Chance me for UNC EA - Out of State

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
1

I’m a current senior doing applications, and UNC is my absolute dream school. I’m out of state though. I plan to double major in media and journalism and psychology and then get a master’s in education.

I’m also planning to apply to Vanderbilt, Tulane, UMD, Northwestern, Emory, UT-Austin, UMich, Syracuse, and U of I.

UW GPA: 3.9
W GPA: 4.9

All honors and APs all four years of high school.

AP classes: European History, Music Theory, Calculus AB, Lang, US History, Psychology, Environmental Science, Statistics

Class size is 500 kids, and we don’t rank but I’m assuming I’m in the top 5% at least

ACT: 35
SAT: didn’t send

SAT II
Literature - 790
US History - 790
Biology E - 770

AP scores (so far)
Euro - 4
Music Theory - 4
Calc AB - 5
Lang - 5
US - 5

ECs on common app:

  • Poms Dance Team: 4 yrs, captain - danced outside of school since I was 3, part of school dance team
  • Tennis: 4 yrs, all varsity, co captain, made it to state two years so far, played tennis since i was 8
  • Newspaper, 3 yrs, executive editor this year, editor previous year
  • Snowball Leader - 3yrs, heading the retreat this year
  • Choir - 4 yrs, VP of choir this year, in the two selective a capella groups
  • FCCLA - 4 yrs, 3 yrs on board, national awards
  • Religious Groups - Young Life Teen President this year, and volunteer with synagogue kids a lot (I’m both Christian and Jewish)
  • Theatre - 4yrs, president this year, usually dance captain or chorus roles
  • Class Board - 4 yrs, liason this year
  • Future Educators of America - 3 yrs, 2 on board

Employment: Teach dance at a local camp over the summers since I was a freshman

Community Service: Do a LOT of work with Young Life as well as my temple, def over 400+ hours in four years

Honors/Awards:

  • Dance I choreographed made it to finals in a state competition
  • FCCLA multiple regional or national awards
  • All conference in tennis three years, all state two years
  • Illinois Journalism competition honorable mention
  • National Merit Semifinalist

Essays and Recs should be good, one from my newspaper sponsor who’s a former english teacher of mine, another from my lang and current cst teacher.

State: IL
School Type: Public
Ethnicity: White
Gender: Female
Income Bracket: 150k-180k
Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): absolutely none at all for UNC. parents are both northwestern alum, and my brother goes there as well.

I’ll chance back :slight_smile:

2

Just a couple of observations, before I get to my comments about your chances. First, UNC-CH is not going to care whether it is your “absolute dream school” or not; the “level of applicant’s interest” is not an admissions factor that is considered by UNC-CH. Second, you don’t appear to have any “safety” schools – where admissions is going to be pretty much guaranteed, where you can afford the cost without loans, and where you would consider attending if all other options fail – in your list of schools where you are applying; you might want to consider including one or two, if you haven’t already.

Now, to my comments about your chances of admission. Generally, the chances for any OOS applicant to UNC-CH are somewhat problematic due to the highly competitive nature of OOS applications there: UNC-CH admits OOS applicants in numbers that are calculated not to exceed 18% of an entering freshman class. See “Undergraduate Admissions” on Page 2, here: http://www.admissions.unc.edu/files/2013/09/Admissions__Policy.pdf. As a further example of the difficulty for OOS students to be admitted to UNC-CH, the entering Class of 2022 had a 13% acceptance rate for OOS applicants: https://uncnews.unc.edu/2018/08/17/carolina-welcomes-5095-new-undergraduate-students-to-campus/ (29,563 OOS applicants; 3,829 admits).

If you look at the UNC-CH Common Data Set, here, https://oira.unc.edu/files/2018/06/CDS_2017-2018_20180605.pdf , under Part C7 it states that standardized test scores, application essay(s), letter(s) of recommendation, and the rigor of your high school record are “very important” academic factors considered for freshman admission, whereas GPA and class rank are “important” academic factors considered for freshman admission. Extracurricular activities, talent, and character/personal qualities are considered as “very important” non-academic factors. (As you can also observe in Part C7, “Level of applicant’s interest” is not considered by UNC-CH.)

Further, Part C9 of the Common Data Set for UNC-CH gives the median 50% for both SAT and ACT scores, as well as the percentage of the entering first-year class falling within certain ranges of SAT and ACT scores; Part C11 gives the percentage of entering first-year students falling within a range of unweighted GPA on a 4.0 scale, and Part C12 gives the average high school GPA of first-year applicants.

By way of comparison, our OOS high school usually has 8-10 students who apply, and 1-2 students who are admitted, each year to UNC-CH; and, with the exception of legacy students, our admitted students have SAT scores of 1500+, ACT scores of 33+, and weighted GPAs of 4.4+. These successful applicants also were involved in extracurricular activities that showed commitment over time (no “drive-by” ECs), and demonstrated leadership in the school as well as their ECs. Other kids in our city who I know were admitted to UNC-CH recently also had similar academic statistics and non-academic characteristics; and all of these kids were “unhooked” in admissions parlance (i.e., not a recruited D-1 athlete, or a URM, first-generation college student, Carolina legacy, etc.).

Having stated all of the above, your ACT score and GPA should make you competitive with other OOS applicants. Of course, even those things are no guarantee of admission: in another thread on this forum, @burghdad noted that his daughter was rejected with a 35ACT, 4.0UW GPA, 4.6W GPA, and 7 AP classes. So writing really good essays and having very good LORs may be what separates you from the rest of the OOS applicant pool.

I don’t know whether your high school has Naviance or any similar program that gives information about how students at your high school have done in applying to colleges and universities; if so, you might peruse that data. I would also try to meet with a guidance counselor at your school as soon as possible this Fall to discuss application strategies for UNC-CH; if any former students from your school have been admitted to UNC-CH recently, the guidance counselor may be able to give some insight into how and why such student(s) were successful.

Best of luck to you.

3

I’m always surprised by how many top OOS students strive to get into UNC CH. Due to its mandated 18%/82% out-of-state/in-state ratio, you basically need Ivy League level qualifications to get into UNC out-of-state. However, because 82% of the student body didn’t need anything close to Ivy League credentials to get in (46% in-state admission rate for fall of 2017), UNC CH, although an excellent school, is not at an Ivy League level. If you have top level qualifications and want to go to school down south, Duke and Vandy seem like better options.

4

@gandalf78 my safety is u of i, as i’m in state, and not going for engineering or business. i’m also considering mizzou and osu as safeties. naviance at my school states in the last 4 years only one student has applied to unc and gotten rejected (albeit with a 33 ACT and a 3.7 GPA)

5

@TheBigChef Vandy is one of my top three! I did visit Duke and do an overnight but didn’t like it as much as UNC, as the vibe there was too pretentious for me + UNC seems to be better renowned for my intended majors (media and journalism esp) and the quality of life there seems better as well when I visited for a weekend with friends.

6

@TheBigChef although Duke and Vandy are amazing schools… there are students who prefer UNC. There are also students who prefer these other schools. As far as the caliber of students at UNC… you will find instate students who are similar academically to those from OOS, and you will find kids who might not be… and who bring other strengths to the table. UNC will not be a cakewalk for anybody… whether from instate or out.