Application journey of an asian international applicant...

Applying to College Admission Stories
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So hey all, I’ve been a long time lurker on cc, I’ve finally made an account just to document my application process and hopefully provide some useful (albeit anecdotal) information for future applicants in my situation.

I’m an international applicant from an overrepresented country in asia, I’d rather not say which. I’ll be leaving out a fair bit of details in this because I’d rather be safe than sorry with putting such information on the internet. PM me if you’re interested and want details.

I started thinking about applying to US colleges last year, and I had the pretty standard ‘clueless international applicant’ list, which was HYPSM plus most of the other ivies and other top 20s like Berkeley. I watched the massacre of the class of 2019, where so many international applicants like me got waitlisted and rejected to all the colleges they applied to and I panicked and starting rethinking my list, thank goodness.

A few things to note here: I’m very fortunate to be a full-pay applicant, so finaid and merit scholarships were never a concern for me, but for internationals who do need financial aid (as some of my friends did), you need to broaden your search a lot more (check out colleges with guaranteed scholarships like UA and colleges with competitive scholarships like USC). Also, even after all the amendments, my college list ended up being very reach-heavy, but it was okay for me because I had also applied to UK universities including safeties. Do not apply to US colleges with a list like mine if you don’t have any other safeties in your own country/other countries that you’re happy to go to and can afford.

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(cont.)

It took a very long time to get over the prestige issue. Until now it’s actually still something I think about - but prestige is extremely relative. For example, I doubt many people in my country know what Caltech is but it’s unarguably one of the strongest tech schools in the world. I ended up applying to several colleges which were still /very/ competitive and difficult to get into, but which were unheard of in my country.

I started working on my essays very early, in the start of 2015. I got the essay questions of colleges I was interested in and commonapp questions from the 2014 cycle and started the drafts. This was undoubtedly one of the smartest things I did (even if I didn’t know it back then). It took many many drafts and edits and new ideas to start writing true, genuine essays. It’s hard to describe but you’ll feel it when you’ve finished it if it’s really an essay that reflects how you feel. I started by trying to write essays that would portray someone colleges would want, but I gave up halfway because it’s impossible and self-defeating. As good as a write you think you are, it’s impossible to artificially inject genuine passion and interest into your writing.

So here are my stats (finally):

SAT 1: 2320
SAT 2: Math 2 800, Chem 800, Lit 780
Straight As throughout my junior and senior years, a few A-s and Bs in freshman and sophomore years. Highest course rigor available and one of the strongest students in my school (but as I’ve learnt, academics and stats merely get you past the front door)
My ECs are pretty distinctive, so I’m not going to describe there for fear of someone recognising me, but I had one leadership role in an organisation that I spent a lot of time and effort in, and a few other ECs and international competitions (nothing on the level of international olympiads or ISEF though)
Took part in Yale young global scholars - I mention this specifically because this program gave me my first true experience of what an american liberal arts education is like. It corrected the misconceptions and fantasies I had about studying in a US college and allowed me to focus on what I truly sought in my undergrad education and what I could gain from and contribute to in a college environment.

Colleges:
Yale SCEA (deferred and waiting)
Stanford
Cornell
UC Berkeley
UCLA
USC
Pomona
Rice
WashU
UMich
CMU
Wellesley

I applied to the colleges of arts and sciences (or equivalent) in most of the colleges above - for Rice and CMU I had to apply specifically to the school of social science. I applied to a fair number of schools (12) because I enjoyed writing the essays and I started on the applications very early - ymmv

I had interviews with alumni from four colleges. The Yale interviewer was nice and we had a solid conversation for over an hour but it wasn’t spectacular. The Rice interviewer was extremely friendly and we only talked for 30 minutes but we got on really well. The Stanford interview was definitely my best one and the alumni was in a career similar to what I’m aiming for, and he gave me a lot of advice not just for college but also the future - a very nice guy and I’ll probably keep in contact with him. The WashU interview was absolutely terrible - I waited for almost 2 hours at night due to scheduling issues (he was interviewing two other people before me and had messed up all the timings) and ended up talking for only 30 minutes. Definitely wasn’t an experience I enjoyed but I still think WashU is a great school.

Because I started on my essays so early, I was finished by October for most of my colleges. But in late December, just before I was about to submit my RD applications, I ended up ditching a few of my essays and completely rewriting them. I did this especially for the colleges where I had practically no chance (like Stanford and Pomona) and wrote some risky essays, but essays that were very much my true opinions and feelings. Should I have done this? I’m not sure - looking back, my original essays do feel a little flat (maybe because I’m privy to how much editing the essays have gone through), and my last-minute essays were definitely interesting but may come off as… too honest, for lack of a better descriptor. We’ll see, I guess!

And that’s all for now - I’ll update as the admission results come trickling in and I’ll post a full reflection when I have all my results. Hope future applicants will find this helpful! :slight_smile:

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Good luck! You sound awesome, and you’ll do well wherever you end up! It looks like we’re really similar-I finished most of my college applications in October, and I’m also a senior (Asian American, living in the South).

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Good luck! I’m bookmarking your thread and hope you’ll keep us updated.

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Thanks for the comments! Things have been pretty quiet lately, got rejected for a merit scholarship at WashU but that’s no surprise, I mostly applied to show interest in WashU since they don’t have supplementals.

My Wellesley EE decision is coming out in 2 days though, so I’ll update when I get the result!

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Update: I got a ‘possible’ from Wellesley EE… a bit disappointed because I thought my Wellesley essay was pretty decent and genuine, but there’s still hope I guess. Just very tired of all the waiting.

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Thanks for sharing! Good luck to you.

Can you explain what is Wellesley EE?

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EE is a sort of early read, so that you can shift your attention to another college if need be.

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Ahhhh! I got into WashU! I’m so ridiculously happy right now, even more so because I didn’t expect results to come out today, so I woke up and got a complete shock when I checked my email and it told me to check my portal. Extremely extremely relieved, because over the past few weeks I’ve been worrying that I won’t get into a single US college (the risks of not applying to any safeties or proper matches).

WashU is such a great college, amazing campus, great academics, I’m so grateful to have been accepted!

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Thank you for sharing your journey. You have a wonderful stats and you should get accepted into your dream schools. Congratulations on getting admission from WasU.

I have bookmarked the thread and would be happy to hear more updates from you.

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Two more decisions came out today, I got rejected from pomona but accepted to UCLA! The california dream lives!

A bit sad about pomona but very much expected, considering that pomona has taken 2 students from my school in the past ten years, and it’s such a small and selective school. Very happy about UCLA, but I’m not sure that I would go to UCLA over WashU… the weather and location are fantastic, but I worry about large classes (ucla’s freshman class is 4 times that of washu!), difficulty to take required classes for a major and the usual problems that come with a large public school (not to mention the UC budget cuts…)

A whole bunch of decisions are coming out next week, and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel… the end of this tiring college admissions journey is coming!

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You have many great choices to choose from and can’t go wrong with any of them. Thanks for sharing!

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Another college decision came in today… and I got accepted to Wellesley after being given a ‘Possible’ in EE! I was honestly shocked at this one. The possible evaluation basically lowered my chances from the average admissions rate of about 30% to about (or less than) 20%, since only 20% or less of ‘possibles’ end up getting accepted. I thought my essays were pretty decent (as I wrote above), but I missed the deadline to interview by a few days and then spent the next few months regretting not emailing wellesley and asking if I could still get an alumni interview.

So to any future wellesley applicants: ‘possibles’ do actually get accepted! And also try your best to do an interview, try your luck even if you missed the deadline by a bit haha

I haven’t been replying to your comments but I’d like to thank all of yall for your nice words and encouragements! And especially to @purrples, good luck with college decisions! …but then again, I saw you got accepted ea to caltech, so I don’t really think you need much luck :wink:

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A bunch more college results have come out in the past 2 days. I got accepted to uc berkeley, rice, and cmu (accepted to mcs and dietrich, invited to join the SHS program and the QSSS program). Also got rejected from stanford, but no biggie.

I’m now very very conflicted between uc berkeley and rice. There are a bunch more college results to come, but it’s highly like that it’s gonna come down to berkeley and rice in the end. I love rice’s size (one quarter that of berkeley!), residential college system, small class sizes, no greek life, ease of double majoring… but literally no one in my country knows what rice is (beyond a staple food), while berkeley is practically an ivy league. I would love to go to berkeley, but I’m really worried about the UC budget cuts and the large class sizes, and i worry if I would be able to double major in 4 years there… also apparently housing is terrible. But what great weather and surrounding area and culture though!

any advice for me?

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Isn’t CMU well known ? Here it’s basically considered equal to Harvard for cs.
I’d pick Rice over Berkeley - excellent quality but more manageable size, easier access to classes… Can you show your family rankings as it may help them understand that rice is a top school, actually higher ranked than Berkeley(normally I’d say those rankings are pointless but since it’s help for your parents…) , with no budget cuts?

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@MYOS1634 CMU isn’t really well known, but it’s sorta heard of amongst the CS people. CMU is great for CS and engineering and the like, but given that I intend to major in econs and sciences, CMU isn’t really extremely up there in terms of academic quality - I mean it’s good, but not harvard standard.

My parents and all my relatives (because apparently all my relatives have a say in this decision) think i’m insane for even /considering/ anything short of yale or stanford over berkeley. It’s honestly very annoying to have to deal with this kind of ignorance said with such confidence… I’m working hard to convince them with stats like faculty-student ratio, median class size, admissions rate etc.

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Use college data. It’s a website that summarizes the CDS.
But economics at cmu isn’t as bad as you make it sound. Sure it’s not CD, but they offered you lots of advantages. I’d consider cmu more carefully. Since your family and relatives are probably swayed by ranking, look at all of them. Look up articles with mentions of financial problems and budget cuts.
Although for economics and careers that branch off from there, Wellesley would require at least a second look.

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Sorry to all for the lack of updates in the past few weeks! it’s been a pretty hectic time with a lot of second-guessing and confusion. Ivy day was anticlimatic, with expected results. So, to summarise, the results of my admissions journey:

Accepted:
WashU (in St. Louis)
UCLA
UC Berkeley
CMU (MCS and Dietrich, offered QSSS and SHS)
USC
Wellesley
Rice

Rejected:
Yale
Cornell
Pomona
Stanford
UMich

12 applications to extremely selective colleges, majority with acceptance rates under 20%. 7 acceptances, as an international from an overrepresented country. These are much much better results than I ever expected. I’m also a little amused that I got no waitlists at all (I was originally expecting results closer to 1-2 acceptances, 4-5 waitlists, 6-7 rejections, which is what some of my friends ended up with). Also a little amused that Michigan rejected me, especially since I put proper effort into their essays, ended information sessions and submitted my application pretty early, but I guess they thought I wasn’t going to attend? (if so, they were right)

After all is said and done, I will be attending Cal! Very early on, I told myself that I would pick WashU or Rice over Cal if I got accepted, because I was drawn to the idea of small colleges and was very scared by rumours of horrible scheduling and overcrowded lectures and funding cuts at Cal. But to some extent, that is the kind of environment that I thrive in, one with less hand-holding and more independence, with some competition to provide motivation, with opportunities - but only if you’re willing to fight for it. That’s the kind of environment I’ve grown up with in Asia, and while many criticise it, it’s what suits me.

As you can tell from my previous posts, I was leaning towards Rice, where I would probably have spent a very comfortable four years. But after much thought and talking it over with many people, including friends at Rice, Cal, WashU, Wellesley and other schools, I’ve come to realise that the environment of small, collaborative colleges is perhaps something that is tempting and superficially appealing to me, but not quite what would push me to reach my potential.

My friends at Cal have given a good idea of how much the ‘work hard, play hard’ motto is really the way of life there, and I’m getting more and more excited for it by the day. Sure, scheduling is a bit of struggle, but what other college would have so many student-run websites (ninjacourses, berkeleytime, etc.) that help you plan your schedule? Things like this truly illustrate the essence of the Cal student body (as well as in the inability of the school to build a proper scheduling website haha).

All in all, I want my college experience to push me out of my comfort zone, but provide me a safe haven to relax when things get too stressful. I think Cal does that for me. What really changed my mind was the fact that Rice sounded relaxing and tempting, while Cal scared me a little, but in a good way. Maybe it’s a little strange and emotionally masochistic, but that’s how I knew Cal was right for me.

So, thank you to everyone who has followed me on this journey, I hope this is a satisfactory ending for all. To all high schoolers, feel free to drop by and ask me any questions. And finally, I’m proud to be a member of Cal’s Class of 2020! Go Golden Bears! (BEAT STANFURD!)

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@dwabliam What an amazing list of acceptances! Congrats on Cal! I am leaning towards it as well; maybe I’ll see you there :wink:

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I am wondering what you would have called STANDFORD if you were actually admitted to???