Chance me please!!

Colleges and Universities A-Z Harvey Mudd College
1

<p>Applying for engineering</p>

<p>Rigor of secondary school record: 7 AP's
Academic GPA: 3.74 (3.2 freshman, 3.79 sophomore, 3.9 junior year)
Class rank--doesn't rank :/
Recommendations: pretty good
SAT: 2300/33
Essays: hopefully good
Extracurricular activities--
-Pit Orchestra 3 years
-Marching band 2 years
-Section leader and principal bassist in highest orchestra
-lead bassist in jazz band, honorable mention all state
-three years of MUN, selected to team both times
-three years JV tennis, undefeated all three seasons
-Medalist in solo and ensemble regional and state festivals
-lettered in music at my school
-10 years of piano</p>

<p>Started an Orchestra Outreach program at my high school to spread music to underprivileged kids. </p>

<p>Alumni/ae relation --
Geographical residence-- MI
Ethnicity- asian/indian
Volunteer work- 500+ hours in specific places (tutoring)
Work experience- 3 summers working as a paid data analyst for pharmaceutical firm, youngest person ever hired</p>

<p>I know it's doubtful but wanted to get feedback nonetheless</p>

2

<p>It’ll come down entirely to your essays. Your test scores are good (what are your AP and SAT subject test scores?), but nothing incredible, and you seem to have almost no science/math/engineering-related extracurriculars. Mudd wants students that are genuinely interested in STEM (as well as being really good at it), and pursue it outside of schoolwork. Your GPA is a little worrying as well, make sure to have STELLAR first semester grades senior year.</p>

<p>So, it’s doubtful unless you can convince them with really outstanding essays :/</p>

<p>Best of luck and I hope you prove me wrong!</p>

3

<p>Upward trending GPA is good, but frosh and sophomore GPA’s are still lower than typical. I made it in with a 3.8-ish GPA when I applied though so you’re probably okay. Your freshman GPA is particularly questionable, so a good excuse will be nice. If not, then life goes on anyway. GPA is the most overrated quantity on any undergraduate application.</p>

<p>Having 7 AP’s is solid. Roughly par for the course among applicants from high schools that offer lots of AP’s.</p>

<p>Class rank - your counselor will be asked if you “belong” in the top 10% despite having no official rank from your school. Whether your GPA qualifies you for that, or whether your counselor even considers GPA in the definition of “top” 10%, is completely unknown.</p>

<p>SAT is good. That’s also on par.</p>

<p>EC’s are sufficient. Write about them somehow. That said, be careful to not be pretentious when addressing the disadvantaged kids you helped. You seem humble enough, but other people reading this should be aware that off-the-cuff judgments (even implied) can kill an application on the basis of being a dick.</p>

<p>As for zrathustra’s comment, I disagree about a lack of STEM-related EC’s <em>if</em> you discuss what those three summers working for that firm taught you. See below.</p>

<p>As for work experience, you were accepted as an <em>intern</em>, or were you hired as an <em>employee</em>? If your title was intern, be careful to not over-sell that achievement. Of course, if you were indeed hired, share that. Also, focus on what you did and learned while working there instead of your age. Did you learn something that has guided your expected major, for example?</p>

<p>If you keep up your GPA, then overall you appear to be the kind of person Mudd wants.</p>

<p>And finally, a question for you. If you have had 3 undefeated seasons playing tennis, why are you still JV?</p>

4

<p>Thank you so much for your reply! That was really informative and really helped me out.
As for your question- On JV this year I was finally first doubles (moving up each year from freshman year). The problem is that our tennis team is ridiculously good (Top 5 team year in and year out).</p>

<p>Also the reasons for my freshman year slip-up was undiagnosed (and therefore unmedicated ADD), and the entire year turned into one big pressure cooker for me from my parents. I was thinking about discussing the ADD but I wasn’t sure.</p>

5

<p>You (and by you I really mean your hs councilor) could mention that there were “medical problems” or something along those lines. Your frosh GPA would benefit from some sort of explanation, and having your councilor mention the medical issues means that you’re free to mention more positive things in what you write personally.</p>

6

<p>I got in with a 3.5 GPA, so… :smiley: Your GPA certainly matters, but I wouldn’t say it’s unlikely at all.</p>

<p>I agree with Muddslinger’s advice. Talk up your work at the company over the summers and how that relates to your interest in science, and mention there was a medical reason for your low GPA.</p>