Chance Me: Brown, Cornell, UNC, GA Tech, NYU, JHU

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hello all, I am a rising senior in a somewhat noncompetitive school in Georgia. I plan to go to college to major in a subject in the general area of biochemistry. Please tell me my chances at my top schools; I know that most, if not all, of these colleges are reaches for me. Thanks!

Indian Male
Georgia

Stats:
GPA: 4.0 (We don’t use weight)
Class Rank: 20ish/500
SAT: 1510 (800 M, 710 R/W)
SAT II:Taking October
APs: AP Gov (5), Ap World (3), AP Bio (3), AP Calc BC, AP Physics C mech, APUSH, AP Lang
Senior year APs: APES, AP Spanish Lang, AP Chem, AP Stat, AP Lit
Biology Subject Test: 670 (also retaking this and taking math II in October and hoping for 700+)

ECs (I’m just going to list literally everything I’ve done in high school):
Math Team: All 4 years of hs, Won 3rd place at GSU competition, we don’t have a captain
Science Bowl: 10th,11th, (Captain)12th. Won 3rd place at regional competition with about 20 other schools.
GHP (Governor’s Honors Program): Made it past 3 rounds and became a finalist in the area of Spanish
UGA Research Program: Applied to and made it into a research intern program at UGA. Currently doing research under a professor and I will be published in the acknowledgements of the paper.
Volunteering: (10th grade summer) Volunteered at 2 hospitals over summer for total of about 80 hours. (9th and 10th grade) Volunteered at summer camp for disabled children for total of 75 hours. Volunteered at soup kitchen, tutored high schoolers in calculus, bio, and other subjects for honor societies.
Multiple meaningless honor societies: NHS, Mu Alpha Theta, Spanish National Honor Society, Science National Honor Society, Tri- M Honor Society. (Leadership positions here are meaningless popularity contests)
Band: Played trumpet since 6th grade. Practiced, auditioned, and successfully made it into District Honor Band (8th, 10th, 11th). Currently in highest band, Wind Ensemble. Played in Marching Band for 9th and 10th; won multiple awards at marching band competitions.
Temple Youth Group: Volunteered many hours. Actually practiced and danced in Grand Finale for India Day.
Varsity Swim Team: Swam for school swim team. Boy’s Swim team has won regionals all years.
Varsity Tennis Team: Only played 10th grade because didn’t make it 9th, and I switched schools after 10th and state rules say that you can’t play varsity sports once switching schools. Won regionals and ended up 6th in state.

Note: I was in the IB program in 10th grade, but I, along with the vast majority of my classmates, dropped out because it was the first year of the program at our school. That is why I got sent to another school.

2

Your stats are in the ballpark for any of these schools but they are reaches for everyone. Brown, JHU, and Cornell being the "reachiest"on your list. Will you apply ED to your favorite? Both Cornell and JHU have much higher acceptance rates in the ED round.

As I say on this board all the time to everyone, put more match and safeties on your list.

3

bump

4

bump

5

bump please help

6

I’m a Senior in Georgia as well, so take my advice with a grain of salt. Your SAT and GPA is in the ballpark for these schools. If you can do well on the Subject Tests, then your stats will be competitive for your schools. Your ECs also look pretty good as well. Of course, those schools are reaches for everybody (except for maybe Tech in-state). Also, I would say not to apply to UNC because it is extremely hard to get in out of state. They have to fill a quota of in-state applicants, so if you want to apply to a school in the Carolinas I’d say Duke since it’s private and doesn’t have to fill up its class with 80% Carolina kids.

Edit: Just checked UNC, and they can only admit 18% of their class out of state, so you’re competing with 49 other states for an extremely small number of spots.

7

Thanks man, I appreciate it.

8

bump

9

I’d have to agree with the comment on applying ED to your top choice if you have one and not applying to UNC OOS. That will improve your chances considerably. Your best chance of the schools mentioned is NYU, the others are really going to be reaches.

10

Assuming all are RD apps:

Brown, Cornell: Reach
JHU: Low reach
UNC OOS: High match
GA Tech in-state, NYU: Match/low match

If you have a safety picked out, you’re fine.