Just remember to apply to UMD early action.
As a suggestion for a potential addition, look into Swarthmore.
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Are you a national merit semifinalist?
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Do you qualify for need based aid…or are your parents able to pay the full cost to attend these school?
Berkeley gives zero $$ in need based aid to OOS students and precious little merit aid. Can your family pay over $70,000 a year for you to attend this school?
University of Michigan does not guarantee to meet full need for OOS students.
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There is probably an interesting story here. Would writing about this give admissions insight into who you are as a person?
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Yes, I got a 1510 psat
Very. Had to look up Esperanto.
Future CIA employee here.
Apply EA to USC. National Merit Finalists who are admitted, receive a half-tuition Presidential scholarship.
USC also awards a very limited number of full-tuition Trustee scholarships. For those students, they are looking for much more than grades and test scores. They are looking at drive, ambition, initiative, and a sense of awareness of who you are and what you want to do with your education.
While USC encourages students to study more than engineering, they do not have either a CS + math major or a CS + linguistics major.
But do we know financials yet ? Not just if qualifies for aid but what the family is willing to spend ?
Being a NMF opens some doors for you.
Could you please clarify what is affordable for your family annually? Otherwise, these suggestions are a shot in the dark! Once we know that, we can stop talking about affordability!
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I think so? I’ve been thinking about connecting my passions of math, CS, linguistics, and strategy games (oops, I forgot to mention I love chess and Go). I was thinking of talking about how they all stem from my love of puzzles and things I find hard. I really don’t think I’m a natural at any of these things, and I have to work insanely hard to make progress in my languages. How’s something along those lines sound? I think this true to me, but idk if it’ll help me stand out.
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To address affordability, I don’t exactly know. My dad says that if I get into MIT or Harvard or another top level school, then I have to go and we’ll figure the financials out. I’m not exactly sure what what means, but it’s the info I have.
Don’t try to stand out. There is only one you. Don’t worry about what others are writing. Tell them who you are.
What drives you to do things that you find challenging? How do you feel after you accomplished these goals and what makes you want to go back and learn/do more? When did this start? Does your interest in challenges apply to other aspects of your life? Are there challenges that you would like to tackle in the future (beyond college)?
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That’s not right. It’d impact his future it sounds like.
Have him run the net price calculator. See if you qualify for aid.
These are well over $80k a year so you are looking at $350k plus.
You need a budget. A statement like that gives you potential false hope.
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Safety is Umass amherst, for very strong CS and top notch linguistics. They will give you honors and their max oos merit, bringing your cost to low 40s. Good dorms, fantastic food, lovely campus.
MIT is your reach. But it will cost you, unless you qualify for fin aid. Yes, do write about your fascination with languages and linguistics. It will definitely make you stand out.
You could also chase merit, get full tuirion or even a full ride.
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As soon as I read the title of your thread, I immediately thought, UMass. Once your parents run the net price calculator and reflect about what they need for retirement (and how to treat any younger siblings equitably, if you have any), they can hopefully give you a number and by running the NPCs you will know if the school will work or not (speaking, of course, to the schools that don’t offer merit aid), like MIT, Yale, etc.
Also, another school that would be an extremely likely admit for you is IU. You’ve already spent a summer there, and I think you’d be competitive for a Wells Scholarship, one of their full rides: Scholarship Details: About the Program: Wells Scholars Program: Indiana University Bloomington.
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This is absolutely important for a candidate like OP, someone who has a realistic shot at all these top schools. An early conversation on actual cost of attendance inclusive of estimated aid is very important. The worst case scenario is for the OP to get in, and being unable to go due to cost or for the family to strain their finances to help OP go to school.
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That seems like your parents really have not done the financial planning to know how much they can really afford, which can set you up for a big let-down if you get into various desirable colleges and they figure out that these colleges are all too expensive.
Also, it seems like what they are willing to contribute (which may entail them taking parent loans or something financially inadvisable in some cases) depends on what they think of the college, which adds another variable that you need to consider when making your application list.
Have they told you that in-state GA public universities are definitely affordable?
Have they tried the net price calculators on various colleges under consideration?
Pick an REA school, like Harvard, Stanford, Yale etc. (could also add Princeton) and tell them you are “also” interested in comparative literature, in addition to CS etc. Will help.
Play up your college band.
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Something to note is that it may be easier to do a double major in CS + math or CS + linguistics if CS is not in an engineering division or otherwise engineering based, since engineering based CS majors may have additional requirements that can crowd the schedule space available for the other major.
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