Somewhat competitive public high school (not totally sure how to gauge competitiveness)
Asian male
Sibling legacy to GaTech
Intended Major(s)
Finance/business
GPA, Rank, and Test Scores
Unweighted HS GPA: 3.7 (upward trend, 3.9 after freshman year, not sure if that means anything)
Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): 4.2
Class Rank: school doesn’t do rank
SAT: 1570
Coursework
~12 AP Courses, 6 DE Courses, handful of honors courses
AP Calc AB, AP Calc BC, GaTech DE LinAl + Multi, AP Physics 1, AP Physics C, AP Micro + Macro, AP Gov, AP World, AP CSP, AP CSA, AP Stat
Awards
Honor Roll
2x Gold PVSA
3rd FBLA Nationals in relevant event
National Merit Scholarship Semifinalist
AP Scholar with Distinction
Top ~3% in state-level decently competitive finance competition
Extracurriculars
Established and manage nonprofit based on a health app with 700+ downloads and 100+ monthly users
Programming/data intern for local financial services company
Founded and run finance club at school
Emory business school research assistant
Vice-president of state chapter of nonprofit tutoring organization
Essays/LORs/Other
Average
Schools
ED: NYU (Stern)
EA: GaTech, UGA
Safety: GSU
Target: UT Austin, UIUC, UWash
Reach: UMich, Berkeley, CMU, UPenn, Stanford (applying to CA schools because of supposed omittance of freshman grades in GPA calculation where I would have a 3.9)
While Ga Tech dual enrollment math is no guarantee for admission, it is rare that someone who has done a year of math at Tech is rejected. So your chances are pretty good.
For UGA, have you calculated your weighted GPA using their system?
FYI…Berkeley gives zero dollars in need based aid to OOS students…and maybe $3000 at the most in competitive merit aid. That one would cost you $75000 a year…or so.
It can actually get quite a bit higher than that for Regents (even approaching full ride), but of course it’s a long shot and you certainly can’t count on it. So I do totally agree that it doesn’t make a lot of sense to apply to Berkeley out of state if you aren’t prepared to pay full price - around $70K/year.
$40,000 in aid, plus $20,000 still leaves you with a shortfall of at least $20,000 for NYU.
You have a strong SAT score and your GPA is fine. Would Fordham be of interest? Try that net proce calculator and see what it says.
There are lots of cities…is NYC the only one of interest?
As a NMF you have the potential to be a finalist and that opens up the door to a number of colleges with great awards for NMS. Fordham has an award that is not guaranteed, but is possible.
University of Tulsa is another option for national merit finalist awards.
The usual suspects…University of Arizona, University of New Mexico, University of Alabama, Arizona State, UT Dallas (I think).
Check the NPC for Southern Methodist University. That’s a possibility.
I’m not an adcom. I always tell students to reach for whatever they want to reach for. So apply to NYU and see. But have ALL of your other applications done as well. Make sure you don’t miss any deadlines for scholarships…some of those dates are earlier.
If you get accepted to NYU, and it’s affordable, you can withdraw all the other applications. If you don’t get accepted, the other applications will be all done.
Re: debt. I personally think less is better. For $80,000 in loans, you will be paying close to $1000 a month for about 10 years.
NYU COA is $90k per year, so your shortfall is $30k/year (and it’ll be higher each year). You’re talking about at least a $120k loan. IMO, definitely not worth it.
You can’t even borrow that much as a student. There is a limit. To get that much in loans, your parents would have to co-sign and be willing to take responsibility for you debt. That is not a smart move financially.