Chance a south korean humanities girl? (unusual background)

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>My problem is I'm a South Korean national, but I've had to move around since I was about 2 because of my dad's job.
I've lived in 4 different countries/5 different cities and spent about 2~3 years within one country before moving to another, so my ECs aren't constant/strong.
Also, I recently moved back to South Korea about 6 months ago, and since I've only had 2 years of Korean-language schooling during elementary (the rest was all in English), my grades took a pretty dramatic drop.
So, yeah - factoring in the insane ranking system of South Korean high schools (the average for exams range from high 40s~mid60s), I have no idea of whether I have a chance or not - I haven't been able to find any precedents and I'd welcome any type of advice/chancing. Thanks in advance :)</p>

<p>Stats:
GPA
Freshman/Sophomore year (in international school): 3.7(4.0 max), unweighted
Korean High School Year 1: top 20% (don't know what my actual rank is yet)
(btw, currently in last month of Year 1, will move up to Year 2 in March)</p>

<p>SAT: 800CR/700M/750W
TOEFL: 119
(btw, planning to take AP Comparative Govt., AP Art History and AP Psych on top of Korean h.s. workload)</p>

<p>ECs
-Managing Editor and Culture Editor of The Korea Times Jr. Press Association
-Unpaid internship at JoongAng Daily
(both English language national newspapers)
-Model United Nations
-Graphic Artist at former school's magazine
-50 hours community service</p>

<p>Additional info:
Middle income but badly need financial aid </p>

<p>Hooks:
-Fluent in Korean and English (took Honors English sophomore year), proficient in French, Spanish, Chinese
-Moved around all my life, lived in 4 different countries and 5 different cities
(transferred schools every 2~3 years)
-Adjusted to Korean h.s. system after almost continuous English-language schooling
-Planning on submitting short stories/poetry to literary magazines soon, idk if they'll be accepted though </p>

<p>Aiming for:
Amherst
Williams
Dartmouth
Swarthmore
Yale
(for 2012)</p>

<p>What I'm worried about are my ECs - it's really hard to have any kind of life at all besides academics here because of the system, and to tell the truth I've nearly had to cut out all my ECs for the past 6 months because adjusting has been really hard. Any advice would be welcome.</p>

2

<p>…bump!</p>

3

<p>You have a pretty good chance at all of those schools.
No guarantees, though. </p>

<p>You might want to take the SATs again after studying more. It’s fine if your CR score drops since most of those schools just look at the highest scores in each category. </p>

<p>I doubt you’d be penalized for not having a lot of ECs under those kinds of circumstances. You just have to explain your situation really well. Don’t leave any room for misunderstandings.</p>

4

<p>Mudskipper, thanks so much! Yeah, I just wanted a rough idea of whether I had half a chance or not. There seem to be so many qualified applicants out there O___<em>O
aaagh, SATs T</em>T haha well, you gotta do what you gotta do…thanks again for the advice!</p>

5

<p>…bump!</p>

6

<p>If you were an American student, you would a great shot at all of these schools, but since you are not (Im guessing since you are in South Korean national), you are going to have a really hard time getting in, especially to Yale. The standards for international students are much higher than for American students. </p>

<p>Congratulations on your quintligualness(???) No idea how to say it. You’re one of the few people Ive met that can speak more languages than me. </p>

<p>If you want to look at my thread, it’s titled “Might As Well Add My Thread…”</p>

7

<p>Well, ain’t that a sucker. :stuck_out_tongue:
Yeah, I am a South Korean national (unfortunately). I do know that the standards for international students are pretty high - but do you know how much higher they are compared to American students? Just a benchmark would be ok. </p>

<p>Haha - quintlingualness. XD but you speak cooler languages - French and Spanish are so much more boring compared to German and Italian. Thanks for the advice, I’ll check out your thread, but what I know about college admissions could fit on the tip of a small pin, so take what I say with a grain of salt.</p>

8

<p>…bump!</p>

9

<p>

</p>

<p>There are many other well-qualified applicants from your country. Considering the reputation of students from your country, I would say that all your colleges are reaches.</p>

10

<p>0o you know any examples of international students (or basic stats) who would be qualified as matches? (for the colleges I’d like to get into)</p>