Chance me for brown university ed (class of 2025)

Colleges and Universities A-Z Brown University
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Brown is honestly my dream school and if I were to get in ED I would 100% go

grades/info:

  • 3.7 unweighted, 3.9 weighted
  • 12 APs (plus 5 more this year), 7 honors courses
  • I’m not happing with me first SAT but I’m taking it again next week
  • my class rank is top 8%
  • I’m in a competitive STEM magnet program in my school
  • black female, middle class

ecs:

  • competitive gymnastics for 13 years, multiple state and regional awards, I’ve been invited to multiple college camps
  • tennis for the past two years, I play doubles for my school team and a club team off-season
  • I started a tutoring business and I tutor math; I’ve tutored in middle school math, algebra 1, pre-algebra, geometry, and pre-calc; I tutor for about 6-7 hours a week
  • I founded the national art honor society at my school and am the treasurer, I organize field trips and keep track of finances; last year I painted a 10 ft mural in my school; I also organized a soup dinner to raise money for charity
  • I am a physician’s shadow at an optometrist’s clinic; I was the only student they’ve accepted; I basically do all the stuff an intern/shadow does + I’ve gotten to watch procedures and tests, and I answer patient’s questions
  • I was a debutante in a cotillion for alpha kappa alpha my junior year and now for senior year; I have over 45 hours of community service, led cultural activities, and was awarded a community service scholarship
  • I was elected the youth organizer of my local chapter of the democratic party; I organized a protest over the summer and gave a speech at the event; I helped elect and work with a state rep and the police chief in different community stuff like charity work, campaigning, and initiatives; I was invited to the GA state democratic convention
  • I was selected as a chief science officer for my school; I planned, proposed, and organized the building of an outdoor STEM classroom in my school (unfortunately the building was halted when school shut down); I give STEM talks to middle school students
  • I started the newsletter for the magnet program at my school and recruited a team of writers; I write for the student spotlight section and am the editor; this involves interviewing students, weighting articles, editing other writers’ drafts, and getting the issue ready for publication
  • as a hobby, I write poetry and have a blog; I’m also finishing up a novella
  • tons of volunteering: the Atlanta science festival, I’m a member of almost every national honor society at my school so lots of volunteering with that (a clean-up project for a local lake, hosting STEM nights for middle schoolers, etc.), and volunteering/working at competitions for gymnastics; I organized and volunteered at the yearly 5k for my magnet program since it was started my freshman year
  • In January, I’m interning for the state rep that I work with but I didn’t include that since it hasn’t happened yet

awards (nothing major):

  • AP scholar with Honor
  • two honors night awards for literature and biology
  • the work ethic award from Lindenwood University at a gymnastics camp
  • I was nominated for the Posse Foundation scholarship and am currently a semi-finalist

other stuff:

  • I skipped two grades so I’m graduating at 16
  • I plan on majoring in either neuroscience or cognitive neuroscience (I wrote a little about this in my common app personal statement
  • I really like writing and consider myself to be good at it so my essays are ~pretty~ strong IMO
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My main thought is that your extracurriculars are very “spread out”. Perhaps not a whole lot different than a lot other high-achieving applicants, but when it comes to applications to very selective schools you will want to organize and somewhat pare things down to a few focused themes. Are you for example a good (or very good) candidate for Neuro who is also a credible prospect for the gymnastics team? Then things related to those will be what you put out in front, with less relevant activities listed where appropriate but not emphasized.

I’m not sure if writing should be another area to highlight – maybe first get critical feedback from teachers at your school or from others who could evaluate your best work relative to others’. In any event, go more formal on application-related things, using caps and periods where they belong (doesn’t matter in this venue).

You could maybe build an additional theme around volunteer work, but unless you develop an activity in the coming school year which closely ties in to Neuro or medicine, that might not help you much.

I assume (don’t know) that age 16 puts you at a disadvantage in terms of perceived maturity relative to most candidates. Emphasizing anything leadership-related from your EC’s (always a good idea anyway) might help there.


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but I’m taking it again next week < I remember walking into my guidance counselor’s office and seeing on his desk something from the College Board with my name, along with some PSAT scores printed underneath. I kept looking between my name and the numbers, figuring I wasn’t seeing right because scores that low couldn’t be for straight-A me (a 54 verbal is the one I remember). That was my introduction to how even though I test well most of the time, I don’t test well all of the time. Good luck next week – I expect you’ll beat my equivalent of a 540 SAT verbal with no problem ; )

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I appreciate the feedback! And btw, I typed this super fast just to get feedback so I definitely wasn’t trying to write formally or anything like that.

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Update: I typed this very quickly with the intention of receiving general feedback, so I apologize for the spelling/grammatical errors. I did not proofread!

5

Perfectly ok, and what I imagined. I wanted to mention something anyway to be on the safe side, on the chance that lower case/missing punctuation was a “signature style” thing (a la ee cummings), and to a 16-year-old brain it seemed obvious that Admissions would really warm to their sense of individuality. [Knowing my luck, this Spring the perennial annual headline will come with a slant: “Student Accepted to All of the Ivys – Admissions Officers Rave About Stylish Use of All-Lower-Case” : ]