Hello! I applied to a few schools early, and I was wondering what my chances are for regular decision. My reach schools are those listed in the title, as well as:
WashU, UMich, UPenn, Rice, USC, Columbia
Thanks in advance!
Asian Male, California. Competitive Public School. Middle Class.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Intended Major(s)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Environmental Engineering and Biomedical Engineering
~~~~~~~~~~~Stats~~~~~~~~~~~
ACT: 36
Math II: 800, BioM: 780
3.91 UW |4.27W | No Rank, but at least top 10%
~~~~~~~~~~~~Coursework~~~~~~~~~~
AP 5's on all: Bio, Chem, Comp Sci A, World, English Lang, French, Calc BC
Senior year: Multivariable Calculus, AP Lit, AP Gov/Econ, AP Physics C Mech and E/M, AP Env Sci (2 periods)
~~~~~~~~~~Awards~~~~~~~~~~~
French National Contest: Gold Medal | 7th Nationally
15+ Regional/State Science Fair Awards
FBLA: 5 1st place awards, special title for 1st place in 2 events
~~~~~~~~~~~~~Extracurriculars~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Independent research for 4 years: Authored a paper on my work and submitted it as part of my app. It's related to environmental engineering. Won several awards.
Director and Project Founder for a non-profit in Lebanon: Created a project that reached over 2500 people based on my independent research above. Also managed the website and content in French.
Computational Researcher: Have been working as the sole computational researcher at a prestigious university's lab. Authored 2 papers for submission. Great LOR from my mentor.
Re-founder and Director of an environmental study at my school: Participated as a student for a couple years. Leading teacher left and data was lost; I recovered the data and recreated a website. Working with my env sci teacher to manage the project.
Intern at 2 different labs over 2 years: Worked on my own project in 1 lab in 1 year; interned at the other lab 1 year. (I grouped these together on the CommonApp)
Board Intern for a local city arts council: Volunteered for an organization that promotes the arts in a nearby city.
Director of Technology and Content at a national tutoring site: Created project materials for an entrepreneurship program for elementary school students. Managed website.
Music (I'll leave this vague): Won some competitions, earned a certificate.
FBLA: VP 2 years: Won the most awards of any student from my school
Volunteer at a Hospice
Orchestra for 3 years
A few small things for volunteering and stuff locally
~~~~~~~~~~~~Essays/LORs/Other~~~~~~~~~~~~
Not sure about essays. Not sure about teacher LOR's, but my english teacher loves me and my env sci teacher is involved in the aforementioned project with me. My research mentor said he would write a very strong rec.
Thank you! I appreciate any advice you may have.
Major kudos on your achievements. I think at this point it just really comes down to your essays, especially the Yale ones. The fact that as a Californian Asian male you’re not applying to CS is also a point in your favor. Is there a reason you’re not applying to any UCs?
Well my GPA is a bit low for my demographic, and I’m not really interested in CS as a major. Engineering allows me to apply CS to a particular problem pertinent to the environment or biology. Also, I’m looking to go into medicine. I appreciate your kind words.
I understood that you don’t want to major in CS, but I’m curious why you aren’t applying to UC schools as Environ.E or biomed.E. Since you’re in California and have great stats, I expected UCB or UCLA to be on your list.
“env sci teacher is involved in the aforementioned project”
I’d get a recommendation from a core science teacher, and env sci is not considered a core science. I’m assuming you already put in your scea app, but maybe for RD, you can change recommenders.
“Well my GPA is a bit low for my demographic”
I don’t know if it’s that low but it’s a probably average, but you’re in a tough demographic.
“The fact that as a Californian Asian male you’re not applying to CS”
Well CA Asian male for engineering is as tough and really for a place like Yale, non-STEM Asian is also not going to be any kind of preference.
You should get into Wash, UM, USC, maybe 1 or 2 of Rice, JMU, Cornell Columbia, Cornell, and probably not Yale or Stanford. Good luck let us know how you do.
Great accomplishments and stats! Given your tough asian male from CA demographic, my suggestion would be to make sure your personal uniqueness comes out in your essays. Keep in mind, the admissions readers who review your app need to remember you in some way after reading literally hundreds of apps. Make them latch on to something and want to fight for you in the culling process. My daughter was accepted to an elite small LAC and she chose to write about her love of sea slugs. (We live in Hawaii and she’s loved exploring tidepools since her toddler years.) I’m going to hazard a guess and say I doubt there were many essays about sea slugs in the applicant pool. My daughter’s friend got into Harvard and her essay was so funny, the dean of admissions wrote her back telling her it’s one of the best essays ever submitted under his tenure. Your stats say you’re smart and well rounded, but so are thousands of others applicants. Make sure they know who you are and give them a reason to remember you. In my daughter’s case, at least one of the admissions readers must have said, “I want to keep the sea slug girl!”
I am applying to UC’s; I didn’t put them on this post though. Sorry for the confusion.
I disagree that environmental science is not a core class. None of the colleges I applied to specify that it has to be a teacher from physics, bio, or chemistry. It’s an AP class that lasts 2 periods at my school; it’s most definitely a science class. Plus, our school does not have a requirement to take specific science courses to graduate. We can take life science classes, and APES falls under that. I appreciate the other things you had to say though.