I know these posts are all too common, but I’m a white female from a smaller town in the midwest and few students from my school apply to Ivies/top 30 schools so I don’t have much reference.
Colleges I’m looking at:
Yale, Georgetown, Stanford, UChicago, Pomona, Dartmouth, UVA, Michigan, KU Honors, William and Mary,
University of Washington
Unweighted GPA: 4.0
Weighted GPA: 4.32 (I have all As or A+s, but you can’t take many honors courses until junior year at my school so my
weighted GPA is lowish)
Honors Courses: Nine honors courses total tenth and eleventh grade, none available to take ninth grade, I took all available
honors courses in English, Latin, history, physics, math, Spanish, etc. My school does not offer AP/IB
courses.
I took a history course online from my state university fall of sophomore year and did a selective Stanford
program on Japanese history sophomore spring.
Class rank: My school doesn’t rank, but given my GPA I’m probably in a pretty good position. My class has 26 students in it…
ACT: 35 composite and superscore, 36 science, English, and reading with a 33 math; 10 writing. I took it twice and got a 34
composite the first time.
SAT: 1520, 740 math and 780 reading. My ACT score is better, but I only took the SAT to confirm my PSAT score for
National Merit (1510 on PSAT).
SAT II: 770 Literature, 670 Spanish, 630 math I. I was really disappointed by my Spanish and math scores from June, but I
am going to study more and retake them in August along with Latin.
AP tests: 5- APUSH, World History, English Lang
4- Latin
3- AB Calc
(Planned for spring 2019): English Lit, maybe Comp Gov and US Gov
ECs: -Debate: three-year team captain, I’ve gotten third, second, and first at state three years in a row. Debate is probably
my most important school activity; the team has grown from four students when I was a freshman to almost 30 this
year.
- 4H: a rural community organization, kind of like scouts for farm kids if you’re not familiar with it. I’ve been president of
my club since eighth grade and am a county representative, youth fair board rep, and ambassador. I volunteer a lot
for youth programs through 4H in my county
- FBLA: President of my chapter, qualified for nationals every year and competed this year, ran the school career fair
- Varsity soccer sophomore and junior year (didn’t play freshman year)
- Varsity basketball since freshman year (ok but this is not an achievement, there are literally eight girls in the program)
- Model UN: delegate at a local MUN freshman and sophomore year, UChicago MUN sophomore year, vice president
of a council at a local MUN junior year, basically started a program at my school since no one went to
MUN conferences before I started going.
- Exhibition Poultry: I breed and show chickens and ducks throughout the Midwest. I’ve won numerous showmanship
competitions at national meets, class champions in open divisions, etc. Shoutout to my poultry
people!!!
- Forensics: Competed in extemp and impromptu all through high school, qualified for state all three years and got
second at state in extemp last year. Team captain junior year.
- Student Senate: class rep freshman year and prefect next year (elected by the whole student body, five per grade)
- School Paper and Yearbook: staff freshman and sophomore years, copy editor last year, editor-in-chief next year
- Theater: I usually act in one production a year, supporting roles usually
- Girls State: I was elected as one of my state’s Girls Nation senators and will be going to DC in a few weeks for that.
Employment: Local pet store starting in January of this year, 15 hours a week during the school year and 25 this summer
Local Mennonite family farm, 15 hours a week this summer. This job is wild; I’m on the line helping slaughter
and clean chickens in addition to other farm chores.
Study abroad: I spend all of last summer going to school in Chile. I am more or less fluent in Spanish and loved my time
there; I am hoping to find a way to work this into my application.
Honors/Awards: National History Day Award at nationals, bronze and silver medals on the national spanish exam, summa and maxima cum laude on the national latin exam, Brown University book award, Trinity College-Oxford book award, my school’s world citizenship award, a local IR council’s youth award.
I’ll be asking for recs from my Latin teacher who I’ve had since eighth grade and my english teacher who is also my advisor and journalism teacher; they know me really well and (I think) like me well enough lol.
In my essays I plan to emphasize that I’m from the midwest and show chickens, do 4H, work on a farm, etc. I think it gives me a unique perspective.
I am not a STEM person at all (one of the reasons my math scores are lower), and would like to study some combination of classics, philosophy, and poli sci in college.