Chance me ED Northwestern, will chance back

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Applying to Medill ED for Broadcast Journalism

GPA: Above 4.0 UW, 4.5 Weighted. No B’s in high school

SAT:
800 Math
740 Writing
700 Reading (ugh) a little worried about this but CR+Math is 1500 with middle 50 being 1390-1540 which is 62 percentile
Total: 2240

SAT Subject:
Math 2: 770
US History: 770
Biology: 750

Classes: 2 honors- Freshman (no APs available), probably should have taken the other 2 honors offered… But, it’s Freshman year and everyone is still finding themselves

3 honors and AP US1 - Sophomore (1 AP available),

AP Lit, AP US2, AP Environmental Science, AP Micro, AP Psych, Honors Latin (and Academic Calc, but not interested in math and already a year ahead of most kids) -Junior

AP Lit, AP Physics , AP Micro, AP Prob/stat , AP Gov/Pol, AP Computer Science, Honors Latin - Senior

AP Scores:
Lang (5)
US (5)
Enviro (5)
Micro (5)
Psych (4)

Took 3 classes over the summer over my high school years.

ECs- Habitat for Humanity 4 years, Television station 4 year (Freshman year-technical director and control room worker for 3 shows a week in our high school, Soph/Junior/Senior sports anchor), Newspaper (Contributer 4 years, sports editor Sophomore, Editor in Chief Junior and Senior), Junior State of America 2 years, VP senior year, National Honors Society, Latin Honors Society, History Honors society, (leadership position all 3), started a tutoring program to help kids in elementary schools with their work (founder/president) Visited the school every week to help out. Technical director and editor of all school plays/musicals.

Independent coverage for SB Nation, major sports journalism website, and covered college and high school basketball in NY area… Press passes to major events and interviews with notable figures

Attended advanced sports broadcasting camp for 5 years and at the camp hosted own 10-minute sports show. Ran by two leading figures in broadcasting industry

Interest in school: Summer program and Medill, tour at the campus, great interview

Recommendations: From 1 outside of school- big figure in the broadcasting industry- 11/10, Lit/Newspaper- 11/10, TV station media teacher- 9/10

Volunteered in the Dominican Republic the summer before junior year to help the locals rebuild home, create better living arrangements, and integrate the English language and American culture to the underprivileged locals. Took suitcases worth of baseball equipment and school supplies I collected down to them.

Two-Week Summer Video Journalism Class at Harvard, limited to 15 kids from across the world, recommendation from the professor who won a Pulitzer for work in South Africa covering Apartheid (He was shot 4 times!!)

Intern at National Swim meet freshman year, published on the biggest swimming website in the world.

Contacted by Cartoon Network for some of my broadcasting work

Awards- National Latin Exam highest possible award all four years. Best Original Screenplay at NJ State High School Film Contest Challenge.

White, from Public school in NJ. No financial aid requested.

Essay- 10/10.

Worries: CR SAT score, the fact that math is 100 points HIGHER than CR and I’m going to Medill, no AP Calculus, could have taken two more honors freshman and one more as a sophomore than I did

Will chance back!!!

2

Well, thank god those poor things have seen what refinement looks like now. I fear for the unwashed savage who knows nothing of American culture, and has no alternative to his own base ways. As the great Joseph Conrad once wrote, in reference to another continent’s primitive people, “The horror! The horror!” Thank the Lord, you integrated American culture and ‘civilized’ them.

Joking aside, be very careful how you phrase this. Volunteer trips are often regarded as a sign of privilege, and a slip like this would be a bad move if the person reading your application is one of the 40 million Americans born abroad. A lot of people, including respected academics, policymakers, and ignorant fools like myself, actually regard the decline of local languages and traditions and the rise of a globalized US-centric culture as a bad thing.

Your grades and test scores will get you past the first hurdle at Northwestern, and your journalism-related ECs are such that I think you have a very strong chance, although Medill is of course competitive. In light of the 36% ED acceptance rate (though that’ll fall this year, as the number of applicants to top universities continues to grow exponentially), I’d put your chances at 45% or 50%.

3

I’d say your chances are better than 50%. There is no such thing as a 11/10 recommendation and recommendations from Junior/Senior year teachers in academic core subjects are typically more important. As noted above, be careful describing how you brought sunshine to the Dominican Republic. Bringing them baseball equipment is fine, bringing American culture is not so fine. When admissions officers read about summer trips to places like this it basically sends the message that you are privelaged and have access to opportunities others students don’t have. I wouldn’t worry about not having taken AP Calculus, you’ve taken enough AP classes and you have taken Calculus just not AP. Good luck!

4

@Wje9164be @NotVerySmart how do you feel about critical reading ? And I might have phrased the culture wrong. I mean I brought items/games that they wouldn’t have necessarily had access to. Not Americanizing them. And we did help in the schools with teaching teenagers English… Which is a very important part of their curriculum.

5

Your reading score is at the 96th percentile and your overall score is at the 99th percentile - I think your fine.

6

I didn’t think you really meant that you were Americanizing the kids. But be very careful how you phrase such things. My first reaction upon reading your description of the trip was not good, and when readers have 12 minutes to go through your entire application, you don’t get a chance to make a second impression.

The CR won’t be a problem. The SAT is chiefly an indicator not of English or math skills, but of a student’s ability to take the SAT.

7

“integrate the English language and American culture to the underprivileged locals”-- Lol disclosing this would get you rejected in a heartbeat. Seriously. Going to a different country and stripping a way their own culture and language and replacing it with your own hegemonic ideology? Over the summer, we all read the book The Inconvenient Indian that lambasted what white Europeans did to the Native Americans when they got here. In fact, there has been discussion to change some of the names of different things on campus named after John Evans who was responsible for a lot of Native struggles and oppression in the 1800s. Northwestern is extremely politically correct and if you truly believe that teaching underprivileged people overseas American culture and robbing them their identity is a good thing, Northwestern is NOT for you. Save the ED application and apply elsewhere. If that mentality comes across in your application, you won’t get in anyway.

8

I don’t mean it like that and would not phrase it like that @CaliCash I’m sorry if it came across that way what I meant was taking sports equip and American board games and such to them and helping teach English in the schools to the teenagers as it was a major part of their curriculum

9

Sorry, am I not understanding correctly? I thought someone with a 4.0 GPA and 2200+ SAT had a very solid chance of admission.