Chance African American M for Georgia Tech, Cornell, Duke

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Demographics: African American, East Coast, Middle Class

I’m looking at Georgia Tech, NYU, Cornell. Am I overshooting or undershooting or are these good targets? Keep in mind Computer Science is MAD competitive

Intended Major(s): Computer Science

GPA: 3.5UW, 4.4W (not cool man >:(, but there’s a major upward trend: 2.7 Freshman → 4.0 Junior)

SAT: 1550

APS: 3 APUSH, 5 Lang, 5 Biology, 5 Comp Gov, 5 Comp Sci A

AWARDS:

USACO Gold (Top Programming Competition in the US for High School)

AP Scholar With Distinction

National Merit Finalist

ECs:

Started a website with 40k monthly visitors

Started another website with 4k monthly visitors

Contributed to numerous open-source projects

Varsity Lacrosse (captain)

JV Hockey (captain)

Student Council (vice president)

NHS

Senior Year Courseload: AP Physics, AP Psychology, AP Stats (Our school offers 9 APS)

Rigor: I’ve been taking the hardest classes offered to me every year

Other stuff: I took a bunch of college courses about Economics, Business, and advanced CompSci courses online (maybe colleges will like that I enjoy learning?)

What should I do to increase my chances???

2

Does your school offer AP Calculus? I cannot speak to NYU or Cornell, but I know that Georgia Tech likes their incoming freshman to have taken calculus in high school. You have very impressive ECs!

3

CS really isn’t all that terribly competitive, depending on where you go. It’s a ridiculously employable degree, so it doesn’t matter at all where you go to school at. Tech is vastly diverse, and it’s all based on practical hands-on experience. In fact, after about 3 years of experience, employers don’t even ask where you went to school. I can tell you with 100% certainty, you DON’T need to spend $300,000 on a bachelors from a school like Cornell or NYU. You really can’t go wrong with an affordable state university.