Chance me

Colleges and Universities A-Z Williams College
1

<p>Applied ED to Williams... I'm waiting anxiously for December 15th :(</p>

<p>Gender: Female
Ethnicity: Caucasian
School: public, ~800 students, in VERY rural Massachusetts
Rank: 2/197
GPA: 4.1 unweighted
Rigor: All honors classes except for electives since 9th grade; Two APs junior year - U.S. History and Language - got 5's on both exams. I'm taking 4 APs this year, Physics, Bio, Calc, and Lit. The only other APs offered at my school that I'm not taking are Art and Spanish (I took French).
SAT: CR-730, W-730, M-760, Total: 2220
SAT II:
-Math 2: 790
-Literature: 750
ACT: 35</p>

<p>ECs:
- Varsity Cross-Country, 9-12. Captain junior and senior year. All-conference all years. All-district (state-qualifier) 2 years.
- Varsity Indoor Track, 9 and 11.
- Varsity Outdoor Track, 9-12. Captain junior year and I'm presuming this year.
- National Honors Society member, 10-12. President for the 2010-2011 year. Min. 30 hr community service/year.
- volunteer, local senior center
- volunteer, local hospital</p>

<p>Awards:
- Most valuable runner Cross-Country (3 times)
- Coach's award in Track
- Columbia Book Award, 11th grade
- various athletic/sportsmanship summits with my athletic department
- National Merit semifinalist</p>

<p>Recs:
I didn't read them, but I'm assuming they're pretty good. I got one from my English teacher of 2 years (his should be fabulous) and one from my XC coach/chem teacher (I wasn't really sure about his letter-writing-capabilities, but he's known me for such a long time I thought it would look weird not to ask him).</p>

<p>Essay:
I wrote my essay about spraining my ankle on a mounbounce over the summer. I chose something lighthearted to write about because I thought it reflected my personality and humor while also showing that I'm a decent writer. I wanted to stay away from the "trauma" essay about a death in the family or a mental illness...</p>

2

<p>You are an AR 1.5 or so, a strong candidate for ED admissions. I would guess you will get in but the competition does get tougher each year.</p>

<p>Does the track coach know your name? Are you fast enough to contribute at Williams? If so, reach out to him now.</p>

<p>Does rural MA mean the Williamstown area? If so, I bet you are in. There is non-trivial advantage to local applicants.</p>

3

<p>You look like you have a good chance!</p>

<p>Dkane, I think you should stop going around as a quasi-admissions officer… no one can assign an AR ranking except for one of the two readers looking at the application, so to put this person’s chances in such clear terms as if you are an authority may be giving false hope. The truth is that no one has a great shot at getting into Williams, even an AR 1.5.</p>

4

<p>I don’t often side with dkane, but I agree with his post above this time. I also think he has the experience with Williams admissions to venture a pretty good guess as to an applicant’s AR. The Williams AR for admissions has been discussed extensively in ephblog, which I believe he founded or co-founded.
His suggestion to contact the track coach is a very good one, and I think his observation that Williamstown area applicants have an advantage is correct. Besides, he never said that the OP had a great chance; he said that he would guess she would get in, but the competition gets tougher each year.</p>

<p>I do agree with you, benjaug, in that dkane sometimes seems too sure of himself.</p>

5

<p>So I hope you had already contacted the XC coach, because you’ll be in with a “tip”. Go for it. If you haven’t e-mailed him or her, it isn’t too late.</p>

6

<p>Thank you for your input everyone!! I have indeed been in contact with the XC coach :)</p>

7

<p>How do you calculate AR?</p>

8

<p>It’s in ephblog somewhere; it’s actually the Academic Ranking for Amherst, but it’s very similar to Williams’. It gives SAT limits for AR1 through 9. I recently saw the link in a thread similar to this one.</p>

9

<p>Ok, I found it:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.ephblog.com/2006/06/08/academic-ranks/[/url]”>http://www.ephblog.com/2006/06/08/academic-ranks/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

10

<p>A more thorough discussion of Academic Rating at Williams:</p>

<p>[Academic</a> Rating at Williams : EphBlog](<a href=“http://www.ephblog.com/2010/12/02/academic-rating-at-williams/]Academic”>http://www.ephblog.com/2010/12/02/academic-rating-at-williams/)</p>

<p>Hope you find it helpful, happysunnyshine. Good luck!</p>

11

<p>But what if one meets all except one of the criteria for an AR group? Does he/she still belong to that group?</p>

12

<p>There is no magic formula. It depends on how important that AR group is (high school grades matter most) and how far away you are in that category.</p>

13

<p>Do they count the writing section of the SAT in that? All of the charts that have been posted show a 1600 SAT scale, so what happens with the last 800 points? </p>

<p>Also (sorry to hijack the thread for a bit) but what would an AR for this situation be: a legacy, a 1520 (with 800 on writing, not added in), a 3.99 unweighted (my school doesn’t weight), a 790 and a 750 and the two SAT subject tests I sent. I’ve taken 4 AP tests and gotten 5s on all of them, and am taking 3 AP classes this year.</p>

14

<p>1) The writing section is counted like another achievement test. It is not nearly as important as math/cr.</p>

<p>2) I would <b>guess</b> that you are an AR 1 or 2. Raw GPA is irrelevant. What matters is where in the class you fall and how strong the class is. What sort of colleges were attended by the students last year who had the same class rank as you?</p>

15

<p>I would say most people with a 3.9 and above at my school go to either highly rated colleges, with some Ivy League acceptances (last year, a few to Cornell, 2 to Princeton, 1 to Yale, 2 or 3 to Dartmouth), and I think about 1 or 2 have gotten into Williams every year for the past many years. Generally, the valedictorians will have either a 4.0 or a high 3.9.</p>

16

<p>I would give 20 to 1 odds that you will be accepted ED. Congrats!</p>