Sophomore Year: AP World History (5), AP Biology (5), AP Calculus BC (5, alongside AB subscore), AP Computer Science Principles (5, perfect score recognized by county)
Junior Year: AP Physics C: Mechanics (5), AP Physics C: Electricity and Magnetism (5), AP US History (5), AP US Government (5), AP Statistics (5)
Senior Year: AP Chemistry, AP Language and Composition, AP Computer Science A, AP Macroeconomics, AP Microeconomics
Governor’s Honor Program - Mechanical Design Finalist
National Honor Society
Mu Alpha Theta
Awards
Science Fair - Competed in County Fair, BioGENEius, Sigma Xi, Junior Symposium (all competitions for science fairs, I wasn’t exactly sure if to put this in awards or extracurriculars since it is like an extension of research)
Academic Achievement (basically an award given by a teacher to a selected student for subject excellence) - Biology, Precalculus, American Literature (9, 10, 11)
Extracurricular Activities (4 for MIT)
Research at Emory - Published paper as equivalent lead author in a journal with impact score ~5, drug patent-pending, working on an additional paper during Senior Year via an extension of research
Volunteering at Church - Led/played for several worship services for my Youth group of around ~50 for 6 years, it’s something that has always been important to me
Korean Translation - Translate Korean services to English in real-time to a congregation of around 500~ people, and have translated captions for independent theaters
Vex Robotics - Worlds Qualifier (2022, 2023) and part of the outreach committee
Additional Extracurriculars (For CommonApp):
Technology Student Association - Representative at State Leadership Conference, CAD Architecture (State Finalist), Music Production Team Leader
Library Volunteer (78 hours, over the summer)
Internship at a local legal firm working with computerized data entry
Essays (CommonApp)
I’ve always been a fairly strong writer, and my school has several opportunities to help with editing and reviewing essays - I’ll likely be writing about my research project, and having failed several science fair-oriented competitions before pivoting to publishing
Letters of Recommendation
Biology Teacher - I had her for both my 9th and 10th grades due to a teacher leaving, and due to COVID I was one of the only people in person, so the letter should be great
Literature Teacher - She’s written letters for other students that got into great schools and I feel that I have a fairly good relationship, so the letter should also be good
Research Mentor - I’ve secured a letter, but this is mainly just for the research supplemental. Does anyone have information about how that’s sent in? I’ve been trying to look online, but since the EA application isn’t open yet, it’s been difficult.
Schools
Safety - Georgia State, University of Georgia
Match - Emory University, Georgia Institute of Technology (EA)
Reach - MIT (EA), Caltech, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, University of Pennsylvania, Carnegie Mellon, Stanford
I would say you can apply to Ga State but you don’t need to.
I suspect you’ll get into a reach or two - and certainly one between Emory and GA Tech. What would you major in at Emory - isn’t the joint with Ga Tech graduate only?
OP said he’s a first gen immigrant (not relevant for college admissions), not first gen to college.
Agreed, OP has an impressive profile and is competitive for all his reaches.
@ceIebix, you haven’t mentioned your budget - that’san important consideration.
The only other thing I’ll add is that your best chances at most of your other reaches (not Caltech) are in the early round, but you’ll only be apply to one of these REA/ED. You may want to reconsider your application strategy. I don’t believe MIT provides you an advantage applying EA.
That’s very true, but MIT is my first choice - it’s been my dream college.
I don’t have a particular desire for any of the other ivies, so it would be difficult to decide which one to REA/ED.
As for my budget, my family earns >150K per year and has saved up a lot of money for college, due to my brother enlisting in the Air Force rather than going to college. I’m extremely lucky to have a lot of freedom and support from my parents.
Sure, you don’t need to apply REA/ED if you don’t want to, but REA is not binding. So you could apply REA somewhere and then apply RD to MIT.
That’s good to hear. But are they willing and able to pay $80-85k per year ($320-340k total) if you don’t qualify for aid? This is very important - so ask them explicitly.
I agree with other responses that you are very competitive for any university.
Probably something like 80% or 85% of applicants to MIT and Stanford are academically qualified to attend. Of course they accept a far fewer number of applicants. These are reaches, but very reasonable reaches for which you are very well qualified to attend and do well.
Georgia Tech is an excellent university. The main thing that comes to my mind is why would any particular student prefer MIT over GT or GT over MIT? I actually had this conversation with a GT graduate recently (I am an MIT graduate) and we did not come up with much (other than summers which are better at MIT, and winters that are better at GT – we each had a glass of beer in hand and were being polite). You might want to look closely at the graduation requirements for each university – considering both general requirements and major-specific requirements.
If you do get into GT and one of your reaches (let’s assume MIT), you might want to think carefully about whether the difference in cost is worth the difference given how excellent both universities are. Saving money for a possible master’s degree or some other purpose might not be a bad idea.
MIT is indeed a great school. It is a LOT of work, but it looks like you are ready for it. One question however: Why is it your dream school?
I think that you are likely to do very well regardless of which university you attend.
I agree with your comments about the OP’s first gen status. I will point out to the OP that it is worth looking at each school’s definition of first gen students as a few define it as first to get a US college education. At those, it could possibly provide an admissions and merit/aid boost.
Yes, worth double checking, but for OP’s knowledge: there are very few schools that define first-gen as first to have a U.S. education. The majority exclude applicants whose parents have a college degree from anywhere.
I’m a GA resident so familiar with our state’s schools, public and private. While I think you will have options with your impressive profile, your family may want to compare costs when decision time comes around next spring.
I would leave GA State in the mix only because it is a great option for kids who want to transfer to GaTech (although I believe you will be accepted EA at Tech, the last few years of admission results make me cautious). GA State shares some residential and other student facilities with Tech so a kid with that intention has options to get involved with Tech students during freshman year, making a transition easier after transfer. Hopefully is a non-issue but better safe than sorry. Just my two-cents.
Best of luck and congratulations on your amazing accomplishments to date!
I think you are an extremely well qualified applicant and will be competitive at every school you are looking at. Your perfect AP score (achieved by only a few hundred students around the world) is impressive as are your ECs. I think you will get into Georgia State, UGA and Georgia Tech - with the rest it is hard to say since things are so competitive. I do think you have a good chance to get into one of your reaches but it is hard to say which one(s). Before applying, though, you need to confirm that the cost is within your family’s budget - if you don’t qualify for any need based aid some of these schools are $90k per year so run the NPC for any school you are considering.
I think the main reason is that I want to broaden my environment, in a sense - I’ve lived in Georgia in the same area for most of my life, and I want to experience going to a new place and meeting new people. A lot of my current friends and already-graduated friends are attending Georgia Tech, and I want to have a fresh start.
Furthermore, I agree that Georgia Tech and MIT seem to have similar levels of education in biomedical engineering; however, I do feel that MIT attracts extremely passionate people, and I think that social experience would be valuable. Prestige is also nice, of course, but I don’t think that it matters all too much for engineering.
As for master’s degrees, I haven’t put that much research into that area, but you bring up a good point. I’ll be sure to look into it.
My parents have let me know that cost is not an issue, and I’m not eligible for any form of financial aid.
I’m not entirely sure, as I’ve wanted to work in computer hardware engineering for a while throughout elementary and middle school. After getting the opportunity to do research in bioinformatics and biochemistry, however, I’ve come to really enjoy the subject, and will likely pursue it in college.
I don’t have a strong interest in pre-med, although I may enjoy working in academia as a researcher.