<p>Hya!
Firstly I really want to thank you all for helping confused students like me. If anyone of you is applying, I think you can put "member of college confidential" on the first place of your ECs- seriosly. This is what I call volunteer work.</p>
<p>Now to business ;)
Could you tell me in which colleges I have almost no chance of getting in? For example, do you think brown would even look at my application when i have such a SAT score? same question for the other unis.</p>
<p>I am from Bulgaria.
My unweighted GPA: 3.90, top 25% class rank, most classes: AP level
SAT I (a disaster, but what can I do, won't retake it):
maths: 620
reading:690
writing:620
TOEFL:283
Will take 3 SAT IIs in Dec: Maths IIC, World History, Biology</p>
<p>ECs and all:
Student Government
Project for collecting information on the school's history
Public Speaking Contest- national level
creation of a project "Information on applying to US universities" for the junior students of the school
Debates club
Sahaja Yoga
drawing course (4 years)
Class President
School President of Communications (created the school website, created and regularly published the school's bulletine)
Oganizer of 2006 graduation play (playwright, one of the directors, one of the actors)
Editor-in-chief of the Jubilee edition of the school newspaper
swimming (3 years), tae-bo (2 years), tennis (12th grade until now)
Outstanding contribution to school life honor
Model International Crime Court Poland (pilot project), Chief Prosecutor of the group, Director's award </p>
<p>colleges I like:
University of Chicago
Colby College
Colgate University
Grinnell College
Ithaca College
Macalester College
Pace University
Swarthmore College
Trinity College<br>
University of Richmond
Vassar College
Whitman College
Brown University
Drake University</p>
<p>grt stats.. ur sat score's a bit low but that'll work.. so lets hope for best.ur college lists are grt with all matches n reach..
r u bulgarian?? i mean 'hya' sounds very nepali to me..</p>
<p>even "Nirmala" sounds very nepalese to me...btw your EC is phenominal.. plus being a girl will do u a world of good i guess.. at least to my knowledge..1930 is not that bad let me tell u that.. one of my frens got into duke with 1860...i see u ending up in one of the big shots.. i really do.</p>
<p>Your ECs wil surely compensate for ur SAT scores. Are you applying for finaid? that might be pivotal in some of your college choices. make sure U ace math level 2! that wil speak for low math score.</p>
<p>"one of my frens got into duke with 1860...i see u ending up in one of the big shots.. i really do."</p>
<p>now this is showing me some rays of hope amid all those black clouds. i also scored 1860 and am still very depressed with my score.. had expected more..
Nirmala my sat score is also not that good, but i'm hopin for best. urs are better than mine so i think u have pretty good chances with the colleges in your list. btw, r u applyin early anywhere??</p>
<p>oh, it's nice that you said it, shail! all of my friends had at least 2100.. what's more, i just spoke with an acquaintance of mine, who had 2400 and is in harvard, her brother is in princeton... and i was more than depressed than you maichang!.. but you are right, scores are not the most imp factor.
one thing i can't understand is why we're talking only about princeton, harvard and stanford- there are so many just as good schools out there. in my opinion, the first 50 ranked universities are all "the best". i understand if you are an enginner and want to go to princeton or want ot be a lawyer and apply to harv, but otherwise it's more or less snobberry. i'm saying it as sth we need to remember, not that i won't be happiest if i'm admitted in brown..</p>
<p>i will apply for fin.aid everywhere, as paying even $3000 a year for me is impossible. and this is a disadvantage, as not many colleges are need-blind.
i am not applying ED, as i couldn't find one that doesn't want sat 2s and i don't have them yet.
i am undecided, maybe i'll choose rhetorics, they told me that whitman is pretty good there... but i think i'll apply as an undecided. do you think this is a minus?</p>
<p>kinda true but not entirely... i am applying to princeton and it is not just snobberry...lol.
princeton is not only good in engineering...though it gives such impression to people... Woodro wilson school of international studies is one of the best...as well as its economics program for graduates(so, we can suspect similar for undergrads).some people say that Princeton's A.B. program is better than its B.S.E (engineering) program...princeton and harvard don't have geeks as we suspect.. they have high achieving well rounded individuals...and princeton offers the best financial aid .. .i am offering to pay only 500 dollars..and this will not have the slightest disadvantage for me..and no matter what people say...in terms of job oppurtunity later , going to the prestigious college is better....it should not happen ..but it happens..
so, princeton is my choice for more reasons than it being ranked no.1
i am intending to major in Physics/mathematics or double major....but not engineering...so, i have 2 years to choose..</p>
<p>i think there is quite a big differnce between snobbery and pride...moreover..getting into big universities means big fin aid .. i guess that't the biggest advantage of all more than anything else...job afterwards in a thing of future...now we need to look on who gives the most fin aid and there's no doubt that the bigger the university..the better the chances of getting more bucks...and regarding princeton for that matter..being need blind really really helps us...</p>
<p>hey hey hey.
you got me wrong. if you've explored a certain university, and you find that it's matching your preferences, then of course you'll like it!
what i am trying to say is that although princeton is very good, it is not the only very good school.
moreover, i am pretty aware of the fin. aid situation- most need-blind unis are also the most competitive. that's pretty unfortunate.....
shail, what will your major be ?</p>
<p>What I thnk is need-blind schools are the hardest to get into. By saying that your financial situation will not be taken into account, these schools are encourages tonnes of international students both extraordinary and the average well rounded students. Out of the thousands of apps they look through, your app has to stand out and that means at least something has to be well above average. I am not trying to dishearten people from applying these schools, but it is true that there are lots of great schools which have a lot of reputation internationally and the fact that they are not need-blind myt mean less competetion for the funds. </p>
<p>I feel that the best chances to get finaid is from LAC. Most of the good ones do give need-based aid and competetion is less intense if you choose to look outside the first 10 or 15 at least. i guess the problem here is LACs are not that well known outside of the US.</p>
<p>Big unis does not mean big fin aid. If you compare the finaid packages of LACs and big unis, u wil see that the average aid packages are around 25k everywhere. the interesting thing is the percentage of intl students getting aid compared to the total enrollment in LACs are hgher. of course there are exceptions.</p>