Carnegie Mellon Class of 2021 Applicants Discussion Thread

Yeah I’m pretty busy with exams, but I don’t want to pass up an opportunity if it truly will make a difference.
I attended a CMU presentation in my school and I had a long conversation with the CMU alumnus who I am supposed to contact for the interview, so I don’t really have any more questions about the university. CMU says these interviews “are meant to be more informative than evaluative” but they also say “Although Carnegie Mellon doesn’t require an interview for admission, it’s highly recommended.”

Confused! Any advice?

@samc24… do it if you can, I was accepted ED and I think it helped.

I live in India, and in my city, there aren’t any interviewers who went to CIT.

Does anyone know if I need to have my mid year report sent to CMU?

Yes you do.

With regular decisions coming out soon will you all please chance me.

I applied to these other schools:

MIT (Early Decision Deferred)

Regular Decision:
RPI
Northeastern
Harvard
Princeton
Columbia
Cornell
UPenn

Short Biography: I was born in Bangladesh. At age 4, I moved to Japan because of my mother pursuing her PhD in Immunology there. We lived there for 6 years, and in 5th grade I moved to Philadelphia where my mom worked at Upenn. We stayed in Philly for 2 years and then we moved to Baltimore where my mom worked at the NIH. We lived in Baltimore for 3 years from 7th grade to 9th grade. At the end of 9th grade, we moved to Albany, Upstate NY. I lived in Albany for sophomore year, and then I moved to Gainesville, Florida where my mom worked at UF. I stayed in Florida for junior year, and now as a senior I am back in Albany. I am fluent in Bengali, Japanese, English. Highly proficient in French, Spanish, and Arabic.

Prospective major: Electrical Engineering

Objective:

SAT I (superscore): 1520: 770 Math and 750 Writing
ACT (breakdown): no
ACT superscore (breakdown): no
SAT II (subject, score): Japanese - 660; Math 2 - 800; Chemistry - 760.
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4
Weighted GPA: around 4.5
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): not ranked and class size is 453
AP (place score in parentheses): Chemistry (3), Physics-1 (4), English Composition (4), US History (5)
IB (place score in parentheses): no
Senior Year Course Load: AP Calculus BC, AP English Literature and Composition, AP World History, AP Statistics, AP Physics C Mechanics, Computer Science 1, Economics Honors
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel, etc.): National Spanish Exam Bronze Award, National Youth leadership forum in Engineering and Technology Distinguished Alumni
Common Awards (AP Scholar, honor roll, NM things, etc.): AP Scholar with Honor, National Merit Semi-Finalist, honor roll all four years, Academic achievement award (top 10% of class by Unweighted GPA at end of junior year)

Subjective:

Extracurriculars (name, grade levels, leadership, description):
Major Extracurriculars:

  • My biggest EC was babysitting my currently 6 year old sister for 4 hours every weekday.
  • I am a religious Muslim and I know around 200 pages of the Quran by heart. I started memorizing when I was 5 and still do. I memorize and recite with an imam or my father.
  • JV soccer 10th grade(captain), JV Tennis 10th grade, Varsity Tennis 12th grade
  • I go to the Mosque almost every day at around 6AM for our first prayer of the day. I also frequently go there on evenings and afternoons to pray.
  • In 9th grade, I helped my father and his fellow Masters in Industrial engineering students build a near perpetual hydroelectric generator that won first place for Thurgood Marshall Entrepreneurship competition. I did a lot of labor and hands on work such as working with the piping, woodworking, etc.
    Minor Extracurriculars:
  • New York Mathematics League
  • Coding club
  • School newspaper sports writer
  • Co-Founder of math team
  • Science Olympiad
  • Model United Nations
  • Quiz Bowl
  • I came very close to joining a 7 consecutive national title winning Mu Alpha Theta
    Math team at my school in Florida but I was rejected at the last minute because I had just moved from New York and
    learned a different math curriculum the previous year.
  • Chess club
  • NASA SEMAA program, Morgan State University
  • Owner of Youtube channel (mentioned in major of interest essay) with over 50,000 views
    and Instructables page with over 75,000 views dedicated to DIY engineering projects,
    technology workshops, reverse engineering tutorials, science experiments, and
    electronics repair. My goal is to teach and promote interest in STEM for young people and
    beginner enthusiasts with little to no background knowledge.

Hobbies and activities:

  • knitting, giving haircuts, and furniture repair
  • growing vegetables in my backyard (I grew Basil, Chili Pepper, green beans, cucumbers,
    and cherry radishes this summer)

Job/Work Experience: Survey taker at a Market Research Firm
Volunteer/Community Service:

  • I helped with the construction of a new Mosque in Albany. I currently volunteer by serving food during community events, cleaning, and doing other menial work.
  • Volunteering at a local auto repair shop
    Summer Experience: Did a lot of moving work every summer since I moved around the country so much

Writing (Subject, 1-10 rating, details):

Essays:
Not going to talk much about these. I found they were pretty good and reflected my personality.

Teacher Recommendation #1: Did not read.
Teacher Recommendation #2: Did not read.
Counselor Rec: Did not read.
Additional Info/Rec: Did not read.
Interview: I thought this went pretty well. It lasted 30 minutes at a Starbucks near where the interviewer worked. He told me to talk about my high school life and I asked him questions about his college days. He didn’t take any notes or ask me anything specific.
Art Supplement: no

Other

Date Submitted App: 12/30/2016
U.S. State/Territory or Country: NY
School Type: Public
Ethnicity: Bangladeshi (Permanent Resident)
Gender: Male
Income Bracket Range: 60k
Hooks (URM, first generation, recruited athlete, development): URM maybe??

Reflection

Strengths: Now I don’t really think I ever had any. I guess I had some good looking academics going for me, and I am a National Merit semifinalist. I also know 6 languages.
Weaknesses: I feel like I am mediocre. I haven’t won Intel or won a major award. I feel like students going to top schools excel at a particular field and put a lot of time and effort in that passion like research in Molecular biology, competing in US Math Olympiad team, etc
What would you have done differently?: I don’t really know

@just_nag Did you resolve that error? I believe that I have completed all my financial aid documents, but I am getting an error on the “Where are you in the Process” page when I try to complete the attestations.

whoops I just read some earlier comments regarding this issue

I should wait it out then? Since it seemed to be a normal “issue”?

@math3matical Nope. Error persists.

Does anyone know how we can change the address on the application? We are moving in a couple of days and want to make sure we dont miss out on any communication. Appreciate any help.

hey guys, lurker here. Was hoping on some feedback on my app; sorry for the chance me but heres the link:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1967151-too-late-to-apply-anywhere-but-chance-me-anyway.html#latest

when will the decision release?

ugh notifications from this are giving me ptsd to the ed release bye guys

@Maggie1224 No later than April 15th (stated on website), but the first may possibly come out the last weeks of March.

schools should not wait until april 15 to release decisions. thats so dumb especially considering we need to make a decision by may 1st

CMU released RD decisions March 26 last year. Probably +/- 1 week of that date this year. good luck.

Does anyone else have “not received” in some spaces for their financial aid documents on their “Where Am I In the Process” page? I have no idea what the Schedule C, and K-1 documents are/ whether I have to submit them if I am not specifically requested to in the IDOC.

These are the tax forms that need to be filed if you own a business. So I assume your parents own a business and would have filed these documents with their tax returns. If you have any doubts you should probably call the financial aid office.

@math3matical. See above

Good Luck to all

When does CMU release decisions?!?!!??

@CMUpleaseaccept 3/31 if the same as last year.