Chance me!

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Basically I’m wondering what type of colleges are going to be safeties, matches, and reaches for me. Also if you could chance me directly for ivies, Stanford, Northwestern, top LACs and other similar schools I would greatly appreciate it.

This is somewhat speculative but I’m pretty sure my application will look very similar to this.

Demographics: Middle Class, Asian/white, male.

Intended Major: Unsure currently.

Academics: 4.0 Unweighted GPA, 4.57 Weighted. Ranked 1/around 250. (not a very competitive school, not awful, but not
competitive.)

APs: Human geography, both Spanish ones, world history, US history, government, econ, both English ones, psych, stats, both Calculus ones, chemistry, physics. (This is an estimate but I’ll say eleven 5s and 4 4s.)

PSAT: 1500.

SAT: 1560-1580

SAT II: Not sure here. Considering taking a few, I’d guess I’d score in the mid to upper 700s.

ACT: 35 (There’s a small chance luck is on my side and I get a 36)

Awards: I don’t have much here. National Merit semifinalist. Some winning from writing stuff, which I’m not even sure counts as an award. Our school’s department awards which are basically meaningless.

Extracurriculars: (Didn’t really focus until sophomore year.)

Founder and president of Debate club (11, 12) and creative writing club. (10, 11 ,12)

Lead editor and publisher of our school’s literary magazine. (10, 11 ,12)

Part-time internships during the school year and full ones during the summer. During the school year it’s with a writing
focused (but covers all subjects) learning center. It’s good but not crazy amazing agency. The internship over the summer is as a Youth Learning and Outreach Intern. It’s somewhat selective and I organized, assisted, or ran many events. (10, 11 ,12)

Assisting around the office with our award-winning local paper. Also, contributing articles to it, acting as an unpaid part-time reporter. (10, 11, 12)

Placing in/winning some pretty big writing contests (and also some smaller local ones). Also, being published many literary magazines or journals (besides my own). I don’t want to get too specific but some of them were pretty prestigious.(10, 11 ,12)

Took place in Boy’s State.

Took part in a peer helpers class (11, 12) that focuses on helping out with mental health and well-being. Became a student counselor, as apart of it.

JV and summer baseball. Freshman year, we won the JV league, not that it matters much. (9, 10)

Member of our gay-straight alliance, mock trial, NHS/California Scholarship Federation, and interact club. (10, 11, 12)

Attending some rather selective summer writing camps. (10, 11)

There’s a fairly high chance I end up with a small, local job. It’d probably either be at the Boy’s and girl’s club or as like a waiter or something.

Organized a school book drive that got study books for AP tests, the ACT, and the SAT to students who needed them.

Volunteering:

At the library to help children of lower socioeconomic status with literacy, as well as helping out young adults with special needs. (10, 11, 12)

Also, miscellaneous community service that will probably end up with around 200 hours, maybe a little more. (9, 10, 11, 12)

Volunteering with Planned Parenthood when available, sparingly during the school year, somewhat often during the summer. (10, 11, 12)

Helping provide the elderly and lower class families with basic groceries and toiletries. (9, 10, 11, 12)

Tutoring, both at our High School and the local library. (9, 10, 11, 12)

Recommendations: I’d guess that they’d be pretty dang strong but I’m not sure.

Essays: This is my time to shine (I hope). I feel pretty confident that I can write some killer essays.

I have a legacy at Stanford and Columbia.

Thanks!

2

Oh I forgot to list that I’ve earned a seal of biliteracy and am fluent in Spanish (I’ve taken immersion since kindergarten.)

3

All around decent stats, legacy for Stanford should really help.

Btw if you are Asian/White just put down Asian.

4

Anything that was particularly strong or weak? Thanks.

5

You have a very strong profile! Tests are great (the 35 you actually achieved, right?), and GPA too. While you do have a lot of extracurricular experience, none of them really stand out to me – could be seen as resume padding. To me, you seem like you’d enjoy majoring in English/writing. Some great schools for that (with more of a focus on creative writing) would include WashU, Brown, Stanford, Harvard, and Pomona.

Are your parents active alumni? If they aren’t, legacy status won’t really mean much. I know a kid who applied to Harvard SCEA with legacy and 35 ACT who was rejected (and mind you they defer almost everyone). His dad wasn’t an active alum, though.

Also, good on you for not falling into the stereotypic Asian STEM profile! It’s true that being Asian will hurt at top schools, but being an Asian in STEM would hurt even more. Many LACs actually need more Asians, so consider that as a viable option.

You definitely won’t be able to fit all that stuff onto the common app, so only choose the activities you identify with/have a leadership role in. Good luck!

6

Thanks for the reply! I will definitely narrow down my list of ECs when the time comes. Actually, I’m sorta worried about the resume-padding thing. I honestly am not, I’m just going after what I love to do. Will the edited list come off less resume padding-y?

7

Wow! As good as it gets without national/international STEM awards.

Undecided is a slight ding.

Stanford, HYP are high reaches
Columbia, is mid to high reach
Penn depends on the school, low reach (CAS), reach(SEAS), mid/high (Wharton), high reach (dual degree eg Huntsman or Jerome Fisher)
Brown is a low/mid reach
Cornell and Dartmouth are low reaches
Amherst/Williams/Pomona/CMC/HMC are mid reaches.
Northwestern is a match if you apply ED. Low-Mid reach otherwise because there is little space in RD pool.

8

Nope. It isn’t whatsoever. Any Adcomm worth his salt can see you enjoy the humanities. They don’t need an off-hand decision about a major quite yet.

Being an Asian in STEM wouldn’t “hurt.” A student with fantastic extracurriculars and stats will get into a top college, regardless of his ethnicity. I resent the term “Asian STEM profile”–there are lots of STEM white kids, black kids, Latinos, etc. STEM itself is a popular sort of realm of study.

9

Few top LACs consider being Asian a hook. Anyway, I think you’re in general a strong candidate with an interesting background. If you can really nail your essays and recommendations, I think you have a solid chance anywhere. The EC’s might be a little bit on the average side for the most selective universities.

It’s hard to say what individual schools will think of you but I think the above poster does a solid job classifying schools. I’d say myself:

High reaches: Stanford, Yale, Princeton, U’Chicago, Harvard, Penn Wharton
Reaches: Columbia, Duke, Northwestern, Brown, Dartmouth, Penn, Amherst, Williams, Pomona, Swarthmore, Bowdoin, Claremont McKenna, Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Vanderbilt, Rice
Low reaches: Emory, USC, Middlebury, WashU, Carleton, Davidson, Wesleyan, Haverford, Tufts, UC Berkeley
High matches: Northeastern, Vassar, UVA, Grinnell, Wake Forest, NYU, BU, most honor programs at state universities
Matches: Occidental, URochester, Macalester, Brandeis, Case Western

The reach schools tend to be reaches for everyone, but I think that shouldn’t deter you from applying. Just be sure you’re giving due thought into which schools you’re applying to rather than just blanket applying to the Ivies.

10

Are the test scores (apart from PSAT) actual results or projected? If actual stats then as good a chance as any applicant. If not then we really can’t determine chances.

The seal of biliteracy for the state of California is given out senior year on the diploma BTW. You may have qualified for it with your foreign language proficiency by junior year but senior English grades count too. I would not list it in your college apps.

11

The more I look at the thread, the more I think that most of what OP has put down is all hypothetical. Please ask for chances once you have actual numbers.

Try not to take my post personally. It would be great if you did what you wrote (take 15 AP tests with 4s and 5s, score high on SAT/ACT, active in multiple EC) but most people would have very little time to fit everything in.