I’m asking for advice for a sibling who’s currently a high school sophomore and will be applying to college in 2024. We’re both international and based on my parents’ financial information, his EFC is around 25-30k. Financially, we’re upper middle class in a developing country. His basics stats are SAT 1580 (780EBRW, 800 Math) and a near-perfect GPA in the country’s system, class rank 1 out of ~100. He will be starting the IB program next year at a local school, and will have external coursework covering the first ~2 years of college in his intended major.
He has strong awards from competitions in two different scientific disciplines for which there’s a major olympiad, among IMO/IOI/IPHO/ICHO/IBO. He will likely get into two teams this year and will probably get a bronze or silver medal in each. Unfortunately, these are his only achievements even in these subjects. There’s no good research opportunities in the country we live in, and summer programs outside the free training camps were too costly.
His other extracurriculars, however, are very mediocre. He’s part of 2 clubs at school (no leadership roles). Outside school, he started a podcast on something related to his scientific interests and had standard volunteering with 2 external humanitarian organizations (no leadership roles, but sustained commitment starting freshman year). He does have other interests but put them aside to get good results in scientific olympiads.
May we ask for advice on the following points? Any responses will be very appreciated. Overall, his goal is to be able to get into a US top 50 and have it affordable based on the EFC above (which matches what my family could pay.)
He’s wondering if it’s worth to continue the olympiads he’s doing. He does enjoy it but is equally open to trying out something new. A large consideration is that dropping out of the training system after attending several summers’ worth of training camps is extremely frowned upon, and will likely lead to him losing strong letters of recommendation from local university professors. If he does both for another year I think he could improve one to a gold, though this is far from certain.
For a STEM student with olympiad achievements, would a well-regarded summer program in the US still possibly improve his college prospects? My hunch is that they might open him to research opportunities that are simply inaccessible where he lives (even college students very rarely do research, and most of what professors do is teaching).
To what extent are more “social” extracurriculars necessary for a student with a strong (but not excellent) STEM profile? I’ve seen profiles of students who get into HYPSM from the country with mainly “activism” style profiles, but he isn’t interested in this nor is practical given his lack of connections. He has an idea of an outreach program to spread interest of his area of scientific interest around the community, but I get the impression that this sort of EC is way too common and no longer holds much weight.
As a more open-ended question, if I have on the order of $10k (and nothing more) over the next year to help him improve his chances and his education overall, what would be best to spend it on? He has all the coursework he wants to take from a local university and is nearly free, so we don’t have to worry about this. I’ve heard for some sort of paid research programs based in the US, but I’m not familiar with which ones are good and whether they’re worth it.
I could be mistaken but I’ve seen posts where people are asking for others get flagged because the person is asking for someone else who could make their own account. You can see what happens. Perhaps since you’ve identified yourself as a sibling you’ll be fine.
Users can ask questions for themselves and their dependants. For many reasons, not least of which is privacy, other “asking for a friend” posts are not allowed. Your sibling really should make their own account to ask the question.
That said, I’ll give some leeway since both kids presumably know the financial info. So I will allow to remain open so long as OP can answer proibitive questions from users seeking clarity. If it turns into a game of telephone (with responses of I don’t know, let me check), I’ll reassess.
The biggest hurdle for most students is cost. Unfortunately financial aid is difficult to come by for international students. The most generous schools in the US are also the most competitive. Not all schools will match an international student’s EFC so run the net price calculator on the schools on the list. Be sure your brother has affordable schools in your home country.
Major Olympiad participation and success is great! If your brother is enjoying it, keep at it. Honestly I don’t see any problem with what you listed for his activities.
Summer programs in the US are costly, or highly competitive. Personally I’d save the $ and put it towards college costs.
Within the list you posted, there is an informal ranking – probably IMO → IOI/IPHO → ICHO/IBIO. It may matter where the medals are anticipated, as a starting point.
Then there is the question of which country is coming from – small country, big country etc
Is that $25-30k EFC based on what a recent college calculator has used with the assumption that there’s more than 1 student in college at the same time? If it is, that may need to be reevaluated because I think that starting next year a family’s EFC is not divided by the number of children who are in college.
I’m not a STEM expert but I think that all the olympiad achievements combined with the consistent community service and podcast would definitely be sufficient.
Is there a STEM field that your brother is particularly interested in? Is there an institution he is already leaning towards? If so, you might see if that college offers a summer program and then get it vetted here by more knowledgeable folk. I have heard numerous examples of someone who did a summer camp/experience at a college which people then suspected gave them better odds for admittance to that particular college. I don’t think summer camps are necessarily that helpful in terms of getting into other colleges, though.
I thought that most colleges tend to use the U.S. formula as the general basis for their in-house formulas, but the portion of aid that would be covered by the feds for domestic students would instead be covered by the institution for international students (for those that do need-based aid for international students). Or perhaps it depends by university.
First, most schools don’t cover the full “need” of their students. For the ones that do, they will all have their own methodology. The 568 presidents group does share methodology, but that is a small group of about 20 schools. One of the most impactful differences between schools is the way that they treat home equity.
Indeed, we’re international so FAFSA would not apply.
The EFC estimate is based on what I received in fin aid when I studied as an undergraduate at a T20, so I just assumed that a similar EFC will occur. The years when the two of us are in college do not overlap at all. I’m currently working in industry, though I don’t think my earnings will count towards this.
Both of his olympiads are in the first two categories, if this matters. Country is reasonably competitive, within the top half of ranks and is medium-sized.
To me your siblings ECs sound quite good. You and your sibling should both read the “applying sideways” blog on the MIT website and take it seriously. My take on this is that you should do what is right for you, and do it very well. This is exactly what I did that got me accepted to MIT as an international student, although the blog did not exist at the time that I was in high school (which was a long time ago). I also only had a limited set of ECs, but did them well. While this blog is aimed at MIT admissions, the same approach is appropriate for other top universities in the US.
Of course any university in the US that is either famous or offers full financial aid for an international student is a reach, and you and your sibling will need safeties somewhere outside the US.
Just a word of caution to not assume that your process will be the same for your brother. College admission can change very quickly and schools that were likely 4 years ago may be reaches now.