<p>Schools I'm considering:
CAL
Stanford
Pomona
Princeton</p>
<p>Can anyone give me some other schools to consider?</p>
<p>Gender: Male
Ethnicity: White
Location: California
School Type: Medium-sized Public (1400 students), Very uncompetitve
Income: $80,000/year
I'm a first-generation college student
I've taken the hardest class schedule at school, all honors/APs.</p>
<p>Prospective Major:
Psychology or Cognitive Science</p>
<p>GPA:
Un-weighted: 3.9
Weighted: 4.4
UC GPA: 4.15
Rank: Top 3% (10 out of 353)</p>
<p>Classes
9 AP planned
-Biology (4)
-Statistics (5)
-Calculus BC (5)
-Chemistry (5)
-English Language (3)
-US History (4)
-English Composition
-Spanish Language AP</p>
<p>Extracurriculars:
Basketball - all four years, varsity starting center
Math and Science Bowl/Academic League - 3 years, on starting team
World Affair Challenge - 2 yrs, our team won last year
Tutoring - 50+ hours nonprofit
LEO Club - 250+ hours nonprofit
CSF - President</p>
<p>Essay/Rec:
I think both of these are pretty good, but you never know.</p>
<p>Excellent GPA's and rank/Above average Sat's+II's. Rigor shows maturation. Above average EC's. If your essays/rec's stand out, i don't see you not getting into at least Princeton or Standford.</p>
<p>All four of those schools are reaches, as you probably know. Because of that, it's next to impossible to estimate chances.
I think UC Irvine has a strong program in psych and cog science. I would add Irvine and Santa Barbara to your list, as it doesn't hurt to check the boxes if you are applying to Berkeley anyway.
Being a first generation student will help at Cal, but maybe not enough at the other three on your list. Your SAT scores are still a bit low for all of these schools.
I would suggest applying anywhere that interests you, but really look around for a few match schools,(like UCI and UCSB) and at least one school where you are sure you will be admitted. Have you considered going out of state? You might want to look at the University of Washington in Seattle, the University of Oregon, and Whitman College. These three are all wonderful schools with a nice "college town" feeling, like the ones on your list. They are also much better matches for the stats you have posted.</p>
<p>I already plan on applying to other UCs, but I know those are pretty much locks for me since I'm ELC.</p>
<p>Is a 33 on the ACT really low for these colleges? When I look, it shows stanford/princeton being like 30-34 for middle 50%, making me in the top 60%~ at least, and pomona is 30-33.</p>
<p>Would it hurt me if I only give ACT/SATIIs?</p>
<p>Any more college suggestions would be greatly welcomed... especially colleges with pretty decent psych/cog science/neurology undergrad programs (they don't need to be super good, when I go on to grad school I'll worry about that).</p>
<p>Well, you should get in at Cal and Pomona--and Stanford is a question-mark and for Princeton the SATs are just a bit too low--I think you need about a 2250 SAT I score. (Your ACT of 33 is the equivalent of a 2205 SAT I.)</p>
<p>I'm glad you are also applying to the other UCs as your backup schools, since it is very logical to do so given your ELC status.</p>
<p>Good luck with all your apps--and let us know where you end up going to school.</p>
<p>P.S. I'm thinking you would be a match at a place like Penn as a psychology major if you are interesting in one of the other Ivies.</p>
<p>You have fair chances at Pomona (match), but reach for Stanford and Princeton.
Your ACT scores are stellar, and your GPA is fair enough. Your AP scores arent above the conventional. </p>
<p>*Just a question. How can your parents make 80k/year and not've gone to college?</p>
<p>The problem with considering Pomona a match is that is it a very small school, and being a Californian puts you at a bit of a disadvantage. With a class size of slightly over 300, with half of those being female, and Pomona making the effort to have representation from all over the country, there are relatively few spaces for California kids with very good but not stellar stats/ECs. I'm not saying you couldn't be one of the lucky few- but just warning you to be realistic. At very small colleges, there are a lot of influences at play when it comes to admissions that one can't predict, especially if their acceptance rates are in the teens.
At a school like Whitman, even though it is small, you would have the geography on your side.<br>
I'm not sure that you can submit SATIIs without SATIs being seen. I believe they are all on the same report. (?not sure though)
It might make sense to just submit the ACT with Pomona - check to see if they need SATIIs. Your AP scores are nice- be sure to include those where you scored a 4 or 5. Good luck to you! You should have very nice options if you broaden your search. Don't get too hung up on schools with tiny admit rates. There are so many great schools out there!</p>
<p>OP- check out Occidental College. It may not be the type of campus you're looking for, but their compsci faculty looks impressive, if PHd's from top institutions are any guide. And it's in California.
You can google the field you're interested in and dig further to investigate individual programs. Again, if you're willing to go out of state, your options expand greatly. Vassar, for example, is a school where you would not only have geography on your side, but your gender as well! They claim to have a long-established and well respected compsci program. Don't forget UCSD of course, as their compsci program has an excellent reputation.</p>