Chance me + need advice!

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Rising senior
Indian Male
Intended Major: Polisci/ Public Policy/ Government (depending on the school)

Planning on applying to Ivies, Stanford, UCB
GPA: 4.82 (top 1% in class, school doesn’t rank)
SAT: 1540, 1560 super score
AP: 8 AP’s so far, 7 next year. 4 5’s, 2 4’s. 2 3’s. Five in all major related AP’s (calc, stats, history)
No SAT II yet

EC:

Founder and Executive Director of a Nationwide Nonprofit organization that educates children’s about a specific subject related to the rest of my application. More than 5000 students reached through our programs. Managed funding, partnerships, built website, reached out to elementary schools where we implemented the program, recruited a team. Featured in Forbes, Huffington post + other national news outlets. Raised $60,000 in in kind grants and donations.

Research: Polisci research with a professor at Harvard. Might be published in a Top 14 University Law Review. I was accepted into a Polisci conference at a university for this research.

More Research: Working with a UW Professor this summer on research similar to my Harvard work. Wrote a chapter of his book, which will be published.

Martial Arts: I am a third degree black belt, have done it for 12 years. I am also a certified instructor and teach children martial arts. I am a founding member and leader of an initiative at my martial arts studio that performs martial arts to raise money for local charities. Helped raise $30,000 through this.

Debate: Captain, Haven’t been able to do many tournaments this year due to scheduling conflicts

Mocktrial: Founder, Captain

DECA: Went to internationals, 1st in state

On the policy development team for a city council candidate in my city

Stanford Precollegiate Summer Studies: After freshmen year

AWARDS:

Coolidge Senator
Scholastic Gold Key
DECA First in State
Kung Fu 3rd degree
International community service award for nonprofit (top 6 out of 1,000)
National community service award for nonprofit
Top 100 Finalist in a pretty competitive essay contest with over 7,000 applicants, I wrote about stuff related to my research

LOR: Harvard Professor, APUSH Teacher, AP Seminar Teacher: she really likes me and I know her super well, as she’s my Mock-trial coach

Question: Do I have to take subject tests? Or will I be fine without.

2

You have about as much chance as any high achieving, high stats, and a decent set of awards. So roughly about 2X-3X the average chance of a non-hooked applicant.

Most colleges are going test optional, so you likely do not need to do the subject tests, but if you can, you should.

You are competitive for any college in the USA, and will be considered at any college to which you apply. However a reach is a reach, and the colleges with the lowest acceptance rates receive application from about 6 times as many applicants like you as they are able to accept.

That being said, have you set up a real college application list, rather than “Ivies + other highly prestigious colleges”?

Find yourself 3-4 reaches, some matches, and one safety at least, and make sure that your parents can afford to pay for your tuition. Since you are looking at Poli Sci, find out which are the best colleges for this. Then check out which ones are the best for you. Do you prefer a large college or a small one, an urban one or a rural one, what geographical area, etc.

I know that it’s tempting to apply to the most prestigious colleges that you know, and there are plenty of lists out there which will place the most famous colleges at the top of every list, even for fields for which the colleges doesn’t even have a major.

For example, you want to study Political Science, and you immediately think of “Ivies, Stanford, U Chicago”. Yet Georgetown is one of the biggest names in Political Science, and it’s not on your list.

So go forth and do some research. You are a very smart person and it won’t be that hard.