Hey y’all, I’m currently a rising junior in a competitive public Texas high school. I’m planning on pursuing a pre-med track with a double major in psychology and biology (my hope for a future career is as a forensic psychiatrist). Just wanted to put my stats out there and see what y’all think:)
School type: Public
Ethnicity/Gender: Asian Female
Income: >200K
Hooks: N/A
SAT: haven’t taken yet, but hopefully around 1500s
PSAT: 1470 (in tenth grade, hopefully I’ll do better in 11th and qualify for NMSF)
Unweighted GPA: 4.0/4.0
Weighted GPA: 5.316/6.0
Rank: 51/556 (top 10%)
APs: Human Geography (4), Psych (5), Environmental Science (5), World History (3, yes I cried when I saw this)
11th APs: AP Calc AB, AP Physics, AP Chem, AP US History and AP Lang (together in a gifted/talented program called American Studies), AP Seminar, will also take AP Chinese test because I tested out of all four Chinese classes at my school
12th APs: AP Calc BC, AP Bio, AP Macro & Micro Econ, AP Research, AP Lit, AP Stats
Awards: Nothing major, National Honor Society (but everyone at my school is a part of it), advanced to Area competition for HOSA but didn’t place
ECs (a bit weak):
-HOSA, will be a four year member
-UNICEF, will be a four year member
-Key Club, will be a four year member
-Red Cross, current Public Relations Officer
-Mental Health _____(name of my city in blanks which won’t be disclosed for privacy reasons obviously), Public Relations Officer
-Club volleyball for 2 years
-Will be part of a Clinicals class next year in which I’ll obtain CNA certification and get to learn among health care settings (with EMTs, watch surgeries, etc)
-might start selling bucket hats because I’ve been super into sewing them lately and they’re actually kinda cute if that counts as an EC?
Volunteer:
-Currently have 110 hours of online volunteering with an organization called Spread the Love, in which I help create notes and letters that will be sent to children with disabilities (should have around 150 hours by the end of the summer)
-At an after school care center for children with disabilities (approximately 20 hours)
-Feed My Starving Children: packaged food that will be sent to children in developing countries (~15 hours)
-Some other random volunteering here and there (~20 hours)
-Have a volunteer position lined up at a hospice facility that I plan on volunteering at as much as possible when Covid restrictions are lifted (hopefully at least 50 hours)
Summer:
-Plan on getting a part-time job as soon as I turn 16 and can drive myself
-3 EdX courses: Child’s Rights and Laws in Theory and Practice, Biochemistry, and the Psychology of Criminal Justice
-Not really doing any planned activities other than virtual volunteering, just doing a ton of SAT/ACT practice and college research
-Plan on asking my pediatrician about shadowing opportunities
LORs/ Essays: I’m still a year off from having to write/ask for these but I am a bit worried. As much as I hate to say it, I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to write for my essays. I also tend to keep pretty quiet and rarely ask for help and/or talk to my teachers so I’m worried about my recommendations as well, especially for my counselor. I tried to talk to my counselor once about my class schedule and my GPA and he flat-out told me that there was no way I was going to make top ten percent. I walked out of his office close to tears, but at least I proved him wrong! Anyways, I don’t really have any sort of relationships with my teachers and counselor other than being known as that one student who does well in class but basically never speaks, so I am going to have to work hard to build some relationships next year, which could prove difficult because of COVID-19. Yikes.
I was hoping y’all could chance me on the colleges I included in the title as well as recommend some good matches to add onto my list, since I would definitely consider Georgetown, NYU, and SUNY Stony Brook as reaches. My preferences for college would be a non-religious school in an urban setting with smaller class sizes and decent financial aid or merit scholarships, but not having one or all of these characteristics wouldn’t be a deal breaker to me. A heads up about UT, I’m in-state, but I wouldn’t qualify for automatic admission unless I miraculously was able to bump my GPA up into the sixth percent. Also this is not relevant at all to my chance me question, but I just barely missed top 10% for three semesters in a row (was about .06 off each time) and finally made it this semester!! The cut off was a 5.308 so I just barely made it, but I can ecstatically say that I made it and it was perhaps the proudest moment of my sophomore year (goes to show how bland my life is). I’m also interested in Texas A&M, but I’m on track to be an automatic admit if I stay in the top ten percent, so I didn’t include it in my title.