Am I Freaking Crazy For Applying Here?

<p>Hello. I wanted to gauge my choices and see if there any other colleges that might be a match for what I want to do. Yes, I already know that all my standardized test scores suck :)</p>

<p>SAT I: 670M, 650CR, 560W
SAT II: 690 Chemistry, 640 Math IIC
AP: Chemistry 3, Language and Composition 3
Currently Taking: Physics B, Calculus AB, Lit. and Comp.</p>

<p>Unweighted GPA: 3.8 (9-12), 3.98 (10-12)
Weighted GPA: 4.2 (9-12), 4.37 (10-12)
Unweighted Rank: 42/550 (101010 ;))
YAY FOR UPWARD TREND :)</p>

<p>Extracurriculars:
4 years of Water Polo (Varsity) 26 hours a week
-Captain in 2004, 2005
-Bunch of random team awards like Most Improved and Most Inspirational</p>

<p>4 years of Swimming (Varsity)
-Won in League Finals, but nothing significant really</p>

<p>4 years of Club Water Polo (18 and U) 20 hours a week
-During Winter and Summer Offseasons</p>

<p>4 years of Junior State of America, 5 hours a week
-Historian: Our presentation won 2nd place for the "Chapter of the Year" award at Spring State :)
-Head of Fundraising Committee</p>

<p>4 years of Orchestra/Honors Orchestra, 10 hours a week
-Section Leader for Cellos
-Outstanding Freshman Musician Award
-Played at Carnegie Hall for the New York Orchestra Festival (Silver Award)
-Played in the pit orchestra of the annual school musical "Annie Get Your Gun" in 2004</p>

<p>6 years of Cello
-Passed a CM test of some level I do not remember :p
-Yay! for profeciency in violin, viola, cello, and string bass and ability to read treble, alto, tenor, and bass clef :)</p>

<p>2 years of volunteering at local summer orchestra (4 hours a day for 5 weeks)
-Section Coach for both Cellos and String Basses</p>

<p>-Attended National Youth Leadership Conference in Washington D.C., Spring 2006
-Elected one of the most inspirational leaders by faculty adviser
-RUTEBEGA! Sorry, this is random inside joke.</p>

<p>1 Year of Brighter Side Singers!, 30 hours a week
-School's show choir that goes around to perform for the community. To show how much work this is, in one school week we had twelve 45-minute performances. Now picture yourself smiling non-stop for 45 minutes. Now multiply that by 12. Now picture sweaty hands and playing a slow, romatic cello solo with the chorus. It's tough stuff.</p>

<p>-I play Ali Hakim in our annual musical "Oklahoma!" this year! Never thought I could get a lead in a musical because before this year I had no acting, singing, or dancing abilities. And nowadays I still don't have any but man I have this charm on stage :p</p>

<p>1 year of Advanced Journalism, 15 hours a week
-School Newspaper! I've probably racked up the most points of anyone on staff at this point in the year. I'm up by 4 issues after doing 5 issues (each issue is 100 points). I love taking photographs.</p>

<p>2 years of Los Angeles Shooters
-A local photography club that goes out and takes pictures around the area and we critique each other's works and help each other get better</p>

<p>3 years of Ping Pong Club
-Head of Public Relations (11th)
-Vice President (12th)
-Yes, I play.</p>

<p>3 years of volunteer water polo time keeping and statting (9-11th grade)
-Shot clock, game clock, unofficial and official stats, I do it all! Both away and home games :p Yeayuh.</p>

<p>Filmed two product reviews for the online reseller Buy.com to kick off their "BuyTV" (Olympus Zuiko 50mm Macro and Logitech MX500 Mouse) @ <a href="http://www.buy.com/buytv%5B/url%5D"&gt;www.buy.com/buytv&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>3 years of Quantum Physics
8 years of Gifted and Talented Education
3 years of National Honor Society
3 years of California Scholarship Federation</p>

<p>I'm pretty sure I forgot some stuff, but I need to get going on homework so..</p>

<p>I'm Asian and I'm from California.<br>
Essays are good.
I've never seen the recommendations but let us assume that they are omfg***zbbqsuperamazing. </p>

<p>Here are my own rankings:</p>

<p>DUDE, YOU SHOULDN'T EVEN APPLY HERE BECAUSE YOU HAVE NO CHANCE:
-Columbia
-Cornell
-Northwestern</p>

<p>Super Humongous REACH:
-NYU (Stern)
-U.C. Berkeley
-Emory (I applied for both the Scholars and Goizueta Scholars program too)</p>

<p>REACH:
-UCLA
-NYU (College)
-USC (Marshall Business)</p>

<p>Sort of MATCH:
-University of the Pacific (Either accelerated MBA or Pre-Pharm)
-U.C. San Diego</p>

<p>Match:
-U.C. Irvine</p>

<p>Right now, I'm really hoping for NYU Stern, but that's probably out of my range, huh? Oh well.. I'm sort of going for NYU College in my mind.</p>

<p>I really like USC's opportunities (Business admin. major+minor in Biotech), but I really want to get out of Southern California and explore another area of the country, so... I dunno.</p>

<p>I'm sort of extracurricularly-biased which will probably hurt my chances at most of these schools, but hey, that's who I am so at least I've lived and experienced in high school and I don't regret it at all :) Now... to find a school that has the same goals as I do. </p>

<p>So any opinions/tips/rankings? Thanks in advance.</p>

<p>Cornell...Reach
Emory...Match/Reach
NYU...Match/Reach
USC...Match
UOP...Match/Safety
UC-San Diego...Match
UC-Irvine...Match/Safety
Oxford College (of Emory U)...Safety</p>

<p>I agree with your categories. With great essays and recs USC or Stern could happen. If you need aid don't count on NYU though because they seem to only give it to the very top applicants.</p>

<p>Personally I'd go to a mid tier UC before UOP. Then work hard and go to a good business school, something UOPs isn't.</p>

<p>I don't think I can get any aid other than scholarships. Fastweb is my friend.</p>

<p>GetYourOwnBox:</p>

<p>UCB/UCLA: Slight Reach
UCSD: Match
UCI: Safe Match</p>

<p>Hopefully I get lucky with the slight reaches for the UC campuses then :) 30% chance here I come! </p>

<p>What do you guys think about NYU vs. NYU Stern?</p>

<p>i think you have a good shot at all of those colleges actually, good luck!! i play violin haha - gotta look out for my strings friends</p>

<p>String instrument love.</p>

<p>I guess it all depends on how much the school weighs SAT scores and extracurriculars. That we will just have to wait and see.</p>

<p>You have a good shot at all of them, and quit being so damn modest with "DUDE, YOU SHOULDN'T EVEN APPLY HERE BECAUSE YOU HAVE NO CHANCE:"</p>

<p>Better writing score would be nice on the SAT though.</p>

<p>Too bad you didn't do a little bit better, if you could of just gotten the 1400 I think you could get into Cornell and Columbia. Your EC's are great. I think you will get into either NYU Stern or UC Berkely. I think both are about 50% shots, just pray for some good luck!</p>

<p>Well, I completely blanked out on the essay. I did well on the rest of the writing part but the essay score really hurt me. </p>

<p>I'm basing the titles on my SAT scores, and most say I have to be at a certain level with my scores or I have to have an amazing hook before they really consider the rest of my application. So maybe I'm just reading too much into this college admissions thing and I need to stop but it's soooooooo dang allurrrrring. :p</p>

<p>I will be sure to pray for some good luck :) Thanks guys.</p>