Chance on admission?

With a composite SAT score of 2110 and 4.45 GPA, what are the changes of getting into the following?
Which have highest chances?
Taking it again in December, but want to use the 2110 for possibly some early actions, which should I use the 2110 on, and which should I wait for the Dec scores (hopefully better) for?

Brown, CalTech, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Northwestern, Princeton, Stanford, U Chicago, U Michigan, U Penn, U San Fran, U Southern California, Yale, UCLA, Berkeley

Thanks!

ECs are Yearbook editor, Stu Co, DECA, Quiz Bowl, NHS…

Why are you looking at each of these colleges?

This looks like you copy+pasted a top-20 list and added a couple of California schools. On this list, you’ve got

-All 8 Ivy League schools (Nobody is a good fit for every one of these
-A couple of the most selective public universities in the country (UMich and Berkeley)
-Two “Ivy equivalents” (Stanford+UChicago)
-More prestige schools (Northwestern, Caltech)

Throw in Georgetown and MIT, and you’d have a real laundry list. There are schools there that are nothing alike, which makes me suspect you haven’t seen what their programs are like for your major, but have simply chosen based on prestige. That usually leads to poor results (students transferring out from UChicago because the college doesn’t offer a computer science major, to give but one example).

Your odds at all the schools from your list mentioned above are low with your current SAT (unless you’re in-state for UMich or UCB), because even students with near-perfect stats have low chances at those colleges. To chance you properly, though it might be better for you to come back with a better-researched list first, we’d need far more information. I’ll give a brief summary below.

Academics

-Unweighted GPA (there are 30,000+ high schools and as nearly as many systems for weighting, so colleges don’t trust wGPA too much).
-Class rank
-SAT breakdown
-SAT II scores (if any)
-Course rigor (List any AP/IB classes)
-Awards (academic or EC)

Extracurriculars

-Activities
-Length of participation for each (ECs you’re involved in throughout grades 9-12 and something you start grade 12 are seen very differently)
-Any accomplishments/awards/recognition (this might be a positive review of a play written by an applicant in the NY Times, congratulations from a major elected official, etc)
-Jobs/internships
-Summer programs
-Recruited athlete?

Other

-State
-Ethnicity
-Income bracket
-Legacy
-Applying for financial aid?
-Rough guess at how good your recommendations will be
–Which two teachers for your teacher recs?
–1/10 is “don’t admit this student.” 10/10 is “best student I’ve ever taught,” plus an anecdote about the time you saved a suicidal classmate from depression, plus several examples of your outstanding contributions to the school, all of it written beautifully.*
–What will your counselor rec be like (how well does he/she know you and some stuff you’ve done that isn’t listed on your application
–Additional rec (same info as counselor rec)

*If you self-rate recommendations 10/10, I won’t believe you unless you have a Nobel Prize sitting around somewhere. I’ll be similarly skeptical of a 9/10 estimate, and probably just assume 8/10 at best.

Why are you looking at each of these colleges?

This looks like you copy+pasted a top-20 list and added a couple of California schools. On this list, you’ve got

-All 8 Ivy League schools (Nobody is a good fit for every one of these
-A couple of the most selective public universities in the country (UMich and Berkeley)
-Two “Ivy equivalents” (Stanford+UChicago)
-More prestige schools (Northwestern, Caltech)

Throw in Georgetown and MIT, and you’d have a real laundry list. There are schools there that are nothing alike, which makes me suspect you haven’t seen what their programs are like for your major, but have simply chosen based on prestige. That usually leads to poor results (students transferring out from UChicago because the college doesn’t offer a computer science major, to give but one example).

Your odds at all the schools from your list mentioned above are low with your current SAT (unless you’re in-state for UMich or UCB), because even students with near-perfect stats have low chances at those colleges. To chance you properly, though it might be better for you to come back with a better-researched list first, we’d need far more information. I’ll give a brief summary below.

Academics

-Unweighted GPA (there are 30,000+ high schools and as nearly as many systems for weighting, so colleges don’t trust wGPA too much).
-Class rank
-SAT breakdown
-SAT II scores (if any)
-Course rigor (List any AP/IB classes)
-Awards (academic or EC)

Extracurriculars

-Activities
-Length of participation for each (ECs you’re involved in throughout grades 9-12 and something you start grade 12 are seen very differently)
-Any accomplishments/awards/recognition (this might be a positive review of a play written by an applicant in the NY Times, congratulations from a major elected official, etc)
-Jobs/internships
-Summer programs
-Recruited athlete?

Other

-State
-Ethnicity
-Income bracket
-Legacy
-Applying for financial aid?
-What will your essays probably be like? This is largely based on what your English teacher and guidance counselor think of them.*
-Rough guess at how good your recommendations will be*
–Which two teachers for your teacher recs?
–1/10 is “don’t admit this student.” 10/10 is “best student I’ve ever taught,” plus an anecdote about the time you saved a suicidal classmate from depression, plus several examples of your outstanding contributions to the school, all of it written beautifully.
–What will your counselor rec be like (how well does he/she know you and some stuff you’ve done that isn’t listed on your application
–Additional rec (same info as counselor rec)

*If you self-rate recommendations or essays 10/10, I won’t believe you unless you have a Nobel Prize sitting around somewhere. I’ll be similarly skeptical of a 9/10 estimate, and probably just assume 8/10 at best.

At 2110 you are a bit light for Ivy plus schools. You might get a bite from 1-2. So, while there are students accepted with this scores, they are usually the following: URM, athletes, legacies and other folks with dilneated hooks.

@NotVerySmart
I have already applied to a few schools which are in-state for me and with much higher acceptance rates than the ones I have listed above, so I am not going for an all Ivy application or anything. It seems like you know what you’re talking about to a degree, so if I answer some of the additional questions you asked, could you chance me on those schools? I would really appreciate your help since you seem to know what you are saying. Please be honest.

Unweighted GPA: I am not really sure how colleges will calculate an unweighted GPA, is it just 4 for an A, 3 for a B… etc? For my school, it is 5 for an honors/ap A, 4 for a regular class A, and goes down a point for each letter grade down. Weighted in my school’s system, my GPA after six semesters is a 4.495
Class Rank: 10%
SAT Breakdown: 650R 700W 760M
SAT II (taking Lit, Math I and Math II next weekend)
Course Rigor: 8 total AP classes, and everything honors that was offered to me (electives and health and gym could not be honors)
Awards: I get the Scholastic Honors every year

ECs
Student Council 9-12 (VP 11)
Yearbook 10-12 (editor 12)
Quizbowl 9-12 (VP 12)
DECA (11) President
NHS (12, but thats the only grade offered)
Camp cabin leader
Intern at a chamber of commerce office
Those are my primary ones with the most involvement, but I have a few more

Awards: I got an award for winning an essay competition presented to me from the mayor of Detroit… how and where do I include this in my application?

Other: I don’t really want to share all that other info, but I am not a legacy anywhere, asian, and 6/10-7/10 on my rec essays, maybe a 7/10-8/10 on my common app essay

I hate to be the bringer of bad news, but odds are, you’d get rejected from every school on your list except maybe U Mich, U San Fran, possibly USC, and maybe, just maybe UCLA. Unless you can bring up your rank to top five in your class, bring up your SAT scores to 2250+, and get 750+ in all your SAT subject tests, the Ivies won’t give you much thought. Of course, I may be absolutely wrong in saying this, but they see thousands of students identical to you on paper. The one thing that is a pull factor is that essay award, but it’s completely offset by your okay-ish CR&W scores on your SAT.

I doubt anyone is going to be rejected for having a 2100+ score, but it certainly makes things more difficult at the schools you’ve listed. I see a few positives in your profile, a negative or two, and some things worth noting. With regards to UW GPA, the scale you give (A=4, B=3, etc.) is what colleges will generally use, though many of them take into account gradations of a given letter grade (B+ is somewhere between 3 and 3.5).

The good news is that your course rigor is fine, student council involvement is a good EC, and the essay award will look good (list this in the “awards” section of the common app).

The bad news is that your extracurriculars don’t seem to have a strong focus or national/international recognition, which is what it can take to stand out at a lot of the schools you’re looking at. And being asian is never a good thing from an admissions standpoint - the effect has been estimated to be tantamount to a 100-200 point drop in your SAT score. Your lack of legacy isn’t going to help, but you’re hardly alone in that.

You should spend a lot of time on your essays, because essays and recommendations are how most top schools will differentiate between 20,000 qualified applicants. If you feel like your supplements are anything less than your best work, you should rewrite them. This is a large part of the reason I would counsel you against applying to 15 schools - you just won’t have the time to write good supplements for that many colleges.

In cutting the list down some, I would again urge you to start with the Ivies. Brown, for instance, is a school where the focus is largely on your major - pick an interest, and take most of your courses in that field. UPenn is completely different, in that double majors are common and many students will self-design a course of study that often lacks a laserlike focus. If you’re looking for a school in or near a city, Columbia might be the place. Dartmouth, a couple of hours away from Boston, would probably not be your cup of tea. Or maybe you want to avoid large cities and would love Dartmouth. I don’t know your situation, but these are factors to consider before applying.

If you can cut that list down some (I’d suggest losing about 5 schools), that’ll allow you to devote considerable attention to each application. As long as you write good essays and your teacher recommendations are good, you’ll almost certainly get in somewhere, and all these colleges are good schools. Whatever may happen, you’ll be in a position to succeed once you matriculate, and a university education is what you make of it, so don’t worry too much about getting into a particular school. Best of luck.

@NotVerySmart Which things are worth nothing? I will put less focus on those. Ps, I have shortened my list by taking Dartmouth and U San Fran off and will probably eliminate a couple more

Also, where is the section on common app where i can add the award from the essay competition? (is it an “acedemic” award? it wasn’t through school)

Where is your home state?
What is your intended major?
For uwGPA at UMich, it is A=4, B=3, etc.
Your SAT is below admission average of UMich. If you ae from OOS, it is a reach for you as the OOS admission rate is 20% this year.

Where you apply is a decision for yourself and parents to decide, but I must say of the Ivyplus schools you have listed, you probably had a better chance at admission at Dartmouth, as opposed to HYPS…you are below the mean in all these schools for scores. Further, USF was the only legitimate safety school list, and you have no real match schools…??

The points worth noting are those about essays and the differences between various Ivies.

Yes, you would list the essay competition under “academic awards.”

@boolaHI I am applying to a few other schools which are in-state for me with higher acceptance rates. These are some schools on my list with the lowest acceptance rates

@billcsho the oos rate for UMich is 20% this year?!! Intended major= business admin or engineering

@question10101 That is for UMich overall OOS admission. Ross is always below 20% even including in state. CoE should be below 20% for OOS.

If I am applying to some schools early action, and some schools regular decision, can I change my common app essay for my regular decision app even after I submit it to a couple early action schools? Like, can I have different versions of my common app where the main common app essay varies depending on the school I am applying to (because I want different schools to see different CA essays and answer a different CA questions depending).
How do I make a different version of it?