Chance Me Please

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Colleges I am interested in:
Upenn (ED)
U Michigan
USC
UCLA
UC Berkeley
NYU
UCSD
Tufts
Northwestern
Notre Dame
(I am applying to more, but these are my slight reach/reach schools)

Intended Major: Psychology
Disclaimer: Some of this is hypothetical but I am almost 100% sure this is how it is going to turn out.
UC Unweighted GPA: 3.95
UC Capped Weighted GPA: 4.32
UC Fully Weighted GPA: 4.5

Regular Unweighted: 3.97 (B in H Bio 9th grade and B in H Chem 10th grade)
Weighted: 4.27

Rank, percentile rank, or percentile range (if available): 8/260
Comments about course load (including senior year): H Economics/AP Gov (Econ first semester, Gov second), AP Lit, APES, Choir, AP Calc BC (at community college), Computer Science (at community college)

SAT (total and sections): 1500 (not sending) 740 R, 760 M
ACT (total and sections): 34C breakdown-34E, 32M, 34R, 34S
SAT Subject Tests (if any): Math 1-750, Math 2-790, US History- 770
AP exams (not including senior year APs): AP World: 4, AP Lang: 4, AP Calc: 3, APUSH: 5, AP Comp Sci Principles: 5, AP Psych (self-study): 5,

For the following, indicate level of recognition or award (e.g. local, state, national, international) and/or leadership roles:
Extracurriculars: NHS President (11th, 12th). Model UN Secretary (11th) Model UN President (12th). Samaritan Project President (12th), Mu Alpha Theta Founder and President (12th).
Job/Work Experience: N/A
Volunteer/Community service: Set up volunteer program at my school through NHS. I set up a program where students from the school could come to us and we tutor them free of charge on whatever they need to do (1 hr/week)
Write encouragement notes to cheer people up to try to make people’s day better because I want to try my best to stop people from getting sad/depressed (1 hr/week)
Did like 70 hours of community service doing like park cleanups.
Run a website promoting mental health awareness
Article about mental health published in local newspaper
In the middle of writing a book about mental health

Summer Activities:
9th Grade: I interned at City Hall in Downtown LA for the summer and took Journalism at my nearby community college
10th Grade: Traveled Europe LMAO
11th Grade: Plan to take AP Stats and Anthropology at my nearby community college and write college apps lol

Essays (topics, details):
Going to write about how my mom’s severe depression and schizophrenia inspired me to try to help her and others who suffer from mental illness. My niche is talking about mental illness and my family’s struggles with it (runs in the family but thankfully I do not suffer from this) and how I blossomed out of it to try to shed light to this neglected topic.
[ab]Demographics[a/b]
ASIAN MALE (rip)
State (if domestic applicant): California
High school type: Tiny All Magnet Public School Grades 4-12 (less than 1000 total high schoolers)

Gender: Male

Applied for financial aid?: Nope
Highest level of parent education: Dad: Undergrad, Mom: Grad School
Living with both, one, or no parents?: Both
Income bracket: around 250,000

[ab]Reflection[a/b]

Strengths: Extracurriculars surrounding mental health, good essays, very involved in school stuff
Weaknesses: meh ACT score (33.5), low GPA (school doesn’t offer a lot of AP’s), some bad AP scores, and I am Asian lol which makes it a lot harder

I know this was a lot and any feedback is very welcomed. Thanks!

2

Great stats. Not an admissions guy but will be in conversation for all of them. But top 10 and 20 are a crapshoot. Looks like you have a couple of safeties but would guess you get in a few but also have some deferrals and wait lists to wait out.

3

This applies more to private elites, take it or leave it. Your mother’s illness isn’t a “niche” for you or your college app unless you can point to some substantive actions. The essay is meant to focus on you as the applicant more than family details. And while writing notes is nice, it’s not direct engagement or particularly challenging. It could be different if you were volunteering with an adult-run local organization or cause. Something where you’re actually involved. Think about it.

For humanities, the 4 and 3 scores put you in a less competitive position. Plus, other than taking APBC next year, you haven’t mentioned rigor in core stem classes. While psych, in general, isn’t stem, some branches of its study do need stem strengths.

And it’s troublesome that you ask, in another thread, about transferring into Wharton. It raises the question of your true intentions.

You have time to think about your match and fine tune.

4

that is not my intention but someone from my school is trying to do that and i was like what??? i’m a psych major all in. my past and my family’s history has driven me to want to become a psychologist or something like that so I can help people who suffer from mental illness. but i do appreciate your feedback.

5

Consider getting some relevant experiences. It’s not too late. Outside the hs, not solitary. Exactly what you do for an org or cause can be less important than that sort of awareness of the opportunity and your activation.

The essay isn’t where you just explain. It’s where you sell your assets in a certain way. You need, “Show, not just tell.”