Demographics:
US domestic
State/Location of residency: CA
Type of high school: Pretty large high school, very competitive
Gender/Race/Ethnicity: Asian Indian Female
Other special factors (first generation to college, legacy, athlete, etc.): N/A
Intended Major(s): Double major in biochemistry or biological sciences and English
GPA, Rank, and Test Scores:
Unweighted HS GPA: 3.85
Weighted HS GPA: 4.24
Class Rank: N/A
ACT: 34
SAT: 1550
Coursework:
AP/Honors Enrollment classes:
10th: AP Calculus AB, AP World History
11th: APUSH, AP Lit, AP Music Theory, AP Statistics, Honors Spanish IV, AP Biology
12th (upcoming year): AP Gov, AP Lang, AP Psych, AP Calc BC, AP Spanish, AP Chemistry
Awards: N/A
Extracurriculars (strong point):
3-week summer medicine program, gained exposure to the medical field (program hosted by pretty prestigious university)
Ecology research summer before sophomore year, published in summer program journal
TA’d for freshman english/AP Lang teacher
Organic chemistry research for approx. 2+ years, 7-time published, presenting at American Chemical Society conference (as a high schooler, pretty big feat)
Executive director and co-founder of surgical literature journal club for pre-med and medical students, run by myself and other surgeons
Currently interning in an executive office in pretty big company
Cellist for 8+ years, in reputable private orchestra (touring Europe next summer)
Currently working on a blog site where I’ll write about a variety of topics (related to humanities)
Currently working on a site with co-researchers regarding research in general
Secretary of high school club related to music tutoring
On student advisory board of one of the most prestigious journals for high school research
a couple others, member in a couple of other HS clubs
Essays
Haven’t written them yet, but will be pretty strong
LOR
AP Lit teacher (virtual all year, but I was a good student and should be a good LOR)
AP Biology teacher (also virtual all year, same as AP Lit)
Freshman english teacher I TA’d for sophomore year (hopefully should be good)
UW GPA’s a little on the low side for a school like Cornell, especially for an ORM going to a large HS in CA. But it depends on the highest GPA in your class (and historical GPAs from your school) - if you know what that is, it could be helpful for evaluating your chances. It also depends on the strength of the ECs among other students at your school.
This comes off as a little judgemental. A 3.8 at my high school once when he had to convert from 100 scale to 4.0 was an A-, which means a student got an average of 90-92% in their classes. If OP is specifically skilled in, say, quantitative sciences and math, they may be getting high B’s in their history, foreign language, music, etc. classes, especially if their high school is truly competitive and they are taking the most rigorous courseload. I agree that more context about research would be preferable, but this student has as good of a chance at Cornell as most other unhooked applicants. Still a long shot, but not impossible, and definitely worth applying if this is OP’s top choice and it’s affordable.
Of course, the student should apply and see what happens.
Perhaps. However, I do have some context for this. Both my husband and I are PhD’s and have a pretty good idea of what it takes to do research in something like organic chemistry. Looking at the OP’s course load, junior year does not have a strong STEM component - student took AP Stats even though they had AP Calc AB is sophomore year. They should have been able to take AP Chem junior year - especially if they are doing research in chem (unless the school has some wacky prerequisite sequence) . Maybe the OP can clarify.
The list of EC’s tells me that the student has access to university level research and top execs ,but no mention of any ISEF style competition or any other independent verification. As a fellow Indian American, I am really starting to wonder about the preponderance of these types of EC’s . I have family in Silicon Valley who are top execs at tech firms, and so I am pretty familiar with what’s accessible.