Demographics
US citizen currently living in Saudi Arabia
IB school, taking full IB diploma
Female, white/latinx
Intended Major(s)
Aiming for computer science
My school doesn’t do GPA because we only get grades on a scale of 1-7, but my semester 1 IB score was 36 not including the IB core points which I expect to receive full 3 marks in.
I take the SAT soon but my PSAT score was 1410 and a practice Bluebook SAT I took gave me a 1590 score, but that test oddly felt easier than the PSAT so I’m a bit concerned it’s not an accurate reflection of the difficulty of the SAT.
Coursework
Math AA HL: 5
Physics HL: 6
Psychology HL: 6
English Lang & Lit SL: 7
Theater SL: 6 (I can basically guarantee I’ll end up with a 7 by the end of the course though)
Spanish B: 6
Music (not IB): 7
Awards
MUN Best Delegate
(my school doesn’t do a lot of awards, the administration dislikes too much competition)
Extracurriculars
SRSI (A Saudi program modeled off of RSI)
NEOM Innovation Challenge
Building an app/website for a local Volvo truck factory
Beamline competition (don’t yet know if my group won)
Starting a crochet business and building a website for it
Writing, producing and performing music with my band (Mercy Beat) and building a website for it
Fairy Godmother in high school production of British Panto Cinderella
MUN as a delegate and a chair
Student Council grade level representative
JUMP! Leadership training program
Schools
I’m curious what my chances would be for the top schools I’m considering applying to:
Carnegie Mellon
UC Berkeley
Stanford
MIT
Duke
Also, I’m new to CC so let me know if I’ve messed anything up
You have an impressive set of accomplishments. Congratulations!
I’m sure you know these are all very low acceptance schools (I’m curious why you have Duke on this list though - it’s not particularly strong in CS).
Do you have financial need, or are you a full pay student? What is your family’s budget?
I think your best chances are at CMU because they try to maintain a 50-50 gender balance. But would you be ok with what many perceive as an intense, competitive environment? Are you ok with doing a very high level of math at MIT? Would you be ok with a large public school that has resource challenges (Berkeley)?
Don’t just chase ranking and prestige - ask yourself if you’d enjoy your 4 years at each of these schools.
Finally: do you have other schools on your list? Especially top CS schools that are public flagships?
Congratulations on being a competitive applicant. I will only address UC Berkeley which happens to be test blind. You will also be full pay at around $72K/year since they offer little to no financial aid to International or Out of State students.
The most current data is from 2022. 2023 data should be available later this year.
The Overall International admit rate in 2022 was 5.5% Admit rate for CS in the College of Letters and Sciences was 2.9%. EECS in the College of Engineering was 4.5%
UCB will be a High Reach school for any CS applicant.
I’m still talking to my family about budget, but I don’t have a lot of financial need. It’s good to hear about CMU! Math is typically one of my stronger subjects (though I have been struggling a bit with the jump from MYP extended math to HL AA math) and I personally enjoy competition. I’m not settled on any of these schools yet, though, just wondering what my chances are if I were to apply. I have a lot of other, less selective schools on my list (though I haven’t checked specifically for public flagships; I’ll look into that), and I’m very interested in the ACME program at BYU Provo.
Thank you so much for the info and advice!
So knowing your budget is the first step. Check out the net price calculators on the websites of some of these schools. Your budget may eliminate some of these schools. So please talk to your parents asap, run the calculators, and report back here.
That’s good to know. But MIT will be intense, just so you’re aware.
You are what we here on CC call a “typically excellent” candidate. That means you have high stats (GPA and test scores) and very good ECs. But so do thousands of other applicants to these schools. So chances are very low for the vast majority of applicants.
You definitely should. Like I said above, some of the strongest CS schools are public flagships. UIUC, Maryland and Purdue should be on your list I think (as long as they are affordable). There’s also GeorgiaTech and Michigan, but they’re both reaches.
If you’re actually looking at a 36/42 you should look at far more realistic options. It’s a fine score but most students who I know who get into the schools on your list score a 39+/42.
You ideally want to look at colleges ranked outside the Top 20.
If you can improve your grades, then perhaps you can consider some of these schools as reaches.
If the score in math stays at a 5, and persists senior year, I don’t think the schools on your list are attainable for CS. You said you have other schools on the list, what are they?
BYU is not a good fit unless you are Mormon (around 98% of the students are)…is that the case?
I would also firm up budget with your parents. Full pay for many schools is $80,000+. Are you considering any schools elsewhere, say Canada, UK, or EU?
All of these schools are definitely reaches for me, but I will definitely get my Theater grade up to a 7, physics, Spanish and Psychology I think I can get up to 7 as well, and Math is my biggest struggle at the moment but my goal is to get that up to a 6 at least. Spanish and Psychology are classes I’m taking on Pamoja which has higher grade boundaries, so I have a good chance of getting a predicted 7 for those two even though I’m currently at a 6.
CS admissions won’t care too much about your Theater grade. They will care about the math grade. CS is very math heavy. There will be plenty of applicants who have a 7.
Thank you! I really hope that doesn’t persist, and I’ll be doing math all summer, so I doubt it will. Other schools include Binghamton, Macalester, Stevens Institute of Technology, Stony Brook, UC Irvine, University of Michigan, and William & Mary.
Yes, I am Mormon, plus a lot of my family lives in or near Utah.
I’m still working on budget at the moment, and I currently am only thinking of applying in the US.
Thanks for all the help!
That’s all helpful. The list of schools is pretty good…but wide ranging, which is ok at this point. It’s hard to chance you until you have a better idea of your predicted IB score, especially math. With that said, Stevens, Stony Brook, and Bing are what I would say targets at this point, not highly likely/safeties.
What size school would you prefer? What geography? Are you set on CS, or do you want flexibility to change majors? What other majors could be on the table? Hard budget…is $80K per year doable for your family?
Take a look at U Utah, Iowa, Iowa State, U Arizona, ASU, Oregon, Oregon State for more likely schools. If you end up applying to the UCs (which all use the same app), you might send apps to more than just UCI.
