Chance Me for UF - EnvEngineering Major

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Florida
1

Rising Senior Class of 2019
OOS Student (PA)
From a small, competitive Catholic college prep school with a student body of 450. (130 in my class)
Asian (female)
Major: Environmental/Environmental Health Engineering
PSAT: 1280
SAT: 1300 (retaking on August 25, 2018)
ACT: 27 (retaking TBD)
** Would it be recommended to take the SAT Subject tests?
GPA: 3.6 (as of beginning of Junior Year - will receive GPA in September)
Junior schedule: Religion, American Cultures (Honors), English 11, Music Theory I, Biology II, Precalculus (Honors), Spanish III (honors), Physics I (Honors)
Senior schedule: AP English Lit, AP US Gov, AP Micro, Spanish V (honors), Physics II (Honors), Calculus I (Honors)
** Note: My school is a very small school which only offers a few advanced classes. No IB classes, and only 5 AP classes available. APUSH was offered junior year but only selected 20 students for the class. I qualified for APUSH (80 students qualified overall) but was not selected.

Extracurriculars:
National Honors Society - Service Committee member (11) and Character Committee Chairperson (12)
Drama Department - (9-12) Stage Manager (11-12)
Interact Club (a community service club) - (9-12) Secretary (11-12)
Piano—(11 years)
Science Club - Secretary (11) and Vice President (12)
Student Ambassador - (9-12)
Work—(11-12)
JV Tennis—(9-11) Varsity Tennis (12)

Volunteering: ~250 Hours + an Internship at an Aquarium

UF is one of my top choice schools!! I will be working to improve my scores on the SAT and ACT when I retake both of them.
If you need me to elaborate or add more details let me know.

2

Hi!

First read this article on this year’s admitted class.

http://www.gainesville.com/news/20180212/uf-admits-36-percent-of-freshman-applicants

UF uses holistic admissions. About 50% is based on academics (with GPA, class rigor, and essay being more important than test scores). The other 50% is based on non-academic factors, like ECs, volunteering, work, “First time in college”, etc.

See table C7 in UF’s common data set for a breakdown of each item and it’s relative level of importance.
https://ir.aa.ufl.edu/media/iraaufledu/common-data-set/CDS_2017-2018_UFMain_5_07_18-.pdf

UF does “consider” the level of applicant’s interest, so visiting UF and going on an admissions tour would be very helpful for an OOS student.

On to your stats. GPA is very important at UF (more so than test scores), so your 3.6 UW GPA is a bit low. I hope that it went up a bit after your junior year. Still, it’s within range. It makes UF a high match and maybe a bit of a reach, it’s hard to tell with holistic admissions. UF does want to increase the % of OOS students, and the acceptance rate for OOS students is about the same as in-state students.

Raising your SAT/ACT scores will help. Also you’re ECs look good, especially your volunteering efforts (emphases that in your application). Continue to work on your EC’s over the summer and into the Fall.

UF does not consider your major in admissions. UF also doesn’t consider SAT Subject test (or letters of recommendations). UF will consider the size of your school, and what classes are available (If your school doesn’t offer 20+ AP classes, they will not hold that against you). UF also considers class rankings, but at very small schools, class rankings are somewhat discounted.

As a rule, UF doesn’t offer much in the way of OOS scholarships or aid, it can be an expensive school for OOS students. (on the other hand, schools like FSU, USF and UCF offer substantial OOS aid, you may want to consider these schools as safeties).

Have a copy of your transcripts handy when you fill out the UF “Coalition” application, you’ll need to input your classes into the system (into the SSAR).

Good Luck!