough to return weekly and contribute.”

Thanks for the encouragement. I’m sorry to hear about the situation at your school, though. No one really likes preppy popular kids at my school either.

“I think you should just focus on what you can do which is voluntary work and shouldn’t you be in like every National Society? And join clubs that interests you (avoid laundry list of miscellaneous clubs)”

I don’t really know about other honor societies except for National Honor Society. Pretty certain that’s the only one that exists at my high school, and its only available for juniors and seniors. I’m definitely going to apply next year though. Clubs, on the other hand, I find to be tricky things. At my school, we have in-school clubs that meet biweekly, and most out of school clubs require that you join the in-school club in order to be a member. As a result, you can only really choose one club. (I’m not certain if that made any sense at all) I’m sure they’re not all like that, though, so I’ll look into it.

“What’s your Duolingo? I would love to be friends on there for friendly competition to see who can get more exp pts weekly and whatnot.”

Yeah, that’s great! I’ll message it to you privately, though because I don’t really feel comfortable putting it on a public forum (it has my name and my Facebook and stuff).

7

You are a very good candidate for top schools! What type of high school do you attend/do you have legacy? These will all affect your admission chances. Additionally, I do agree with you that your ECs are on the weaker side. If you want to improve your resume, I’d say diversify your ECs if possible. Don’t be too hard on yourself. What I’ve learned from college is that it doesn’t matter where you go, it matters more what you do with the school’s resources. Good luck with everything!

8

I’m a senior who is full IB (I’m waiting for my exam results to see if I got the diploma) and let me tell you, CAS will definitely fix your poor ec’s. My school required that we have 150 hours and the cool thing about IB is that it forces you to join clubs/ volunteer work that may be out of your comfort zone just so that you can meet the creativity, action, and service requirements. It will definitely look good on your college apps. Your grades are great! Just make sure that you keep it up during your junior and senior years, you cannot afford to have a bad grade on your transcript. Full IB will be hard but you can make it. As for your colleges, you can definitely get into top colleges. I have classmates that have been accepted into Columbia, Harvard, and Yale and they have all been full IB(I go to a public school that is not affluent at all and fairly poor). You have to remember that in addition to grades, SAT scores, and EC’s, colleges care about your essay, your answers to the supplements, teacher recommendations, the interview, and etc. Most colleges have a holistic approach to admissions. You will be fine if you continue to work hard for the next few years.