<p>Hello :D I am an indian gap year applicant. Please take a look at my profile and give me an unbiased (but not too harsh please) opinion.</p>
<ul>
<li>cricket
*cricket commentary for 5 years. Acclaimed and recognised by cricketing greats ; featured on news channels (getting a recommendation from indian cricket board official) had a small stint in the 3rd edition of Indian Premier League.
*3 years varsity cricket </li>
<li>co-founder of a cricket related business where we have cricket tournaments for housewives. </li>
<li>master of ceremony for an Indian cricket board function
*one of the organisers of a cricket tournament which raised 40000 for education of unprivileged kids.</li>
<li>advertising
*worked as copy righter for a renowned city ad agency
*working as copy righter for the city branch of nation's best radio station: Radio Mirchi. Penned ads for many top brands.
*Started an ad and marketing consultancy. Employed 5 people as of now. We are growing slowly </li>
<li>doing a very interesting marketing related project with the food vendors of our city. Marketing products of small time business with potential for free.</li>
<li>won a marketing competition at conference of an internationally renowned entrepreneurship group.</li>
</ul>
<p>-social service
*teacher for unprivileged slum kids, working for a national level organisation.r
* motivational speaker for the city branch of the same organisation for one year
* raised thousands in fund raising projects
* been organizing an annual fashion show for senior citizens.
* part of a save river campaign. We got the governments attention and it is actually being cleaned up.</p>
<p>-miscellaneous<br>
*intern at a leading city daily
*written a novel, trying to get it published
* house captain and school head boy
* theater
* won lots of local debates and elocutions
* won a prestigious personality competition and becoming the youngest winner ever
* won in Horlicks wizkids</p>
<p>The sad part
90+% in 9th to 11th but 74% in 12th :/ (i am taking a gap year). Grading was tough and internals at our school are crazy. inspite of 74, i am in the top 20% of the class. My grade is still A ! 60-100 get an A grade.
SATs this october and SAT 2 this november.</p>
<p>My intended major is econ/business.</p>
<p>Should i be hopeful if i apply early to say, a Wharton or Stanford ?
Thanks so much :D</p>
<p>That SAT score is going to be important. Are you indian in heritage or do you live in india? I’m assuming the later, please correct me if I’m wrong. Being an international applicant can be hard, especially from a country like india with so many qualified applicants. Remember that these schools are reaches for everyone. If you want to go to an american school, you’ll want to apply to a few more achievable institutions. </p>
<p>Wharton:Reach
HYS: High Reach
Columbia: Reach
Cornell: Low Reach
UCB: High Match/Low Reach
Uchicago: Low Reach</p>
<p>You do not have any realistic chance of admission to any of the schools that you have listed. Here in the US, a score of 74 is a low C or even D average. Most applicants are paranoid if they have even a single C+ for one semester. Your application will need to work hard to convert these grades to something adcoms can understand.</p>
<p>Even if the 74 is considered an A, it is still a huge drop from your first three years and will need to be explained far more thoroughly.</p>
<p>What are you doing during your gap year? Did you apply to any schools during your senior year - if so what were your results?</p>
<p>I would suggest that you work with your GC to develop a more reasonable list of schools that match your qualifications and desires.</p>
<p>If the board is giving out As for a 60-100, they are obviously doing it for a reason. A few other boards throw marks like anything, My colleagues in other boards attest to this. Wouldn’t the adcoms consider all this ? My GC will mention clearly about in her report, the gist being these marks are not representative of my abilities. I had some reasons, I was sick during preparation leaves of 3 exams, which brought my percentage down. Medical certificates will verify this. Wouldnt all the things about adcoms looking at you as a ‘whole’ and not as a ‘number’ come into play ?</p>
<p>@Wharton1995 - Your extra-curriculars are brilliant. I mean no offense, but isn’t it spelt ‘copywriter’ and not copyrighter? Mistakes like that on your application might cost you heavily and might even cause the adcoms to doubt the credibility of your achievements. Again, I meant no offense.</p>
<p>Oops this is embarrassing. I won’t be writing the college app when sleepy and on crappy phone with crappier auto correct, so such errors shouldn’t occur then.</p>
<p>I personally don’t believe the “reach no matter what you do” thing. If you can show that you are a good fit with the school and that you are impressive in your academics, you may very well pull an Ivy League to a high match.</p>
<p>That being said, you have too much ECs and they are all over the place. Impressive, but impressive doesn’t get you too far. You need to make sense out of them. It’s not just because you have highly publicized ECs that make you go into Ivy League. Analyze what your ECs represent and see how they could be arranged so that they could make you look like a coherent whole.</p>
<p>Your final year grades will hurt your chances by about 50% of your current “chance”. (personally this is what I believe), unless if you explain them well, that is.</p>
<p>Legacy+huge donation+fit with school culture+top sat top gpa top ECs+ED+various</p>
<p>ED seems to double your chances, but also note that only the truly determined choose ED…</p>
<p>The below 10% rates always include people just giving a shot at the colleges simply because they think they are prestigious. An Ivy League may reject you not because you’re not good enough, but because you’re not fit. At the higher level, the more fit you are with the school, the better your chances.
There are also people who choose Ivy League simply hoping for the “off chance” with a 1500 SAT score or something.
There are also people who spam choose universities since the advent of CommonApp.</p>
<p>Sure, your chances will not exceed 50% or whatsoever even if you’re exact fit with stellar ecs and tests. However, if you’re excellent, I believe there is a possibility for you to pull an Ivy League to a high match (perhaps 40% ish chance)…just not very easy.</p>