I am Aarya Deb from India, a high school student. I have passed my 10th grade in 2015 with GPA 4 and class 11 with also GPA 4. I have appeared for SAT-1, SAT-2 subject tests, and AP Physics 1, and TOEFL. My scores in SAT-I are 1410/1600 ( verbal - 630, Math- 780) with essay score of 7 out of 8 in all three sections. I have scored 105/120 in TOEFL. Subject tests and AP results are yet to be published. I want to get admission in Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering in your Ivy League colleges. I am also in need of full financial aid as my family income is too low to continue study in US. Please tell me what are my chances of getting into an Ivy league college with full financial aid. Please help me.
Thank you
why so? Is it due to my SAT score. Please tell me
@AaryaDeb because you are applying to some of the most selective schools in the US, as an international with full need, and with less-than-stellar test scores.
Because any applicant from India applying to these 8 schools has less than a 1% chance of getting in, due to competition.
Everyone will have 1400+ scores (that’s the bottom threshold), top GPAs, and be exceptional in some way. It may be you that gets picked - great story, activity they want,
How much can your parents afford?
Look at the two “big” USNWR rankings: National Universities, National Liberal Arts Colleges; add the top 10 from Regional Universities. Then look at the Top 100 in the Forbes rankings. ALL of these are excellent universities.
Since you’re a girl who wants to study engineering, some schools would be more interested: Olin, WPI, Embry Riddle, Stevens, for instance. However their financial aid may not match your need. Lafayette has engineering, as do Trinity CT and Bucknell - not sure about financial aid.
Some LACs (undergraduate-focused universities with research that involves students) will offer computer science but not engineering - they tend to be more generous than universities from the other two categories.
Create a list where you start at universities where you get automatic full tuition (link in the “financial aid” forum) then add others. The lowest you can go is if your profile matches the top 25% in the CDS. You can then add a few universities from the Ivy League, paying attention to “fit”.
TO understand “fit”, see if you can find a library near you that has a book called “Fiske Guide”, or “Princeton Review’s Best colleges” or “Insider’s Guide to the colleges.” Any edition will do. Read the descriptions for Umass Amherst, William&Mary, Scripps, Mount Holyoke, Washington&Lee, Wesleyan, Davidson, Oberlin, Brown, and Columbia. You should see big differences right away.
Besides a lot of money to sponsor you, what are you looking for in a college?
^unfortunately, international students with a lot of financial need don’t have the luxury of having preferences.They hav to apply widely. They can have preferences when admissions have rolled in, if they have two affordable choices out of 15 or 20 applications.
As I have given SAT on May, my percentile is 97th in India and 95th in the world. And I have heard that colleges do look at percentile scores while offering admissions. So I think that for my batch 1410 is a good score. I am actually for in a college which offers good studies, faculty, research facilities and good boarding other than financial aid. Please also suggest me some colleges which are very generous as well as good selective for mechanical engineering stream. Thank you very much
A 1410 SAT is a good score, it is a great score. Is it good enough for the Ivies as an international? Doubtful.
@AaryaDeb, if you’re in the 97th percentile in India, that means there are THOUSANDS of Indian students with better stats than you. And quite a few of them will be applying to the same schools as you. With these highly selective schools, and coming from India, and needing tens of thousands of dollars in aid, the odds are brutally against you. Sorry. You asked…
As MYOS says, you must expand your search and applications to more American universities to increase your chances of getting in anywhere.
It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t apply. But you MUST look into other universities (I provided you with ways of finding them).
By “Ivy League”, I’m assuming the OP, an international student, is using it as a synonym for “the best American universities”. With the possible exception of Cornell, most Americans don’t attach much significance to an engineering degree from any of the eight universities that officially compete with each other in round-robin athletic events called, The Ivy League. Without getting too far into the weeds as to why this is so, let us just say that there are many more prestigious places from which to obtain a degree in mechanical engineering, starting with some of the better known flagship state universities such as Wisconsin-Madison, Michigan-Ann Arbor, Cal-Berkeley, Illinois-Urbana Champlain, and many, many others. Private universities include Stanford, MIT, Rice, Johns Hopkins, Emory, and Washington U…
“Fit”? Any university with a sizable number of engineering undergraduates.
^OP doesn’t have the luxury of choosing based on personal preferences (her personal fit), but she needs to understand how that works and why it matters to US universities, since many essays can be totally tone-deaf if the international student thinks all universities are basically the same except for prestigiosity and SAT score.
Thanks a lot to all of you for offering me such valuable advise. Apart from Ivy leagues I am now looking for other us universities which offer financial aid to international students so that I can maximize my chances of going to us for my studies. I would like to mention that my SAT Subject test scores have come out, they are Physics - 780, Math level 2 - 700, Chemistry - 710. I am not satisfied at all with my chemistry and math marks as the exam went bad unexpectedly and I am sure that I can achieve a 770+ score. I want your suggestions regarding whether I should give it again on October 1st and can I still be able to apply to colleges in early session. I also want to know that next time I have to give Physics also or I can keep the Physics score of June test. Please suggest me.
Thanks
I usually hate talking about the scores as the “deciding factor” but in this case it might be so. Because international is way more competitive. Also, 1500/1600 on new SAT will be the average for the Ivies. And as an international, the competition would be higher, so you’re expected to score around 1550 or ideally 1600. Even then, getting in is still slim unless you have great extracurricular. Maybe look into other schools that are need blind to international kids. Good luck!
Meeting full need is more important than being need blind. Check the “full need” entries at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Need-blind_admission. You probably don’t want a need-blind school that doesn’t meet full need.