Chance for Princeton?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Princeton University
1

<p>(I am currently a junior in HS)
UW GPA: 3.42 (should be at least 3.5 when they recalculate at end of year)
ACT: 33 (Will retake because I didn't know there was no guessing penalty for the first time)
SAT Subject Tests: Physics, US History, Spanish, Math 1 or 2, possibly chem- should all be at least in 700s</p>

<p>AP Tests (by the time I apply)-Physics B and US History, hopefully will be 4s or 5s</p>

<p>2 years of soccer, got Best offensive player award freshman year</p>

<p>3 years of winter track</p>

<p>4 years of spring track (by end of next year)</p>

<p>Work-teach piano</p>

<p>I tutor in Spanish at my school for free, so that's community service I guess</p>

<p>I also played piano at a local retirement home, and have about 8-9 hours of service in Costa Rica working at an education/health clinic and working on a coffee plantation for community benefits</p>

<p>Have been playing piano 14 years (since age 3) and go weekly to Mannes College of Music prep division (admission is by audition, I live about 3 hours away) and my current piano teacher was a teacher at Princeton prior to Mannes</p>

<p>Won high honors in MAP evaluation (Musicianship Achievement Program) level III a few years ago</p>

<p>Studied for a year with a former Juilliard teacher, it was very rigorous hence a couple lower grades sophomore year which messed up my GPA, but helped a lot in terms of my playing, hopefully I can explain that during interview</p>

<p>Courses next year: AP Macro, AP Lit, AP Calc BC, AP Physics C, Spanish 6 Honors (it is a literature class and I am not taking Spanish this year only because I finished the curriculum at my school early and 6 is not offered this year), Personal Finance and Banking (honors I think)</p>

<p>Teacher recs- one from a Spanish teacher and one from a Math teacher, also maybe one from my teacher at Mannes</p>

<p>I interview well</p>

<p>I am a Hispanic male, hopefully that will help</p>

<p>I know my GPA kinda sucks, do I have any chance?</p>

2

<p>and by lower grades I mean C range. There were only 2</p>

3

<p>What’s your class rank? 3.42 is significantly lower than what Princeton normally accepts, so it would have to place you very high in your high school class to not render your chance negligible, even though the upward trend helps.</p>

4

<p>Yeah, I know it’s bad… my rank is top 30% because of it. My QPA is higher because I’ve done pretty much all the highest level classes.
Also, I just got a letter today that said I qualified for National Merit Scholarship. Does that help my chances?</p>

5

<p>Being merely in the top 30% makes admission to Princeton extremely unlikely unless you attend one of the most elite high schools in the country. </p>

<p>The letter you received probably indicated that you are one of 50,000 candidates for the National Merit Scholarship. Of these, 16,000 will become Semifinalists and 34,000 will be Commended. About 15,000 of the 16,000 will become Finalists, of whom 8,000 will be National Merit Scholars. This competition does not have any significant effect on your chance of admission to Princeton.</p>

6

<p>Okay, that’s a bummer, but thanks for your input! If you or anyone else has any further opinions, I would love to hear them!</p>

7

<p>Also, I’m curious as to if the other parts of my application, such as test scores, ECs and such are up to par. I’m also curious as to how much being a URM will help me.</p>