Chance Me: Harvard EA

Colleges and Universities A-Z Harvard University
1

Keep in mind that I am an international.

Objective:
SAT I (breakdown): 1560 (800 M, 760 CR)
ACT (breakdown):
SAT II: 800 M2, 800 Physics
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 3.9
Weighted GPA: We don’t have one
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 1/52
AP (place score in parenthesis): None
IB (place score in parenthesis): Predicted 44/45 (HL Math, HL Physics, HL Econ, HL Chemistry, SL English, SL French B)
Senior Year Course Load: See above
TOEFL: 115
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): National Economics olympiad champion
Not that major: Wharton Investment Competition final round, LaunchX final round, good placement in state rounds of Math and Physics olympiad, Gold DofE Medal

Subjective:

Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): Started a non-profit for tutoring at orphanages, LaunchX 9-12 (President 10-12), Robotics club 9-12 (Lead programmer), School Newspaper 9-12(Chief Editor), Finance Club 10-12 (Founder, President), Investment Club at a university (best economics university in country), I also research stocks and invest in my demo and real accounts
Job/Work Experience: Worked at local hedge fund for 4 years (part-time Investment Analyst)
Volunteer/Community service: Non-profit, also 3 volunteer summer trips
Summer Activities: Work at a hedge fund, volunteer trips to Myanmar, travelling
Essays (rating 1-10, details): Common App-9 I talked about my love for investing, Supplement 8- Talked about volunteering
Recommendations (rating 1-10, details):

Teacher Rec #1: Physics Teacher 8-Thinks I am extremely talented, I worked with him on some projects, should mention Olympiads
Teacher Rec #2: Econ Teacher 10-Said I am the best student he ever had, mentioned the olympiad win, also talks about how we talk about stocks
Counselor Rec: 8-He is a robotics coach and writes great recs for robotics club people
Additional Rec: My boss at the local hedge fund 10-Said I am the most talented student he ever met working in finance, including those from university. Talked about my time commitment (10 hours a week for 4 years) and how I have slowly risen through the ranks of the company
Interview: Probably around 7/8

Other

Applied for Financial Aid?: No
Intended Major: Economics
Country (if international applicant): Czech Republic
School Type: Elite private
Ethnicity: White
Gender: Male
Income Bracket: High

2

http://www.hio.harvard.edu/statistics

Have you seen the statistics provided by Harvard’s International Office? If you select STUDENT’S, HARVARD COLLEGE (the undergraduate school) and CZECHIA, you’ll see there is one (1) student from your country currently attending Harvard College. That means, on average, Harvard admits about one student every four (4) years from the Czech Republic. Those are terrible odds, no matter what your stats. As such, I don’t know how you expect anyone to give you a meaningful chance. Will you be the lucky student who get’s admitted every 4th year? I have no idea, but best of luck to you!

3

Elite high school, working at hedge fund(how many kids can have this opportunity?), pretentious foreign aid travel (with a church group?). You had a lot of resources. So the bar ought to be higher. Even though your academics look flawless, it might not be enough. And it may very well be decided by who the other candidates from your country are. 50-50 chance.

I wonder how many foreign students are admitted in early action.

4

I gained the hedge fund internship through the Investment society at a university where I met a portfolio manager of a mid-sized fund who was conducting a series of workshops and was impressed by my knowledge about finance. So it was not through my family connections.

And although I know most people doing these trips are pretentious and do it only for college, I attended 3 of them and I have set up a non-profit with a similar purpose (on the foreign trips I have taught English, while my non-profit facilitates tutoring for kids from orphanages).

Regarding other candidates from my country there shouldn’t be many. There are a few from my high school (which is basically the only school in the country which sends around 10% of people to Ivies/Oxbridge), few from other prep schools and other than that pretty much nobody since the smartest people (people I met at Olympiads) usually don’t have good enough English or don’t have extracurriculars so they apply to UK where they don’t care about them.

5

What community service locally?

How much do you understand what Harvard looks for, the balance of attributes that needs to show? And what needs to come through in the essay?

6

Well I mainly worked through my non-profit, tutoring disadvantaged students (around 7 hours a week including running the non-profit). Other than that I was involved with some rather short projects that were not really major (like cleaning a forest, collecting money for UNICEF etc.)

7

I’m curious—did you apply to Wharton or Harvard early? I notice in your thread history you also asked for your Wharton ED chances.

I would just caution you around the enthusiasm you display for the hedge fund industry in —we hide our “rent-seeking” aspirations until after we arrive on campus ; )

8

Better suited for Penn-Wharton finance or the University of Chicago for economics, in my opinion.

9

I applied to Harvard EA, I was just curious what were my chances for Wharton if I get deffered.

10

You’ve made me kind of nervous. Do you think the AOs might reject me due to bad fit? Because honestly I love liberal arts education and I don’t want to be learning purely about finance (and I have touched upon that in the essays).

And could you please tell me what do you think about my chances?

11

Well, that’s a good thing, because Harvard College offers no finance courses.

Can they? Yes. Will they? Nobody here can say.

12

Wharton? Same as Harvard: tough. It’s not just your home country. These colleges like international diversity but could choose a strong candidate from an adjoing country.

You applied. Our chancing can’t add anything at this point.

13

Maybe the fact that I am an IB student could help me? I checked and the admissions rate for IB students is few percents higher than for regular students. Also it’s EA and I don’t think there will be a lot of people applying from my country.

14

Again, it’s not just your country. H and W have many strong applicants from surprising corners of the world and can mix and match what countries, depending on who’s there now, as gibby pointed out.

No, IB is not a tip. Lots of internationals with that, an increasing number of US kids as well. Nor are service trips or travel a boost. Just wait and see. Let us know.

15

Yeah I guess it’s just about luck now. I kind of regret putting so much emphasis on my finance interest, although most people say that I should show them my “spike”

16

It’s not what “people” say. It’s what the college says and shows. Spike is overrated, imo. Don’t worry now. Know that you did your best nd this is a hard mountain to climb.

17

Gibby just posted a good article on 52 reasons people get deferred. Your chances are low as an international, as others have said, but otherwise your profile looks good. Be careful about narrow focus, yes (this is mentioned in the article) and also about coming off as “arrogant” (also in the article). If your application is already in, as it seems, then yes, you are down to some luck (whether the admission officer has had coffee yet, for instance!). Make sure you have other options and try to relax a bit while you wait!

18

IBlord. As a lowly graduate from one of the other Ivies, and married to a wonderful spouse who went to a non-Ivy, I can assure you that there are a phenomenal number of great schools out there and that this is a journey. For many of you, undergraduate studies are a mere stepping stone to future graduate work, and then there is all that you do with those opportunities on your path to career and life success. For what it’s worth, I am in a hiring position for my PE firm and I find our best long-term hires are those that went to their respective state school and killed it, or went to a top 25-50 university and come with experience, dedicated interest, exceptional analytical skills, etc. We certainly don’t distinguish candidates within the top 5, 10, 15 or 25 for that matter. Good luck!

19

Just curious. In statistics provided by Harvard’s International Office I selected STUDENT’S, HARVARD COLLEGE (the undergraduate school) and my country. And got “International population over time - 0”. Probably never was no one. Does it disadvantage, advantage or doesn’t matter?

20

In terms of you, it doesn’t matter, other than the admissions rate of any international applicant is probably half the overall rate. Will Harvard accept an applicant from your country simply to stick a flag on the map? No. Since Harvard does not reveal # of applicants per country, nobody can say why there are no students enrolled from there.