Chance me for Northwestern (Engineering)?

Student Lounge Hispanic Students
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<p>What are my chances at McCormick School of Engineering?
I plan to do applied math or industrial eng. and operations mgmt.</p>

<p>GPA and High School Record:
I had A's and B's freshman and sophomore year but didn't really care about school. I focused at the end of sophomore year and got all high A's my junior year.</p>

<p>This year I'm in AP Physics C, AP Calc BC, AP Lit and Comp, Marketing, Gov Honors, Art 1 and Latin 2 Honors. I have perfect and near perfect A's in all of them for the semester.
Last year my only AP was English. I got a 5 on the exam.</p>

<p>My GPA was hurt by my early high school so its at a low 3.8 or 3.85.</p>

<p>I'm in about the top 25% of my class. After my junior year I was still only in the top 33% though.</p>

<p>Extracurriculars, Jobs and Volunteer Work:
I have been in Science Olympiad for almost three years. I earned three 3rd place medals at regionals. My team won 2nd place overall at regionals and at state we came in 6th. </p>

<p>I'm in Mu Alpha Theta and have been one of the best school tutors and have participated in a lot of math contests. (No awards though)</p>

<p>I have been a (no pay) math teacher at the Salvation Army's GED program for two years. I've had a lot of students come through and get jobs or go to higher education.</p>

<p>Summer before Junior year I attended the National Youth Leadership Forum on Medicine, then worked at my father's assisted living facility. I was a caregiver and nurse's assistant. </p>

<p>I am the president and previously secretary of my school's Latin Club. Last year, in our first year at state competition our team won first place. I gained most points for the team.</p>

<p>I have spent a ton of time teaching myself math and physics. I taught myself Calculus through multi-variable my sophomore year. I also taught myself undergraduate group theory and abstract algebra, linear algebra, differential equations both ordinary and some partial, stochastic calculus and processes, mathematical finance, and set theory/proofs.</p>

<p>I have also written a few original, independent research papers in applied mathematics and economics. The ones I submitted are about a mathematical approach to speculative asset pricing in financial markets, and the other is information and control theory and derives a mathematical definition of risk and rationality (along with a lot of other stuff). I did this stuff alone (idk if that helps). </p>

<p>In my junior year I also petitioned my administration to offer AP Physics C for my senior year. I got it haha. </p>

<p>Last summer I took college courses at University of Chicago. I took Computer Science (B) and Microeconomics (A).</p>

<p>Awards and Recognitions:
I was invited to the National Junior Classical League Latin Honor Society.</p>

<p>I was awarded "Maxima Cum Laude" or greatest national honors for my performance on the National Latin Exam.</p>

<p>My PSAT score made me a National Merit Commended Scholar, and I was given a certificate by the National Hispanic Recognition Program.</p>

<p>In my junior year I won Most Outstanding Student in Pre-Calculus, Physics Honors and Latin 1. </p>

<p>Test Scores:
SAT: 2200 (CR 750, Math 710, Writing 740)
ACT: 33 (Eng 35, Math 33, Reading 32, Science 31, Writing 8)
I'm taking subject tests in Math 2 and Physics this month. They seem easy enough.</p>

<p>I am pretty sure my recommendations were good. I got one from my latin, pre-calculus and physics teachers. I had all of them last year and two of them this year.
My counselor said she wrote her's about how I've been ready for higher learning for a long time so I guess its pretty good. </p>

<p>My commonapp essay was about my childhood interests and my NU statement was pretty personal and detailed about what I want to do there.
I'm also trying to schedule an interview.
Oh and I'm also first generation Hispanic and neither of my parents went to college. </p>

<p>Thanks a lot for any help, information or encouragement! </p>

<p>-Gordon</p>

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<p>Any advice that anyone can give me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks to anyone ha</p>

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<p>Which state are your from? Are you a National Hispanic Scholar?</p>

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<p>^

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<p>How much weight your research papers will carry will depend on if/where they are published. It’s best if they’re in a peer reviewed journal.</p>

<p>I don’t do Chances, but I will say that it does help to be Hispanic and interested in Engineering, as Hispanics have relatively low representation in this field.</p>

<p>See post #2 of this thread for some comments on factors are looked at in college admissions for Hispanic students:</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/hispanic-students/1229462-does-being-hispanic-have-any-impact-all.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/hispanic-students/1229462-does-being-hispanic-have-any-impact-all.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>I’m from Tennessee and yep I’m a National Hispanic Scholar.</p>

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<p>I haven’t gotten them published but a professor at Vanderbilt has read one. I’ve also looked through arxiv and haven’t found anything like them. But that probably doesn’t matter ha. I figured if anything it will show my skills with math cuz together they use university and grad level mathematics.</p>

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<p>I’m wondering what kind of crazy high school you go to where 25% of students have a GPA over 3.8. It sounds as though there is extreme grade inflation, except that you’ve won state and regional awards in Latin and science, achievements that show real ability.</p>

<p>It’s not easy to learn those advanced math topics by yourself. If you’ve managed to achieve more than a passing familiarity with those subjects via self-study, that’s also
a commendable achievement.</p>

<p>I don’t know anything about admissions at Northwestern, but your profile looks strong and interesting.</p>

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<p>There is crazy grade inflation haha the top 15% have gpa’s of like 4.8 and 4.5% and our valedictorian last year lost his spot because he took one honor class with his ap’s instead of all ap’s again. And yeah I was pretty proud of all that cuz it was our schools first involvement in latin and classics, and we’ve only had science olympiad for maybe four years.
Thank you for the kind words about the self-study. I taught myself the abstract algebra over a year ago so I probably have forgotten some of it lol. But I feel like I’m pretty trained with all of it because I try to keep my practice up, and I use it often when doing research.
Thanks very much that makes me happy! It is unconventional but I thought that was a weakness.
Thank you very much again!</p>

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<p>The way I see it, </p>

<p>what might hurt you, is the fact that you only took one AP class in Junior year and three AP in senior year. This course load will probably not earn you the designation, most difficult course load taken from your counselors. It also seems Northwestern will not get to scores on the three AP courses you are taking or how well you are doing in class in senior year. </p>

<p>On the other hand, I think your SAT scores are good & interest in mathematics is apparent. You also have the Hispanic hook which can help.</p>

<p>In conclusion, I would think you have a chance of being accepted, but not very high. However, even if you do not get in now, you could attend a community college, get straight As and apply as a transfer student. At that point your senior year AP classes would show up on your high school transcripts and they would back up what the community college transcript will suggest, that you are ready to tackle the most difficult course load in college.</p>

<p>By the way, my son is in a similar boat as you.</p>

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<p>Yeah that is my biggest worry. I took the most advanced courses offered to me. I would have been in honors pre-calculus junior year but the scheduler messed up my course list and put me in pre-cal standard. But my mid-year grade report this year should be sent. So they’ll see my A’s from this year. I am worried about my “curriculum rigor” the most though. </p>

<p>Thanks for all of that. I knew that my best chance was to stand out. So I did the best I could to show it. Thank goodness I’m Hispanic haha. </p>

<p>Yeah if I don’t get into a top school for freshman, I’ll transfer. Tell your son not to give up, good luck and that he can be brilliant no matter where he is. That’s what I keep telling myself lol.</p>

<p>Thanks again so much!</p>

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<p>Do give serious thought and research to the idea of transferring. One thing to remember is that most of the selective colleges have lower, often significantly lower, admission rates for transfers than for entering fr.</p>

<p>Also, it is often difficult to transfer to a college that you weren’t accepted to after 1 year. This is because you will have only completed 1 sem of college when transfer decisions are made, so most of the weight will still be on your HS record and test scores.</p>

<p>Finally, there is often a social and sometimes an academic cost to transferring. I have a kid who transferred, it was a very difficult decision and process. And while I think that transferring can be a good option, it’s not to be taken lightly and it’s not as seamless as sometimes portrayed.</p>

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<p>Yeah I have imagined that transferring would be pretty difficult. I really just hope I end up somewhere good as a freshman. Transferring sounds like a painful process. It would definitely be difficult for schools like Northwestern with such high retention rates.</p>

<p>entomom, how much do you think my high school curriculum hurts me? I just figured it would look shallow to take AP classes in subjects that it would be obvious I’m not interested in.</p>

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<p>It all depends on what is offered at your HS and what your GC will mark on the SSR (most demanding, very demanding, demanding, etc.). I think that as long as one of the first two are marked, it’s not going to hurt you.</p>

<p>What are your other schools? As long as you have a balanced list of schools you would be happy to attend, your’re fine. Not everyone gets into their first choice, my D2 was denied at her top choice and WLed at a couple more top picks last year. Luckily she had a good list and still had several good choices, and she’s amazingly happy after her first sem.</p>

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<p>I see. Well since most everyone is failing Physics and Calc except for me and a few others haha, I’d suspect she’d put one of the first two choices. But I’m not sure.
I also applied to
UChicago (1st choice), U-Michigan, NYU, Vanderbilt, UNC Chapel Hill, Case Western, and Loyola University in Chicago.
Thats great to hear it makes me feel better. When you haven’t been to college yet it feels like your whole life hangs on where I get accepted freshman year haha.</p>

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<p>^^Yes, there’s a lot of pressure and one tends to get fixated on a few schools at this point in the process. I honestly believe that there are many schools where a hard working student can be happy both academically and personally. </p>

<p>Sorry to keep asking you questions, but in what state are you a resident? And what is your financial situation–will you require need-based FA and/or merit aid? If so, will your family qualify for FA?</p>

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<p>Oh it is absolutely fine you’ve helped me a lot!
I live in Tennessee near Nashville. My father and mother together make enough for me not to qualify for need-based FA, but not enough to pay for all of college. Idk how we’re gonna do it. Maybe I can get some kind of merit aid or something. Not sure :/</p>

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<p>Sorry, I missed where you said you were from TN in your other post :o.</p>

<p>I’m assuming you applied to your IS public as an admissions and financial safety??</p>

<p>Several of the schools you’re applying to have merit aid but it’s really difficult to predict those things, your test scores look within range, but your class rank and gpa may hold you back. Have you applied for the Pogue at UNC-CH, how about Vandy scholarships? Heard anything from UMichigan about the Shipman?</p>

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<p>OP,</p>

<p>I think you sound like a very strong candidate. Were you able to communicate in your application that you took the strongest courseload? Were you able to communicate all of your independent work clearly so that schools will see your love of learning and desire for challenge? I think that’s very important. Being 1st gen Hispanic will probably be a brownie point. I don’t know how they view 1st gen Hispanic who have no financial need, though. (That’s not us at all! My son is not 1st gen as I graduated from a state univ. We are not Hispanic but he is. And he has a lot of financial need) Does anyone know?</p>

<p>I am sure you will get into a great school. Keep us posted!</p>

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<p>Oh not really. I wouldn’t go there even if I got in hah and the deadline has passed. No I haven’t heard about any of that. I’ve been applying to a few small scholarships that fastweb has sent me. But I will definitely ask about those.
I don’t feel like I’m a strong enough candidate for much merit aid especially at competitive schools like the one’s I applied to. But I’m gonna try haha.</p>

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<p>Well thank you! I definitely tried to! I imagine my recommendation writer’s wrote about my commitment to the subjects I did challenge myself in. I also told them about how I petitioned for AP physics C. I also sent a research summary of my paper’s to Northwestern and UChicago. I wrote about the self schooling I’ve done in the additional information section. I think that was a mistake though. I should have put it in extra-curriculars:/
I hope it helps to be in my Hispanic situation lol. I definitely can’t afford every year tuition as it is. But I’m probably gonna work thru college.</p>