<p>Hey misterwang, first off, I’d like to congratulate you on your class rank as this is the first thing colleges will probably admire when they turn to your profile. Now, I will tell you now that I am not your standard “chance me to chance you back poster”. I am not here to boost your ego, or quell any sort of anxiety that is strangling you as I type these very words. I am here to give you a real picture, an accurate assessment of your chances. Now here’s what I think…</p>
<p>First, your class rank/gpa is spectacular. Good job. Your SAT is also quite good, good enough. At the moment, however, the only schools I would label as a low reaches are Dartmouth, Brown, and Cornell: here is why. Your numeric stats are very good, however your EC’s are severely lacking in focus. You have karate. You have music. You have Biology. You have Chemistry. You have Physics. You have Neuroscience. You have Spanish and NHS. I look at these and I can’t see this picture of you, this spark of passion that admissions officers are looking for. You lack focus, and this is what’s barring you from most of the Ivy’s. None of your extracurriculars come out as extremely unique. Sure, your band has gone far, but unless you plan to major in music, that won’t give you an advantage against every other Ivy applicant who plays violin, flute, french horn, and bassoon on the side. This summer, if your goals remain, you need to work on getting something unique and by spending more time on one individual area of study. Since you plan on shadowing a surgeon, you may want to found an organization in the poorer neighborhoods to encourage kids to pursue science (I’m assuming this is where you want to major in, but I know because you’ve mentioned that you PLAN to shadow a surgeon, and not because it’s officially on your transcript). Uniqueness, uniqueness, uniqueness. You must work on this if you wish to compete for spots even in the middle ivies. Honestly, Mr. Wang, you look like every other Asian applicant: good at science, music, and math.</p>
<p>All in all, if you continue down the route you’ve taken, I can only label Cornell, and posibly Dartmouth and Brown, as low reaches. The rest are still high reaches unless you can work on the putting your passion into your extracurriculars. You are a competitive applicant, but schools these day want you to give more! Here is what I propose:</p>
<p>Give up on retaking the SAT, it’s honestly not worth your time, and instead focus your EC’s and work on getting into something unique. That is all, I hope you take my advice, as this is the only way you can hope to get your chances up.</p>