Chance Me- Ivy Leagues, East Coast, California

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hey everyone, I was wondering if you could help me out by chancing me. These are the colleges I'm looking at, a lot, but I'll be trimming that down a lot later and will visit quite a few of these this summer. I want to go into something around international relations or political science.</p>

<p>Yale
Harvard
Princeton
Stanford
Columbia
Georgetown
Tufts
Brown
MIT
Duke
UVA
William & Mary
George Washington
U Richmond
Michigan Ann Arbor
UC Berkeley
Chicago
Dartmouth
American University
Hamilton
Washington & Lee
UCLA
UC San Diego
Washington University St. Louis
Emory
Johns Hopkins
UNC Chapel HIll
Cornell
Boston College
Denver</p>

<p>State: Colorado</p>

<p>Race: White</p>

<p>GPA: 4.0 unweighted (rank 1/408), 4.583 weighted (3/408)</p>

<p>Classes: All honors and AP except for biology sophomore year. Concertmaster of our top orchestra (hopefully we will make the Colorado Music Educators Association performance next year) and next year our top choir (without having previous experience and they went to CMEA this year-a group isn't allowed to audition once making it for four years). Also took Spanish III and IV freshman and sophomore year and psychology junior year. Doubled up in chemistry and honors physics (pilot program based off of the AP curriculum) this year.</p>

<p>AP (9 total, 7 classes): Sophomore- World History (5), Government and Politics (5 without taking a class)
Junior- US History, English Language
Senior- Calc BC, English Lit, Comparative Politics (Independent Study due to schedule conflict), Microeconomics (online due to schedule conflict), European (organized a group of 10 students and a teacher sponsor to help us throughout the year, will not be an actual credit)</p>

<p>ACT (Writing): 31 Comp: 34 M, 28 S, 34 R, 29 E 10 Essay
(Non-writing): 34 Comp: 35 M, 31 S, 36 R, 33 E </p>

<p>-I'll take the ACT one more time with writing so I can get a 34 or 35 while including the essay due to certain admissions requirements.</p>

<p>SAT: Will take on Saturday</p>

<p>SAT II: 720 World History, 660 Math I, 790 US History
-Will take Math II and possibly chem or physics (though the score will be low) in order to apply to MIT</p>

<p>EC
Athletics: Elected Cross Country Co-Captain for my Senior year, running all 4 years. Don't have times to actually go out for any college team though.</p>

<p>Volunteering: Eagle Scout (project was over 300 years making 182 medical kits with solar powered light bulbs for Zambia and Zimbabwe with 30 volunteers and raised $3,100 to pay for the shipping and bulbs)
NHS
Held AP WH review lectures at the library for small group of students during April/May
High School Counselor for 2 week summer orchestra camp 3 years</p>

<p>Music: Front Range Youth Symphony freshman and junior year
Concertmaster of Concert Orchestra Freshman Year, Section Leader Chamber Orchestra Sophomore Year, Concertmaster Chamber Orchestra Junior Year
Lead in musical Junior year (never had auditioned or sang before, 90 people auditioned)
Shades of Blue (top choir) Senior Year
All County Orchestra Sophomore and Junior Year
Might auditioned for all state orchestra and choir this coming senior year
Violin in Pit Orchestra for musical freshman and sophomore year
1st violin in Quintet- We play at weddings and events</p>

<p>Politics: Colorado Student Chair Newt Gingrich for President (2011-2012 recruited other state chairs, ran the official Facebook page)
Intern Ryan Frazier for Congress (2010, recruited and trained volunteers, made 20-30,000 phone calls)
Consultant Jason Welch for State Senate CT (2010)
Volunteer Dan Maes for Governor (2009-2010 he writes about me in his book concerning his selection of a Lt. Governor which I played a large role in)
Volunteer Cleve Tidwell for Senate (2009-2010 made campaign video, worked on blogging presence, contacted out of state elected officials and got the campaign the only political endorsements outside of Congressman Trent Franks)
Volunteer Coordinator Libby Szabo for State House (2010, organized student sign wavings)
Volunteer Coordinator Tom Stone for Chair (2009, helped organize campaign for new state-chair at the state assembly)
Webmaster/Advisor Aaron Azari for City Council (2009)
Volunteer GOP (2008 made phone calls occasionally for John McCain)
Boys State (2012)</p>

<p>Notable Alumni: Sister just graduated from Cornell undergrad
Uncle went to Brown for undergrad
Uncle went to Chicago for grad
Mom's uncle and cousins went to Yale (TV show writers and producers) for undergrad</p>

<p>Any advice on what I should do to improve my resume or stand out from the crowd would be greatly appreciated since I'm just finishing my Junior year.</p>

<p>Thank you!</p>

2

<p>“Will take Math II and possibly chem or physics (though the score will be low) in order to apply to MIT”</p>

<p>If you aren’t interested in Math/Chem/Physics, why exactly are you applying to MIT? (they have a decent humanities department, but still)</p>

3

<p>They have a good IR program and are also ranked pretty high up for Political Science. Their social science program is pretty small, but also good.</p>

4

<p>you have a decent shot at every ivy league and other highly selective college on your list. It will come down to your essays, recommendations, EC’s, etc. Good luck</p>

5

<p>Thank you.</p>

<p>Do you have any idea if not having a hook will hurt me a great amount? Right now I don’t have one, there’s nothing I truly have excelled at to overcome a pool of very qualified applicants.</p>

6

<p>If looking at Boston area colleges might look at Holy Cross-great political science program. Holy Cross has 4-5 Congressman, 1 US Senator, 3 Supreme Court affilations, Chris Matthews, and Obama’s speechwriter among its alumni.</p>

7

<p>W&L is great is you love politics…check out their mock convention on the website. Might qualify for Johnson. They give generous merit aid 40 full rides/year.</p>

8

<p>Not having a hook simply means you should be in the top 1% to be competitive at schools like HYP. But that isn’t an issue for you as of now.</p>

9

<p>You’re very involved politically and that is definitely a bonus. SAT scores are very important (about 1/5th of the applications procedure) so if you do well (2200+, so 99th percentile), then you have a good chance, I’d say about 50% or so, of getting into the schools on your list except for Harvard, Yale, and MIT. The Ivies are unpredictable, and MIT wants to take students who are very involved in math and the sciences unless you want to major in the humanities, for which MIT as great for as many schools on your list. Good luck!</p>

10

<p>Is it worth my dropping the youth symphony next year to focus on academics and possibly politics? I don’t want to go into music or even minor in it though I may audition for some low key ensemble (vocal or instrumental) in the area/ do it for fun. Will it look that bad if I drop it in order for me to reduce some stress, or do you recommend I continue to play in it?</p>

11

<p>I’ll see you at Boys State!</p>

12

<p>Awesome! What a coincidence.</p>