Can you give me my chances?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Yale University
1

<p>It seems like everyone has one of these, but I'm about to go crazy worrying!</p>

<p>OOS female (Alabama)
SAT: 2230 (740 math, 770 CR, 720 writing)
SATII: 790 US History, 770 Literature, 750 Chemistry
ACT: 33
Rank: 7 of about 525
Weighted GPA: about 4.2
Unweighted: I really don't know...I've only gotten 3 B's ever, so I assume it's pretty good.</p>

<p>APs: English Language (4), Stats (5), Psych (5), Chemistry (5), APUSH (5)
This year's APs: BC Calculus, European History, Micro and Macro Economics, English Literature, Biology, and American and Comparative Government (this seems like a ton, but my school is HUGE on AP classses. My 13 is only a little bit above average).</p>

<p>National Merit Finalist
National Honor Society
Nat'l English Hon. Soc.
Mu Alpha Theta (Math Hon. Soc.)
Nat'l French Hon. Soc.</p>

<p>French Club, Politicos (President-it's our political activism club)
I teach French every Friday to elementary schoolers
Church: approximately a million things. 3 different handbell choirs (and official sub for 2 others), singing choir, mission work with the youth group, and am the high school youth rep for the governing council
Dance (15 years)</p>

<p>And I was a camp counselor this summer for a very nominal rate (I think it shook down to about $2 an hour, but it was still enough not to count as volunteering)</p>

<p>I think my essays were good, and my recs were both from AP teachers who absolutely love me (APUSH and Stats), so I assume that those are good as well.</p>

<p>I think that's about it. I know my EC's fail a little, but I'm wondering if my grades and test scores will pull me up enough. What do y'all think?</p>

2

<p>The church ECs are nice, but don’t play well in Ivy League admissions offices. Hopefully, you wrote essays on other topics. Did you write about your Dance work?</p>

<p>Roll, Tide!</p>

3

<p>I disagree; I think your church involvement is pretty impressive. I don’t think your test scores will pull you up, since tons of people with those kinds of scores apply to Yale, but if your essays were stellar and your recs were awesome, I think you have a shot.</p>

4

<p>you have a shot
please, chance back at <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/660584-id-appreciate-chance-two-hmmm-maybe-three-p.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/660584-id-appreciate-chance-two-hmmm-maybe-three-p.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

5

<p>“The church ECs are nice, but don’t play well in Ivy League admissions offices. Hopefully, you wrote essays on other topics.”</p>

<p>I don’t think there is any truth in that statement. Jamescchen - Do you have any kind of explanation for that? Religion is important to a lot of people and adcoms would not be doing their schools a favor by belittling these kinds of activities.</p>

<p>wagegohe - you have a decent shot, but there are a ton of applicants with similar stats. What makes you stand out? I hope you addressed that in your essays.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

6

<p>like Europe. And Europeans, like liberals, have largely lost their Christian identity. They’ve even stopped having kids.</p>

<p>I dare any parent of an elite child to have them write about their relationship with God or their church activities as the primary essay of their college application to Yale. That application would be the first one thrown into the paper shredder. Unless of course, you are Robert Bass’ or Barack Obama’s kids.</p>

7

<p>I actually just LOLed. Or LedOL, depending on your grammatical perspective.</p>

<p>According to the YDN, 95% of the Yale Class of 2011 identified with a religious background. If adcoms rejected all religious people, they’d have a much easier job of choosing acceptees (and a harder job of actually building a class).</p>

<p>Of course, there’s a difference between writing about a sincere relationship with God or church activity and preaching in your essay. The latter is probably not such a good idea.</p>

<p>(btw, your assumption that Europe = Western Europe = godless heathens = sub-replacement fertility rate is both absurd and mildly humorous. It’s called demographic transition. Google it.)</p>

8

<p>“I dare any parent of an elite child to have them write about their relationship with God or their church activities as the primary essay of their college application to Yale. That application would be the first one thrown into the paper shredder.”</p>

<p>You’ve got to be kidding me. Do you think if any Buddhist or Muslim wrote about what their faith meant to them, their application would be “the first one thrown into the paper shredder?” Please. You seem to be making a lot of assumptions. The idea that an Ivy League school would reject somebody based on a religious affiliation is both absurd and naive, and contradicts their desire for “diversity,” whatever that may be.</p>

9

<p>If any Buddhist or Muslim wrote about what their faith meant to them, the fact is that isn’t seen nearly as much as witting on christian third-world county trips/church service.</p>

<p>Sorry but I’m going to have to agree with jamescchen. Church service is usually on par with NHS, hospital volunteering, and third-world country building trips. There are just so many of them… It’s been so overused it became laundry list a while ago (unless it’s something spectacular)</p>

10

<p>By the way I’m fairly sure he was joking about instant rejection… but honestly Adcoms are known to be liberal. It’s a fact that Ivy league universities can be some of the most liberal of all, and it is also a fact the more educated you are the more likely you are to be liberal.</p>

<p>Be honest with yourself, would you really read through an essay that is preaching to you something you don’t totally agree with without giving it some bad mojo?</p>

11

<p>I don’t really see how a group of people open to toleration of other people would really hurt you for writing about something culturally that is of utmost importance to you…</p>

<p>Church stuff is fine, I’d imagine.</p>

12

<p>Your app looks pretty similar to mine…for what it’s worth, I hope we both get in :)</p>

13

<p>I think you have a reasonable chance (and a very good chance of getting into one or more very selective colleges, as long as you applied to a number of them). Don’t worry about your church activities, or even if you wrote an essay about it, unless you called other people the pawns of Satan. Yale is looking for all kinds of people, and they are looking for people passionately involved in what interests them. I think it’s great that you were very involved in something outside of school.</p>

14

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<p>Idk about the above, i mean I wrote one of my essays about faith and evolution and I think it depends on how you present what you write. My essays was about a personal conflict and had about zip to do with other people.
But also people need to remember that Liberal =/= Atheist or non-religious, there are very religious liberals (like Barack Obama) and very non-religious conservatives as well. So we should avoid these labels.</p>

15

<p>Mal- Quite honestly, yes I would be biased against essays that are overly preachy. Everybody carries with them some type of prejudice. But how about essays that are more personally reflective and less judgmental? This is the part of jameschen’s statement that I disagree with. Clearly, one should exercise caution when writing about religion, but the topic itself does not make for a poor essay. </p>

<p>And also- just because a certain EC may be “laundry list” doesn’t mean that it can’t make for an interesting essay. It is not required that people write only on esoteric topics. Some of the best essays are about very common things considered from an unusual point of view.</p>