Chance a Junior for Ivies and other ultra-selective colleges

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hi everyone!

I’m a junior and having gotten my ACT score, the components of my application are starting to come to fruition. Keep in mind that in terms of AP scores and extracurriculars, things are still developing, obviously. This will be a fairly extensive post…sorry…

STANDARDIZED TESTING

ACT: 36 (35E, 36M, 36R, 36S, 10W) [only took once, Dec 2014]
SAT Subject Tests: World History (770), Math II (800)
AP: World History (5)…more to come, see current course load below…
PSAT: 228 (so I’ll get National Merit Semifinalist here in NY)
New York Regents - probably doesn’t matter to colleges, but: Algebra (97), Geometry (100), Alg2/Trig (100), Biology (98), Global History (99), Chemistry (100)

IN-SCHOOL CLASSES & PERFORMANCE

I attend a highly ranked, ultra-high-performing (97% of graduates attend college) suburban public high school in upstate NY. Classes here are fairly challenging, and colleges tend view the school with high regard.
Our GPA system is in the process of being changed, but as of now, it’s a 4.38 unweighted. (We don’t weigh GPAs at all.)
We also do not rank, but I am basically tied with another student for 1st in my class of ~350.

9th:
English Honors: H (means higher than an A+; discontinued after my 9th grade year)
Global History I Honors: H
Alg2/Trig Honors: A+
Biology Honors: A
French 2 Honors: A+
Computer Science I and II: A+
Orchestra: A+

10th:
English Honors: A+
AP World History: A+
PreCalculus Honors: A+
Chemistry Honors: A+
French 3 Honors: A+
Business Law (comes with college credit): A+
Orchestra: A+

11th current schedule:
AP English Lang. and Comp.
AP US History
AP BC Calculus
Physics Honors
French 4 Honors
Chamber Strings
Orchestra
*Note - at my school, 3 AP classes is pretty much the max. possible to schedule for juniors. I realize some juniors take 5+ APs, but at my school, that isn’t possible. My junior schedule is as rigorous as it’ll get here.

12th planned schedule:
SUPA English 12 Honors (a full-year equivalent of two Syracuse English courses - my school’s version of AP English for 12th grade)
AP Macroeconomics
AP Microeconomics
AP US Government + Politics
AP Statistics
Multivariable Calculus
AP Physics C
AP French 5 Honors
Chamber Strings
Orchestra

EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES

  • Piano (since 5 years old, have gone through NYSSMA, etc…a significant extracurricular for me in terms of time)
  • Viola (since 10 years old, part of audition-only private youth orchestra in addition to the two groups at my school, have gone through NYSSMA, have a chamber group that plays at various fundraising events, cocktail parties, etc.)
  • School newspaper, opinion section editor this year, likely editor-in-chief next year
  • Town’s Youth Court, am on board of directors
  • Model UN, attend conferences, etc.
  • Economics Club
  • IDEAL (just getting started, it’s a club from Johns Hopkins)
  • Member of Superintendent Advisory Committee (a few selected students who meet with district officials every month)
  • Interned at a local rehabilitation hospital’s foundation office last summer, in process of getting another internship for this summer

AWARDS
Nothing much other than National French Contest finalist, National Merit Semifinalist (presumably), AP award after this year

I'm a white male from an upper-middle-class household. Both of my parents are PhD college professors. The closest thing I have to a "hook" is that I was born in a Scandinavian country and lived there for the first few years of my life.

So in terms of colleges, I’m extremely interested in Wharton at University of Pennsylvania, and am considering applying ED there. I’m interested in studying some amalgam of economics, business, and/or political science with hopes of going into management consulting after college.

Here are the other colleges I’m looking at - this is not a final list, it will most likely be shortened as I do more research this year.

IVIES
All except Columbia. Would apply to Wharton at Penn. I have a legacy at Dartmouth.

“OTHERS”
Amherst, University of Chicago, Duke, Georgetown, NYU Stern, Northeastern, Pomona, Stanford, Swarthmore, Vanderbilt, WashU, Williams

Not expecting you all to go through each college I listed - I’m providing them just to give you an idea of what I’m looking at. Personally, I think the strong parts of my application will be the academics, test scores, and hopefully recommendations/essays. For extracurriculars, while I find myself with little/no free time nowadays between my various activities and regular schoolwork, I wouldn’t say that anything I’ve done is extraordinary, particularly at this caliber of schools.

So, thoughts? Suggestions? Any other schools I should add to my list for consideration? Areas of the application I could work on as I continue through this year?

Thanks very much in advance! :slight_smile:

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Anybody?

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It’s all rather good. Class schedule, good. EC’s, good. Awards, good. Test scores, great. But is there really anything that’s going to be put in front of an ivy admissions officer that’s going to “dazzle” them? I think this may be the most prevalent issue…

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@PurePhysics Thanks for the response. You’re right - like I said, for the Ivy caliber, while the “numbers” are good, my EC’s are pretty vanilla. I suppose this is where essays and recommendations come into play.

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You have the numbers and standard basis to get you a look by admissions, it just depends on how they feel you can contribute to their school… Ergo, the essays.

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Anyone else?

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You’re a strong student. Could probably get in anywhere. Do you have a personal identity or are you a joint venture between your parents?

How can you be interested in “Management Consulting” as a Junior?

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Do you play a sport or do anything physically active? What do you do for fun? Your stats are impressive but you seem almost “programmed.”

I too question how a 16-year-old knows anything about “Management Consulting,” or why it would be appealing other than as code for “making a lot of money.”

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@JustOneDad @sally305 Thanks for the replies. Don’t play organized team sports; I genuinely like my extracurriculars and truly do them “for fun” instead of just for college. Piano and viola especially, those are things I’ve continued with over the years because I find them fun (not really into the competitions for that). It just so happens that the activities I’ve become involved in happen to be on the “college prep” side of things.

Management consulting is a field that I find interesting and exciting. Are many high school juniors attracted to the field? No, probably not. But the assumption that it’s only for “making a lot of money” is a bit unfair.

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I have not heard management consulting described as “interesting and exciting.” I’m glad you think it might be–it’s hard work.

If this is truly what you want to do I’d apply ED to Penn for sure.

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That certainly wasn’t MY assumption. :wink:

If you are interested in that field, do your EC’s show any of your efforts to investigate/get involved in it?

Do you ever risk anything? Where’s the risk? Where is the passion? Do you ski the trees?

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@JustOneDad In the process of securing a consulting/management internship for this summer. :slight_smile:

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Is “securing” that internship a risk?
Any personal sports that challenge you daily?
Martial Arts?
Running?
Yoga?
What’s the biggest disappointment you ever had?

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I think you’re a really strong candidate, especially since you have great standardized test scores and therefore can move on to other issues. (You probably want one more subject test for Georgetown.) You won’t be one of those applicants who is struggling in the Fall to take the ACT/SAT/subject tests one more time and is running out of testing dates. Keep up the strong GPA and spend the next 7-8 months thinking hard about what is your top choice and think about applying EA or ED if you have a clear 1st choice (you mentioned Wharton) and finances permit. Some of the schools on your list offer a significant advantage if you apply early, others not so much.

My D was just admitted ED1 to Pomona. I would describe her as an unhooked high stats white girl. I think it helped her a lot to have a clear first choice and apply early to a school where her stats were comfortably within their profile. Her fellow honors students at her high school were all applying early to HYPS and most were deferred. In her junior year she was considering Stanford SCEA (she was legacy) but by fall of senior year she knew that Pomona was her #1. I think it helped her a lot to apply ED1 while lots of others with her stats were using their early app for HYPS.

Get out there and visit as much as possible and interview this summer and early fall if possible. When you visit, make sure the Admissions Office knows you were there. Usually you either pre-register and/or you check in when you arrive. Some schools count demonstrated interest more than others. But I don’t consider the Common Data Set to be the final word on this. I think demonstrating interest can only help at any LAC. For example, the Pomona CDS says that demonstrated interest is not considered. But when D filled out the Pomona Member Page on the Common App, there was a spot to list 3 contacts with the school, and D was able to list her junior year visit, senior year interview, and her meeting at her high school with the local rep. She also had kept notes of names, so when she listed her contacts she gave specific names of people she’d met/interviewed with. Again, not every college asks for or lets you list that, but you might not find out until you actually access that college’s member page so be prepared as much as possible.

Anyway, good luck. Enjoy the rest of your high school time. Think about starting on your essays this summer. My D had almost all of her essays (including supplements) done so that if she had not gotten into her ED school, she would have the other apps ready to file. By contrast, I saw others on Dec. 31/Jan. 1 on CC who had been deferred or rejected ED/EA who were rushing to finalize essays for their backup schools. Don’t be that person. Especially since the Common App website seems to crash when everyone is rushing to meet the deadline. Best wishes.

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I think you’re awesome, but I have no idea of your chances. Better than mine would have been, but that isn’t saying much lol. At least you will probably have NMF scholarships as a good backup option. What was your SAT I score? (Not that it matters for college admissions with a 36 ACT.)

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@albert69 Haven’t taken the SAT, and most likely will not take it despite the NMF stuff.

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Just out of curiosity, what does a 16- or 17-year-old do in such an internship?

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My biggest suggestion is to actually create a list of schools that you actually care about and would enjoy attending. Aside from being in the top 25 of the US News Rankings, your schools don’t have much in common. I don’t see how it is possible for one student to be happy in both Brown and NYU or in Northeastern and Swarthmore or in the bustling city of Cambridge at Harvard and in the remote town of Ithaca at Cornell. The vibes are so completely different. The student body is different. The local area is different. I understand that you have achieved greatly, but that doesn’t mean that it makes sense to only apply to the most selective schools in the country.

Brown and Princeton don’t even have business schools. So I highly recommend that you do research and visit schools extensively. Also, applying to that many reach schools doesn’t make sense in terms of quality of application. Yes, some supplements may over lap, but you will be looking at making at minimum 40 supplements. And you will most likely end up reducing the chance of you getting into these schools. 40 average supplements is not nearly as good as 10-12 amazing supplements. The quality of your applications will go down with this many schools and your grades in school will suffer too because of how much you have bitten off.

Your list needs A LOT of work. If I were you, I wouldn’t apply to more than 6 reach schools that you are REALLY interested in instead of 20, just for the sake of applying and hoping you get into an elite college.

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One extra thing, which is VERY important. Top management consulting firms recruit from the MBA programs at these universities. Usually not from the undergrads. So you’re better off trying to get into these schools for grad school. You should save money and try to get into one of these schools for grad school rather than spending it all on an undergraduate degree. Find a nice affordable option for UG because you have the stats for full tuition at a lot of schools and then, you can go all out for grad school.

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@CaliCash Thank you for your advice. In terms of the college list, like I mentioned, the ones I listed are a work in progress - you are exactly right. What I posted here is literally copy/pasted from “Colleges I’m Thinking About” on Naviance - it is by no means final at all. There is no way I’m applying to ~20 schools, which is about how long my list is now. I haven’t done any college visits yet, so I’m not sure what “vibe” exactly I want yet. After I begin visiting schools on the list, I’ll inevitably figure out what I like and what I don’t in terms of setting.

Sorry if I was misleading, but I’m not looking strictly for undergrad business. Most of the schools on my list do not have undergrad business – but they do have phenomenal economics departments. I’m still figuring out what direction I want to take in terms of that as well.

The list is a first draft, and I put it together mainly based on reputation, how my stats fit in, visits by recruiters to my high school, and recruiting for jobs in consulting, etc. (Top management firms do recruit from undergrad as well - Wharton, Harvard, and Dartmouth are huge feeders.)

Thank you again for providing such a thoughtful and helpful response. :slight_smile: