<p>u have no chance at Cornell and Columbia with those scores, regardless of your race</p>
<p>I know a black guy who got into Cornell with worse scores so....</p>
<p>affirmative action is meant to help disadvantaged people, one of which this girl doesn't seem to be. she's gifted no doubt, but it would be unfair to assume she could get into an ivy league riding on the basis of race alone.</p>
<p>but who knows? that's just my opinion, and you may end up getting in with an awesome financial package!</p>
<p>Regarding SAT scores -they are taken into consideration in context of one's enviornment. A 1300 from a student from a single parent household, public school who works part time to help the family is going to be viewed differently than a 1300 from an intact 2 parent household where one or both parents are professionals. High SES, private school (or premier public school). SATs are also going to be taken in content of the average scores of the school which you attend. If you attend an elite private school where the average score is 1410, your 1300 does not put you competitively in the pool. You wrote that your cousin is from a single parent home, that too is going to be all relative . A student from a single parent household is going to be looked at differently from a child froma single parent household who is college educted or a professional. </p>
<p>Over the next few years, the competition to get into college especially selective schools is going to be really stiff just because of the sheer number of applicanats (this includes URMs). </p>
<p>From the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education </p>
<p>Yale Tops the Ivy League in Black Freshman Enrollments: </p>
<p>JBHE has completed its annual collection of data on black first-year enrollments at the eight Ivy League colleges and universities. Blacks make up 9.3 percent of the first-year students at Yale University this fall. This is the highest rate in the Ivy League and the highest rate at Yale in the past decade. A year ago, only 6.7 percent of the entering class at Yale was black. </p>
<p>Harvard University also had a good year in attracting black students. There are 145 black freshmen at Harvard this fall. They make up 8.9 percent of the first-year class. </p>
<p>At the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, and Dartmouth College, blacks make up slightly more than 7 percent of the entering class. At Columbia University and Brown University, blacks are 6.8 percent of the freshman classes. </p>
<p>As has been the case for the past 13 years since JBHE began collecting statistics on black first-year enrollments in the Ivy League colleges, Cornell University has the smallest percentage of blacks in its entering class. This fall blacks are 4.7 percent of the freshman class at Cornell. </p>
<p>Black Applicants Surge at Harvard and Dartmouth: </p>
<p>Harvard reported this past week that it received a total of 22,717 applications for the class that will enter this fall. The number of applicants rose by 15 percent from last year's total. Black applications for the freshman class increased at an even higher rate. Harvard reports that black applicants increased 28.3 percent from last year. A university spokesperson stated that the huge jump in applicants may be due to the new Harvard Financial Aid Initiative, which essentially eliminates out-of-pocket tuition and room and board expenses for students who come from families with incomes of less than $40,000 per year. </p>
<p>In the year after the Cornel West controversy, black enrollments dipped slightly at Harvard. Now it appears that Harvard has weathered that storm as well as last summer's controversy surrounding the denial of tenure to African-American studies professor Marcyliena Morgan. This denial of tenure caused Professor Morgan and her husband, Lawrence Bobo, the esteemed sociologist and member of the National Academy of Sciences, to take tenured teaching positions at Stanford. </p>
<p>At Dartmouth College, overall applications surged to their highest level in history. The admissions office reports that applications from "students of color" represented 25 percent of the total pool. Applications from blacks were at their highest level in the past four years. Good evidence that a frigid winter climate does not necessarily deter black applications to a college that is otherwise seen as receptive to black students. </p>
<p>What does this mean overall for blacks; every one has to step up their game as being a URM is still going to be a hook, the pool in this population is going to be more competitive, whith more choices given to those that bring the overall "A" game to the table, as the pool is also participating in more rigerous courses offered by their school. In addition there has been a lot of flack because the pool of blacks at a lot of selective schools are or carribean and african descent and there are very few african americans (whose roots are actually from the U.S.)</p>
<p>Black Participation in Particular Advanced Placement Courses: </p>
<p>In 2004 more than 78,000 African-American students took Advanced Placement examinations. Blacks now make up 5 percent of all Advanced Placement test takers nationwide. For both blacks and whites, English literature, American history, English composition, and calculus were the most popular AP courses. Blacks were 6.9 percent of all students who took the AP test in French literature. This was the highest participation percentage for any of the 34 AP subject tests. Blacks were also at least 6 percent of all test takers in the subject areas of English literature, world history, macroeconomics, and French language. </p>
<p>The lowest level of black participation was on the Spanish literature test. Only 56 black students nationwide took the AP test in Spanish literature in 2004. They were only 0.6 percent of all test takers in this subject. Blacks were also less than 2 percent of all AP test takers in the subject areas of electrical and magnetic physics, Spanish language, computer science, and German. </p>
<p>What I would recommend to you and your friend, that you concentrate on raising is grades (while there may be a little slack given on the SAT scores, your high school record, rigor of curriculum and rank -for schools that rank are still the number one factor in admissions). You should look into not only taking the most rigerous courses, but doing well in those classes.</p>
<p>Your unweighted GPA is extremely low for the schools that you are considering. Many of the schools end up unweighing your GPA's (calculating it on a 4.0 scale) as it is almost a given that applicants are taking AP/Honors courses (if the school provides those courses)</p>
<p>sport684-- This is just to inform you last year I was accepted into the Yale compsci PHD program. However, I decided to focus on my business at this time. Don't catagorize the entire Black race. </p>
<p>Lots of Oxford people teach at Yale. Cornell is a good college; however, it is not in the same class of Oxford. Only Harvard and Stanford can compare. I have a friend from Oxford now a PHD student at Stanford.</p>
<p>So sport684-- don't give me that crap.</p>
<p>i'm not sure who told you that Columbia & Cornell were matches with your GPA & SAT scores. They're not. They're SERIOUS reaches. If you tell us what type of school you're looking for - maybe we can help suggest schools that are better fits.</p>
<p>I normally don't do chances but I have to agree with what everyone else is telling you Your list is extremely top heavy with reaches. I would not even count BC as a safety it is more of a match or match slight reach. Your unweighted GPA makes you a solid B student. Even as a URM your SAT scores are low Search through the this season's admissions, as most of the URM's had way better scores than what you are posting.</p>
<p>if they got 1220s hell yes</p>