Chance an Asian Girl for Cornell Engineering ED (CS)

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Demographics

  • State/Location of residency: New York (in-state, even though I don’t think that matters for Engineering)
  • Type of high school: High competitive public HS, we consistently send several kids (think 10+ out of a class of 200) to Cornell every year
  • Gender/Race/Ethnicity: East Asian Female
  • Income Bracket: 100K
  • Other special factors (first generation to college, legacy, athlete, etc.): LGBT – I don’t think this is a real hook though anymore lol

Intended Major(s) Computer Science

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 4.00
  • Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): School doesn’t weigh
  • Class Rank: School doesn’t officially rank – but should be #1
  • ACT/SAT Scores: 1590 SAT (790 R&W, 800 M)

Coursework
15 AP Classes by Senior year, I’ve taken 10 AP exams and got 8 5’s and 2 4’s on them.

Extracurriculars

  1. Research (3 years): CS research at University labs, including a T5 school. My paper was published in a decent peer-reviewed journal conference (I was the first author/primary researcher) – this was actually where I met my mentor who’s a PhD at the T5 since we both had papers featured there. I also won 1st place at a few regional/state level science fairs and received about $10K in awards.

  2. Community Service club (3 years) (Leadership: President + Co-founder): Teach local elementary and MS students weekly lessons in science and coding – taught 400+ students total over the years. We’ve also ran a successful summer camp

  3. Social work internship (2 year) (Leadership): 500 hours of volunteering at a local teen crisis line. I have been trained to respond to various mental health emergencies. Leadership because I now train new volunteers

  4. Computer Science club (4 years) (Leadership: President)

  5. Science Olympiad (3 years) (Leadership: Head of Physics events): Our team did OK at states, but we never made it to nationals.

  6. Political internship for local campaign (1 year): Campaigned a couple hundred homes over the summer

  7. Medical shadowing (2 years): About 100 hours

  8. Some stereotypical Asian other stuff (A sport/musical instrument that I’m not very good at, NHS, math tutoring, etc., that probably won’t make a difference)

Awards

  1. Finalist and tri-state 1st place winner for a semi-prestigious national science competition (top 5/1000+ applicants)

  2. Finalist for another international science competition (top 15/5000+ applicants)

  3. National merit semi-finalist, will likely be named a finalist

  4. Won this award for most committed to volunteer service in my high school out of all co '22

  5. AP scholar with disctinction lol

Essays

My main essay is very personal to me and as about trauma I went through and how I overcame it by helping others through EC #3. I consider myself a good writer – my English teacher started crying while reading it and I had it looked over by some college essay consultants who all said they loved it.

Schools

Other than my ED to Cornell, I already applied EA to Georgia Tech, UMich, UIUC, Northeastern, as well as some in-state safeties.

For RD, I’m planning to shotgun ives + MIT, and the UCs.

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You look good to me but it’s still a lottery. All your schools are reaches for all but your resume is top notch. Good luck.

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Looks really good. Best of luck!

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So, is this effort just to see if you get in?
What’s your budget?

As for the UC’s,
Being from NY makes you a non-resident and makes you pay full fees of ~$67K+ per year. State financial aid goes to residents. Non-residents aren’t eligible for that FA, so your fees will be expensive.
As far as hooks, LGBT was never a hook. A hook is something the college wants or needs and is specific-a tuba player, an artist, an Olympian, a celebrity, etc.
Your HS record looks good, but make sure you have safeties. The competition for those schools is fierce, so you need to have backups.

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Oh - I missed the last line - UCs don’t take the test score so that hurts and unless your family has huge savings then you can’t afford them. OP - You are better to go with a school like Arizona (yes, not top ranked) or Alabama where you’d potentially go free…you’d be amazed at how many smart kids go to these schools. Bama has the most national merit finalists in the country.

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Yup – I’ve already applied to ASU as well as their honors college. Was thinking of applying to Bama but I’m a bit scared of potential racism (I’ve never been to the south before so I would know what to except)

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I meant U of A, not ASU. ASU is wonderful and perhaps you’d get a great offer but U of Arizona you’d get $35K off.

The South (I live here0 is all NYers and Californians…ok, a bit of an overstatement - but Alabama is 60% OOS and they’re coming from Illinois, NY, and out west, etc.

Here’s an article to give you comfort - not saying you should go to Bama but with your #s - youd’ be a home run financially. At MS State, Arkansas and others - but Bama is the big player nationally. Just another thought - if you were looking to cash in (and you would)…it’s why they have the most NMF and a huge out of state contingent.

Good luck.

How the University of Alabama Became a National Player - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

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