From a top public high school in New York; 1550 SAT and 20 on Essay; 96 unweighted GPA (no class rank); three subject tests (two 800 and one 760); eight AP (seven 5s and one 4), taking another 6 this year; AP National Scholar; National Merit Semifinalist.
Extracurricular: International Science Olympiad Silver Medal, Siemens semifinalist, founder and president of one club, board member of two other clubs, bunch of Math/Science Olympiad (different from the previous International Science Olympiad) stuff, varsity swimming in ninth and tenth grade.
Summer: at least one legit summer program per year and summer internship at a bank in tenth grade.
Demographic: Asian male in East Coast, no legacy, no first-gen status(, didn’t donate any building).
Rec: two teachers (one STEM and one APUSH) and one mentor, all should be good, one of them from the director for International Science Olympiad USA team wrote a very strong endorsement that sent several students to Stanford before.
Essay: not good at writing narrative, but revised by a very good college counselor who has lots of Ivy every year.
Doing REA to Stanford, RD to Yale, Columbia, UChicago, Swarthmore, and some target and safety schools
Your chances are probably better than most, but they’re never great at any of the top schools.
Try to make the essays as strong as you can and make sure that your voice comes through loud and clear.
I strongly disagree with @LoveTheBard . I think your chances are really good to get in at least one, and likely many, mainly because of your ISO medal (International Science Olympiad) in combination with your grades, unless you have an awful personality. I would recommend you also apply to MIT, Caltech etc, since they love olympians (the name for students who have done olympiads). Your SAT score is great, and so are your SAT II scores, so you don’t need to worry about those.
About the ISO… Although there are some rare cases, it’s uncommon for ISO team members to get rejected at top colleges. The same goes for students who didn’t make the team but have taken the TSTs (Team Selection Tests) or TSTSTs (Team Selection Team Selection Tests), like (some) MOPpers. If you make sure you have no big red flags, you should be all set.
Best of luck!
You have better chances compared to most other applicants who apply to these schools, but they are still reaches. I recommend applying to more reaches than just those 5 schools.
@droptable Definitely great chances. there aren’t many people with top stats and major international and national awards. It is people like you that make me super nervous about applying to Stanford REA haha
Mind chancing me back? http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/2026851-chances-for-stanford-penn-harvard-columbia-and-other-top-schools.html#latest