Chance@Stanford

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
1

Hello, I realized my dream school is Stanford University and I plan to apply REA next year for the class of 2018. I have 4 main concerns:

  1. What about my resume would Stanford like?
  2. What about my resume would Stanford dislike?
  3. Do I have a good ‘chance’ at Stanford?
  4. Tips to improve my application?

Major: Biomechanical Engineering
State: Ohio
School: Top public school
Race: African American and South Korean (Blasian)
Gender: XY (Male)
Class: 2018 (I’m a junior right now)
GPA: 3.97 W and 3.71 UW (freshmen + sophomore years, junior is yet to be determined. The goal is 4.2+ W.)
PSAT: Haven’t gotten scores back but got a 1370 on last practice test I took.
ACT: 26 w/o writing (took it as a practice with little prep my sophomore year. Plan on retaking for sure until 32+)
Subject test: Math 2 - 700 (took my sophomore year and plan on retaking this year for 750+), US History - 720
AP: AP US History (4)
Past class load: 6 honors and 1 AP - combined freshmen and sophomore years
Recommendations: My guidance counselor really likes me
Essay: I feel I can write very unique and whimsical essays, my 3 main themes are: sports, diversity, and research/science

Junior class load:
AP Calc BC
AP Physics 1
AP Economics
AP English 11
Spanish IV
Electives

Senior class load plan: 5-6 AP’s (including Calc lll, AP Physics ll, and AP Chemistry )
Awards: Salute to excellence - Award for high achieving african americans, Scholar athlete, honor roll (generic awards as of now, nothing big as of now.)

EC:

In school

Basketball - lettered sophomore year, won division 1 districts, really big part of my life
Track - lettered sophomore year, won division 1 districts
African American Culture Club - Co founder and Vice President,
Diversity Acceptance Program - Vice president,
Young Conservatives - Vice President
Youth For Christ - Vice President,
LabLink - research club
Selected freshmen mentor
S.P.L.A.S.H - Selective program for leaders within my school

National Honors Society - Planning on applying this year

Out of School

Partner at Be The Change Venture - diversity and inclusion movement within Cleveland
Junior Ambassadors - Volunteered 109 hours at Cleveland Clinic main campus in the summer
Research Assistant - Assisted post doc at Case Western Reserve’s biomedical engineering lab
Student Board for DifferentLikeYou.com - summer internship at non profit - website for kids with disabilities
Interned at Artificial Intelligence Laboratories - Interned at firm based in San Francisco
Lifeguard - last summer
Council Member at the City Club of Cleveland - year round
Youth Pastor for church - 100 hours - year round
Food bank - Volunteering
Ron Brown GPS Program
HandsOn - Volunteering Program
Started my own lawn care company 2 summers ago

MITES - Planning on applying to next summer
Internship at Diversity Center - Planning on doing next summer
Cleveland clinic internship - Planning on applying to next summer
Case Research - Planning on doing next summer

Since Stanford is the hardest school to get into within the US, I wish to know how their admissions differs from others. (Assume all things I mention that will happen in the future occur). Please help me out! Thank you

-A typical OCD college applicant

2

Test scores low, high school ECs average, courses very good. Some of your out of school activities are impressive. IF you get admitted my guess is your out of school activities will be the main reason.

Your chances? Who knows?

3

Quality and depth much more important than quantity. Grow out of the dream school mentality and its more likely to happen.

4

What’s your sophomore gpa? Stanford doesn’t count freshman gpa.

5

Read this sage advice:

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/20027516/#Comment_20027516

You should investigate schools that match your general stats; GPA & test scores. FYI: my kiddo attended one of my state’s top ranked high schools. Its SAT average was 1334. They MIGHT get a small handful of kids to Stanford-level schools each year.

6

3.98 W, Thats what sucks for me because I got 1 B freshmen year and 3 sophomore year. @Multiverse7 will they really reject me straight out for gpa

7

They start with the grades and tramscript first. Next are test scores. Whether you have enough for them to want to move forward no one can say but right now you’re not looking too competitive. Work on getting those grades and test scores up. Good luck!

8

Do you really expect to raise your ACT 6 points? That’s pretty unrealistic. Without very high test scores, your chances don’t look good.

9

Yeah because last time I took it I didn’t take a single practict test @jennacwa Next time I’ll actuallly study

10

I assume your weighted gpa went from a 3.97 to a 3.98 when you excluded freshman year even though you got more Bs sophomore year because you took more honors or AP classes sophomore year? Unfortunately, Stanford looks at your unweighted gpa which they recalculate using sophomore and junior year grades. They also round pluses and minuses down or up to the whole letter grade. If you got B+ 's this will hurt you but if you got A-'s it will help. I’m assuming with 3 Bs sophomore year your unweighted gpa will be about a 3.5 They also don’t count certain class essays (PE, art etc.).
o
3.5 is very low for Stanford so your number one priority is to raise this and, of course, you need to get your ACT score up significantly. It’ll take some hard work but you can do it! Good luck!

11

@Multiverse7 Thank you so much for the advice, as of now GPA and my test scores are my number one priority. Yeah it will be hard but thank you I appreciate you reaching out!

12

@googledrone do you think I should apply to Stanford REA or is it just a waste of my time and money?

13

You realize that Stanford has the lowest admit rate of 4 yr colleges in the country, right? Why don’t you look at Stanford’s common data set, section C and look at the averages of students accepted. Have there been alumni at your HS who were accepted at very selective schools? What did they look like?

When I give presentations for my school (also with a tiny admit rate), I thank the audience sincerely for considering us. But I also feel it’s important for me to be truthful about the rotten chances for even the most qualified of them. I ask students: “right now, are you among the handful of top scholars in your HS today? Known by all the staff and the principal? Are you one of the strongest students your HS has produced in the last few years? If yes, then you MIGHT be a viable applicant for my school” I don’t say this to puff up my school – I wish to goodness that it could accept many many more. But it’s simply disingenuous for me to say: “It’s wonderful! You should all apply!”

I think Stanford is not a realistic choice for you, not withstanding its place as your dream destination. As I said above, you would barely even be in the top HALF of students at my daughter’s high school. Often, what we desire may not match reality.

My advice for you would be to think of the characteristics you like about Stanford and run the SuperMatch function on the left panel. It’ll give you schools that align to your preferences and are both realistic matches and affordable. Good luck to you!

14

“@googledrone do you think I should apply to Stanford REA or is it just a waste of my time and money?”

I think you should make your own decision. You know better than anyone how to evaluate the merit of your out of school activities. When viewers see a list of student’s accomplishments it is impossible to know if they are presented in a humble, accurate, or overstated manner.

When I applied to Stanford I didn’t know about college confidential. If I had posted my SAT scores on CC at that time I am sure some viewers would have advised me I have no chance of being admitted. I did some unique ECs that would have been difficult to describe adequately in a few sentences. I was accepted early admissions.

While you may want to consider varying opinions from a message board, the decision should be yours alone.

15

@googledrone Interesting. Yeah I won’t take any of these comments to heart, it IS my own decision. I guess you never know what can happen you know? Thanks for the advice