Chances at Harvard

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hi. I am a rising senior. I hope to apply early action to Harvard. I was hoping you guys could help me assess my chances of getting in. I am also interested in Dartmouth, Yale, Cornell, and UPenn.</p>

<p>SATs</p>

<p>New SAT: 2070
Old SAT: 1490 M:790 V:700</p>

<p>SAT IIs:</p>

<p>Biology M:790
Math IIC:780
Chemistry: 720 <--is that decent or on the low side?</p>

<p>Academics:</p>

<p>Unweighted GPA: 3.98 (out of 4.0)
Weighted GPA: 4.85 (out of 5.0)</p>

<p>APs taken:
AP Biology - 5 (taken sophomore year)
AP Chemistry - TBA
AP Statistics - TBA
AP Language - TBA</p>

<p>Next year's APs: Modern World; Physics; Calculus; Human Geography; Psychology; Literature</p>

<p>My school does not rank. Also, I'm from the Washington DC area in which there is a plethora of smart students.</p>

<p>Extracurriculars:</p>

<p>*years include senior year</p>

<p>Debate (4years) Captain (best record on team)
Varsity Tennis (4 years)
SGA (2 years) Parliamentarian/treas
Student Academy of Science (2 years) founder and president
It's Academic (3 years) County Champions
Math Honor Society (2 years)
National Honor Society (2 years)</p>

<p>Volunteer Hours: roughly 200</p>

<p>Summer:</p>

<p>Taken Engineering course at George Washington University
Interned Two years at Walter Reed Army Institute for Research
Created science project entitled "Effects of ACHe on the brains of American soldiers"
2nd place at Regional Neuroscience contest</p>

<p>Awards:</p>

<p>WPI book award
im pretty sure some others but nothing too extravagent</p>

<p>My sister attends Harvard.</p>

<p>Do tell me on my chances to Dartmouth, Yale, Cornell, Duke and UPenn as well.</p>

2

<p>ur much better off with ur old SAT score, but if u submit that, i think u also have to submit some sort of a writing score, so since u don't have that writing score, i think u r unfortunately stuck with ur new SAT score.</p>

<p>ur SAT IIs r fine, ur chem isn't a big problem (by the way, harvard probably wants u to take SAT IIs in differing areas, so they won't like it if u submit 2 science SATs and have them both counted)</p>

<p>ur ECs are typical of an average applicant, so there's no advantage/disadvantage there.</p>

<p>ur new SAT score puts u at a slight disadvantage (average is about a 1450-1500, which translates to ~2190 on the new SAT)</p>

<p>if u want to get in, hopefully ur class rank is top 2% or something. if not, there's not much hope, sorry! If ur class rank is really up there, then u better hope for some rave reviews from ur teachers and a solid interview.</p>

<p>hope i helped</p>

3

<p>now that u've edited ur ECs while i was typing in my previous post, ur EC's are higher than average, so it'll put u at a slight advantage. however, everything else i've said still stands.</p>

<p>harvard still puts a huge weight on rank and test scores.</p>

4

<p>sigh...i have a 2070 too- first time that i took the sats...june 2005...argh...it shouldn't be too late to retake..rite? we stilll have oct till jan for reg decision and for u, until nov...u can retake it for a better score?
-rising senior here too =)</p>

5

<p>You are not getting into Harvard. I am 95% sure of that. It has nothing to do with you, or your SAT scores. The odds of a non-hooked, non-URM, non-legacy, non-major athlete, non-developmental admit applicant getting into Harvard is around 1 in 20, less if you require financial aid.</p>

<p>Apply of course, but don't hold your breath. And I love to be proven wrong (since the odds are so heavily weighted on my side!)</p>

6

<p>isnt sister at harvard 'legacy'?</p>

7

<p>parents at harvard are considered legacy.</p>

<p>but even legacies aren't automatic shoe-ins. The ivies still reject well over half of their legacy applicants</p>

8

<p>i second mini</p>

<p>you don't really have any reason to go to Harvard...that school is exclusively for people who have achieved more in their high school career than the average person in their entire lives...if you ask your sister for her transcript maybe you can find out why she got in</p>

9

<p>what do yo guys think about the other schools i listed?</p>

10

<p>What were your sister's stats?</p>

11

<p>Yeah, compare your stats to your sister's stats</p>

12

<p>No chance at Harvard and Yale. Good chance at cornell (especially ED). Dartmouth, UPenn, and Duke are reaches.</p>

13

<p>My SAT breakup was 680V 710M 680W
Sister 1580 mine 1490.
bio: 800 790
Math: 800 780
Writing:790 n/a
french: 760 Chem: 730
everything else is pretty much same</p>

14

<p>what school do you go to mikej</p>

15

<p>what if I retook the SATs in the Fall and got a 2200+. Would the fact that i took the SAT twice for the old one and three times (including if i take it in the Fall) hurt me more than the help of a better score? Also how much weightage is there on the number of times one takes the SAT?</p>

16

<p>bump......</p>

17

<p>As far as I can see from this post (for all I know you can have a bunch of other excellent qualifications that you didn't post) I don't think you'll get into Harvard. Legacy works best when your parents are alums, especially alums who have been donating reasonable sums. They have no reason to accept you, your SATs and ECs are subpar for Harvard and Yale. Sorry if this sounds harsh, but I think its better to be brash. I don't think you'll be able to score higher on the SATs if youve taken it twice (or more) already. You've probably topped off, but even if they did go up 100 points (you can't possible expect a 150 point increase at this point) I don't think it'll make much of a difference. Look in the archives at the stats of kids who were rejected and deferred early by Harvard, the majority are much higher than yours. Apply anyway, because you could get in and surprise us all. I would just recommend that you get a few safetys. Good luck. :)</p>

18

<p>If you add 150 points to your SAT score, it would have virtually no impact of your Harvard chances. Still about 1 out of 20. Doesn't have anything in particular to do with you, really.</p>

19

<p>Mike, most of these school aren't counting writing this year, so your SAT is under 1400, making any of theme an extreme reach. Yes retake the SAT, but find safeties!</p>

20

<p>Harvard takes the highest subscores from the OLD and NEW. Then, you'll have a 2170, which is really decent. If you think you can do better, by all means, retake. If not, a 2170 is decent. Work more on the other parts of the "package".</p>