I want to give a heads up that I moved high schools almost every single year, so I couldn’t maintain all of my EC’s constantly.
GPA: 3.9 UW (my school doesn’t weigh grades)
SAT: unfortunately, low for Cornell standards. A 1390
AP Classes: 11 total (1 freshmen year, 1 sophomore year, 3 junior year, and 6 senior year)- APHUG, APWorld, AP Physics 1, APUSH, AP Lang, APES, AP Micro, AP Calc AB, AP Gov, AP Spanish, AP Studio Art
Letter recs: 3
Race/Ethnicity: Korean
Gender: Female
Intended major: biology or biochem
EC’s:
-Badminton team JV and V for three years
-School newspaper secretary and treasurer
-Study blog with 1.6k followers
-Racial equity club (selective members)
-Silver Key from the Scholastic Writing Competition
-Chamber Orchestra (violin/viola)
-Social media handler for businesses
-Volunteered for a bit for a cat shelter (moved, so I couldn’t continue)
-Fencing Club (moved, so I couldn’t continue)
I think that top 20 schools are all reaches for you, and probably for nearly everyone.
Also, if you do not know which top 20 schools are a good fit for you, that makes them even higher reaches. If you just forgot to mention which schools you are applying to in this thread, then you should let us know the ones that are of interest to you.
Are you a senior?
Do you know what your budget is? Do you have solid safeties that you would be happy to attend?
T20 are a high reach for you. If you are not a senior try to retake the SAT. It appears to be the weakest part of your profile. And think about what you like and want in a schools. Just saying “T20” sounds like you only care about prestige. That won’t make for a good essay and may not end up making for happy college years.
What is your state of residence? If NY, look at Human Ecology or CALS parts of Cornell to see if you have goals that align with their missions. Or consider community college and transfer. If NY, you have great SUNY possibilities, whether Univ. at Buffalo or Stony Brook for biochem majors.