Hey guys,
i’m an 18 yrs old boy form germany, and for some time past it’s my biggest dream to get into an ivy league uni.
Of course i know it’s pretty hard to get into these school but i think there is a certain chance to get into.
My problem is, i got two choices for applying.
Either I apply next year with the age of nineteen ( not an 4.0 gpa, but still good, class of 2023)
or I apply in two years with the age of twenty ( 4.0 gpa, class of 2024).
So what do you guys think?
Should I apply next year with an lower gpa or one year later with a better gpa (problem: I would start studying with age of 21 which is actually pretty late)?
My questions are now:
Is there a chance to get into Harvard etc. with the age of 21?
And is there a chance to get into Harvard etc. even if I don‘t have a 4.0 gpa, but my extracurriculars, SAT . TOEFL, ACT scores, recommendation letters, and the essays are (nearly) perfect?
I hope one of you can help me out with these questions.
I think you have a chance as long as your GPA isn’t like a 2.0 or something. If I were you, I would apply this year and see what happens because you can always apply again next year. Also if the rest of your application is really good an okay GPA won’t hurt your chances too much. Also about your age, I don’t think that is a problem unless you have a degree already. I think that there are definitely some older students who have taken gap years or applied after taking a break from high school. If you have any other questions about applying as an international student, feel free to send me a message. Are you in high school right now btw?
Alright, thanks for your answer, helps a lot.
No i’m not in High School, beacause we got a different school system here in germany .
My school is called “Fachoberschule”, it’s a school of further education.
At this school, you can do two senior years (currently I’m a junior).
If you graduate after the first senior year you can also study in Germany but you are limited with the choice of what you want to study.
if you gradutate after second senior year you are able to study everything in Germany (law, medicine etc.).
In the US you can study anything with both graduations but i guess the second one has a better reputation.
If you’re confident that you have a good shot for Harvard, I suggest you apply ED or EA. Also, you could apply to another university here in the U.S. and if you’re satisfied with your GPA, apply for a transfer to Harvard. I’m not familiar with international applications so I’m really sorry that I couldn’t provide a better answer.
Hope this helps and best of luck with the application!
Oh, please – this is really awful advice. Harvard, being the MOST famous of US Universities, attracts stellar applicants from every country on the globe. However, Admissions restricts international students to about 10% to 11% of an incoming freshman class. At Harvard, with a freshman class of about 1660, that means they accept 160 to 190 International students – and most of those international students come from 6 countries: Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, China, Japan and Korea.
Go to http://www.hio.harvard.edu/statistics. From the pull-down menus, select STUDENTS, HARVARD COLLEGE (the undergraduate school) and GERMANY, you’ll see there are 25 students who are freshman, sophomores, juniors or seniors at Harvard. That means that Harvard accepts about 6 or 7 students each year from Germany and to be admitted you have to be the best-of-the-best from your country. Is that you? We don’t know, as you haven’t supplied enough data.
Sigh! Harvard doesn’t have ED only SCEA. And, according to Harvard’s rules, a student cannot apply SCEA and ED to another school. So, a student needs to apply SCEA to Harvard (or YPS) or apply ED to other colleges.
First of all, thanks for your response. Appreciate it!
I investigated six of the eight Ivy’s so far.
So I can say that Harvard is definetly my first choice followed by Columbia, Princeton and Yale.
Of course I know that there is a really small chance to get in but most of harvard students had also only a small chance and got in.
So I give you some information about me so you can chance me a little better.
GPA nearly 4.0 (school system in germany is a bit different, best you can reach are 15 points).
Haven’t written the SAT’s an ACT yet, but I’m pretty confident that it’s going to be a 780 / 780 / 780, ACT 36 and Sat Subject Test 780 / 780 as well. (studying every day for the tests.)
I know my english is not perfect yet, but reached at least 110 at the TOEFL test (I’m still improving my english daily to be good enough for the college standard.)
Extracurricular I am writing a book about how teen’s and young adults can be earlier and faster successful although they are so young.
I interviewed for the book ten of the most successful people in Germany under 30 and now I’m writing one chapter for each success factor which is responsible that they became such successful individuals.
(one of them is Toni Kroos, maybe you know him from Real Madrid).
Furthermore I am in the managing board of a non-profit organization.
The organisation helps people in Burundi ( the poorest country on this planet) to live a better life (building schools, etc.) and I’m going to start a new project to help people in India in the next few months.
Hope you can chance me a little better now.
I hope and I guess there is a certain chance to get in. What do you think?
Noone can tell you whether you will get into Harvard or the other schools. It certainly seems appropriate to apply. Your written English does need some improvement
The real question is why did you choose to investigate Ivies and what draws you to them? If you want to study in the US, there are many, many excellent schools, some just as selective as Ivies - including smaller liberal arts colleges. And why do you want to study in the US? I’m sure you have good reasons, just asking…
Thanks for your response.
Yeah, so my spoken english is actually really good but you are right, that I have to improve my written english.
To be honest, I can’t get the thought out of my head anymore, but which is not really bad.
In germany we got some very good universities too, but the Ivy League is still an completely different level.
The prestige, the atmosphere on the campus (visited Columbia last holidays), the renowned professors, alle these factors makes me wanna go to an Ivy League school.
Moreover I always wanted to live in the US and so I thought why schouldn’t I study there as well?
The students in the US are proud to be a part of the university, they are enthusiastic and the students in germany actually don’t even care where they want to study.
