Chance Me for ED to SCS

Colleges and Universities A-Z Carnegie Mellon University
1

Race: White (European)
Gender: Male
State: Ohio
School: Non-competitive HS which sends about 80% of graduates to a local community college
GPA: 3.36UW, 3.57W-- the admissions officer with whom I spoke said that grades prior to freshman year are NOT considered, so my actual GPA would be a 3.4UW and 3.8W. (major upward trend and increase in course rigor)
Rank: 24/209 (as I said, I come from a low-resource area of my state)
SAT: 1530 (740 RW 790 M) super-scored
SAT II: 800 math 2, 740 physics, 600 us history :’(
ACT: 33 (35M, 35R, 31E, 32S)
AP’s:
Calculus AB (4), US History (3), Stats (4), Physics 1 (4)
Senior Year: AP Physics C: Both Parts, AP English Lit, AP Comp Sci A, Calculus BC, European History, Dual-enrollment Chem, Government and Politics, Biology

ECs:
Tennis (3 yrs)
NHS - Couldn’t join last year due to my transferring to this school (1yr)
Robotics/Engineering team - (2 years)
Forgot to mention chess and speedcubing competitions :frowning:
Volunteer at local library - started a class on programming and taught Python and ML during seminars, weekly (40+ hours, could not start until age 16 and began one week after reaching said age)
Student mentorship program
Internship program (starting two internships at NASA and a private contracting firm in two months)
Leadership academy
YouTube channel with videos on machine learning, programming, game development, etcetera with nearly 1,000 subscribers

Experience: know C#, Java, JS/Unityscript, HTML, CSS, Python, Lua, and C

LORs: guidance counselor, stats teacher, and physics teacher (honestly, phys is the only notable one)

Unusual Circumstances:

  • Autism which was not diagnosed until just two years ago-- because of this, I suffered, emotionally, and ended up moving schools thrice between eighth grade and senior year
  • Skipped my sophomore year of HS due to extreme demotivation resulting from a lack of challenging material (once I transferred, my grades went from a 3.2UW between 7th and 9th to a 3.5UW during 11th and, this year, a 3.9-4.0UW)
  • Anxiety disorder which was diagnosed at the same time as my Autism-- led to hypochondria so severe that I had to start therapy (spurred by an erroneous, terminal diagnosis ascribed to my mother)

Want to study either AI or CS as a bachelor’s

2

Also, I did 7 years of 4H and won 1st in robotics, 5 times, and 1st in all of engineering, 4 times.

GPA: they do not use anything before sophomore year, so mine would be a 3.5UW and 4.0W.

3

I would not let colleges know about skipping a year of high school due to demotivation. I don’t think its in your favor to disclose medical conditions to any school. I would not discuss that with any college, but just do the best you can
and get whatever support you need. Are you sure you are ready for going away to college?

I don’t know what you mean by “low resource area of Ohio”. I do not think thats relevant to college applications so much so do NOT go over it in your college applications.

Things that are relevant: 1. Did either of your parents attend college? If not, you can qualify as “first generation college” which is a huge boost
2. did you take extra math exams like AMC 10 or AMC 12. Scores on those need to be high to get into CMU SCS

Your math scores look very solid,. apply to Ohio State, U of Maryland and other top schools for CS in your region.
Its not really that easy to chance someone for the small size of CMU’s CS department. Its just so small.

Aim for a larger state school as it will be more fun and more likely to get in.

4

@Coloradomama I did apply to OSU, CWRU, and some other OOS schools.

When I say that I’m in a low-resource region, I mean that I’m not in Columbus or a somewhere similar. I did disclose my disorder due to the fact that it is 100% relevant to my situation; however, it is not exactly central to my application.

I am not first generation. Also, my therapist recommended that I attend a smaller school due to my not handling large environments like OSU very well.

Lastly, my point of emphasizing my being in a smaller town is that we don’t have many of the ECs that other schools and regions. I really do hope that the context which that provides will help my case, to some extent.

I know that it’s hard to give a chance and even harder to do so in a case like mine, but can you ay least tell me if I’m a competitive applicant or not? This is, by no means, anything other than my top reach school, so don’t worry about my list, as a whole. I’ve backed this up with plenty of matches and safeties.

5

@ScrubStudent

I agree with @Coloradomama. And I also have to wonder how well you would handle the ‘stress culture’ of a school like CMU. And I imagine the admissions folks would probably have the same concern.

There are a lot of red flags in your statements. I hope you find a nurturing environment but I wouldn’t recommend CMU.

6

@SkepticalOfMost I can understand your perspective, but I’m not exactly sure how a “stress culture” relates to my wanting to attend it. I know that the workload is extreme; still, I feel that I would be perfectly capable of handling it.

So, then, I pose two questions of you:

  1. Do you believe the aforementioned things due to my having an anxiety disorder? If so, please realize that this pertains to stressors unrelated to my environment. On the contrary, I suffer from extreme hypochondria which is, for the most part, the result of changes to my general physiology.
  2. This thread was supposed to ask, of you, how competitive an applicant I am. Can you not give feedback on the core question, here?
7

@ScrubStudent,

The ‘stress culture’ has nothing to do with your desire, it has to do with your fit and chances for success at CMU. Which is how the school is likely to evaluate you. Despite your desire, you haven’t demonstrated consistent levels of accomplishment/achievement commensurate with the standards/expectations of the school. Your desire seems to exceed your demonstrated abilities…

I would never discourage someone from applying anywhere. It’s your money for the fee and feel free to spend it as you wish. But I don’t think your chances are good. You asked, that’s my opinion.

Regardless, I hope you find a school where you can prosper.

8

@SkepticalOfMost demonstrated ability being GPA? I talked to an admissions officer, and he said that I’m a competitive applicant.

I seriously don’t know how people can’t be sympathetic with this situation. If you spend your entire academic career in misery because all you want is a challenging education, you tend to put no work into doing things like homework… Last year, I skipped a grade and took 4 AP classes, all of which went fine. So, then, how have I not demonstrated some degree of both ability and passion?

9

I never thought that my chances were high. I really just want to know what they are. You tell me that they’re not good, but what is good? You, yourself, should realize that this advice is utterly useless. Can someone not just give me a percentage range for their estimate(s)?

Also, you make major assumptions as per my intelligence, using those things in order to determine how well I may do at the school. You do not know me, so judging my capabilities is an exercise in futility. I am not going to go to any effort in order to disprove you, but your telling me these things isn’t exactly going to do anything except for pointlessly demeaning me.

10

I suggest you compare your stats, including your GPA and class rank, to the listed stats for the incoming class to SCS at CMU last year. That will give you an objective measure of how you compare. You will note that the average class rank is in the top 2%, and the average GPA is 3.96 (that is unweighted). My understanding is that CMU does not give applicants a “boost” for extenuating circumstances, such as hardship, disability, etc. I say that with compassion, as a parent to two adult children with disabilities, one of which attends CMU. I think it is great you are aspiring high and wish you every success.

Sept 2018 General Fact Sheet: https://admission.enrollment.cmu.edu/media/W1siZiIsIjIwMTgvMDkvMjcvOTU5YjZrZW1ua19HZW5lcmFsX0ZhY3RfU2hlZXRfU2VwdGVtYmVyXzIwMThfZmluYWwucGRmIl1d/General%20Fact%20Sheet%2C%20September%202018%20final.pdf

11

@psycholing Thank you for the kind sentiment! I have looked at their general fact sheet, before.

I do realize that they don’t give me a “boost;” however, the process is meant to be holistic; hence, taking half of my AP courses outside of the school should be of some effect. For instance, people who take one AP in a school with only one, as opposed to those taking 5 with 9 at theirs, will not be held accountable for said difference. In my case, some of these things ought to at least give a positive context.

I have sought out everything that I can, class-wise and otherwise, but I’ve yet to find much meaningful content. I think that that should be evidenced by the fact that I doubled up on core courses, last year, and am taking the maximum number of courses, this yr. (8 during jr and sr with a total of 11 AP classes)

Also, will skipping a grade not make any difference? I will be sixteen when I graduate, and I HAD to skip a grade in order to actually take the classes in which I’m currently enrolled.

The above poster was extremely frustrating in that I’ve not tried my best due to my life circumstances and a lot of slacking, on my part-- not because I’m incapable of doing the work presented to me. I want to go to a school like CMU because the people are like me, from what I’ve heard, there are few parties/greek activities, and I seek to find a challenge which satiates my academic voracity.

Lastly, if you could give me a chance, based upon all of the information that I’ve shared, what would it be? If I’m a strong applicant, how strong? Also, what type of percentage range? I understand that these questions are hypothetical, but I’m quite nervous and really just want some thoughts from objective outsiders.

12

@Scrubstudent . I’m sorry, but I think CMU SCS is an unlikely admission for you, just because of the mismatch between your stats and the school average. I do not think they particularly care if a student skips a grade (my son who is at CMU also skipped a grade, but as far as I know he didn’t even mention it in his application). From what I have seen of the SCS students at CMU in my 4 or 5 visits, they tend to be students who have near perfect grades, near perfect test scores, a certain intensity, and very often high AIME placement. Woman get a slight boost over men, but even so the women are ultra impressive. My impression is that CMU is not all that wholistic. In fact, this year, they stopped having interviews and stopped allowing submission of additional materials for most students. If you look at last year’s results thread at CC or reddit, you will see that many applicants with perfect/near perfect test scores and grades were not admitted.

On the other hand, I recently met a young woman who is a sophomore in CS at U Pitt (receiving a merit scholarship), she is quite brilliant, finds herself challenged, and does research and participates in conferences/hackathons. She just made it to the 3rd round of interviews at Google for a summer internship.

The Moral: One doesn’t need to go to CMU to be surrounded by brilliant people. In fact, the most successful person from my doctoral class came from a public university undergrad. She is now tenured at Harvard.

13

@psycholing sometimes, I wish that I’d known how important one’s GPA was when I was shirking my responsibilities, as a student. I never did my homework, but nobody in my family has ever gone to a competitive university, so they never had any impression that my grades would interfere with my aspirations. I know that I’m capable of doing the work, but it’s too late to go back and prove it. I suppose that there’s always graduate work, but how does one deal with such a thing as this level of regret?

14

@scrubstudent I never found much room for regret personally, despite many many mistakes. I was quite a mediocre high school student with very high test scores. My rank was in the top 5%, but I had terrible attendance, some B’s, and I never did homework. My letters of recommendation were at best ambivalent. Yes I was bored, but also quite depressed. I could have thought that by losing my chance to go to Harvard, my life was over right there. (By the way, I didn’t even apply to Harvard, as I was fairly sure I wouldn’t get in on GPA) . I went to University of Michigan, which was my safety. I am proud to say that I never went to a single frat party while there.

But here’s what I found: wherever you go, no matter how perfect you think it will be, you are still the same person that you were when you walked in the door. I went to college, I went abroad to live in 4 different countries, etc. If I went somewhere depressed, I was still depressed in the new place. If I went in curious and enthusiastic, that is how I approached the new environment. No place, and no institution will suddenly make you whole.

I found (and I think you will find) that the game is not over at 18, no matter how much you mess up. You are still writing your own future. You can be anything you want. You have already overcome significant adversity. You already have solid skills and you have developed, in the last 2 years, a reasonable work ethic. Now it is time to challenge yourself in other ways. Become a bit more adaptable. Try to figure out what you really want, rather than what will impress other people.

Another example: I went to a top graduate school in my field – one that grooms students to enter academia. For a while I worked as a professor. I still wasn’t happy, even though that had been my aspiration. Now I run my own (charity oriented) business. This occupation offers me less money and less prestige than my peers receive. But it allows me to engage my mind, set my own hours, decide my own cases, and change people’s lives every day.

If life is a prestige competition, then I guess I lost. Yet doing this other job, I respect myself. I don’t feel empty. I am no one’s lackey, working each day to make lots of money for someone else. I am not stuck teaching a class to students who are forced to be there for a distribution requirement. I don’t have to go endless repetitive department meetings.

As for prestige, the more you have, the more you need. I find I don’t need it.

So think about what you really need to get out of college. Then, do your best to find that. I promise you that if you go to your state’s flagship (or a comparable school), and you are at the tippy top of their computer science dept, you will have opportunities galore for further education or employment. Just please remember career isn’t everything. You need friends, you need satisfying leisure activities, and you need a sense of self-efficacy and meaning in life to be content.

Finally, if you still want to go to CMU 4 years from now, apply for grad school.

15

@psycholing I know what you mean. My state school, though, is not as good an institution as UMich. If I go there, I end up taking 3 yrs at OSU.

I want to study AI, so that means that I’ll likely end up in a master’s or PhD program. Will a state school allow me to attend a better graduate program, should I do well?

16

Yes, it will. Also, I think you have a pretty decent shot at UMich, even if you are not from in-state. If tuition is too big of an issue, also consider Georgia Tech, UT Austin, or UWashington for CS.

17

@WhaleVomit your advice was worth more than gold (pun)

Tuition is not an issue. If I am rejected by CMU, I plan to apply to GA Tech and UMich during RD.

How would my chances look with UConn, OSU, GTech, UMich, RIT, and Purdue? (Mostly asking abt GTech and UMich)

18

I think you have a reasonable chance at all of them, but there are no guarantees with this business. Let us all know what happens!

19

@psycholing even UMich and GTech? I figured that those two were as much of reaches as CMU…

If possible, could you at least inform me as per their relative categories? (matches vs. reaches vs. safeties) Also, how good are my chances at those two? They were going to be my next choices, after CMU. (OSU is in-state, I’m the most qualified student at my school, so my chances look pretty good-- I wouldn’t turn the IS tuition down for attendance at anything but GTech or UMich)

Also, I can afford it and will not be buried in student debt.

20

The biggest barrier to admission is your gpa. What is your gpa this semester? Possibly if you have a good enough story and straight A’s this semester, they will forgive your lower GPA for the high test scores. Back when I went UM was much more interest in standardized tests than GPA, and I understand it is still like that to some extent. But in this current age of rampant grade inflation, many schools have an expectation that a 3.8 UW GPA is readily obtainable. In fact, I know loads of mediocre students who have that GPA.

I don’t think UM and CMU are comparable at all in terms of admission if you apply to CMU SCS. More comparable to CMU SCS would be MIT, Stanford, or Caltech.

Definitely apply to a range of schools – your profile is somewhat unusual and it would be difficult to predict admissions. I know with my younger son (the one at CMU), no one would have predicted where he was admitted and where he was rejected. Even naviance did a poor job of predicting. It seemed almost random.