Chances at Ivies, Tufts, Cal, etc.?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>So what chances do you guys think I have?</p>

<p>I'm a Jewish, upper class male</p>

<p>WGPA: 96</p>

<p>SAT: R = 720; M = 710; W = 720</p>

<p>APs: English Lang & Comp: 5; US History: 4</p>

<p>Classes Taken: 5 Honors, 4 AP (6 more APs planned for Senior year)</p>

<p>Class Rank: Not given at my school, but probably in the top 5-8% in a class of about 325</p>

<p>Awards:</p>

<p>National Latin Exam -- Gold Medal (Perfect Paper)
National Latin Exam -- Silver Medal
Excellence in Latin I
Excellence in Latin II
Excellence in Honors Chem
Excellence in Business Dynamics
Excellence in Design and Draw for Production
Junior Science Award
Induction into Sociedad Honoraria Hispanica (Spanish honor society)</p>

<p>ECs:</p>

<p>Campus Congress: 10, 11, 12
School Newspaper: 11, 12
NHS: 12
Discussion Panelist at School's Local Cable Station: 12</p>

<p>I know my ECs are weak, although I did do some important things. In Campus Congress in 10th grade I changed school policy to get sophomores' study halls converted to free periods at the beginning of the year, instead of halfway through, as was originally the case. In junior year I worked on a committee with faculty and administrators that came up with ideas to promote academic honesty at my school, and our ideas are going to go into effect next year. The reason I'm mentioning this is because, while I didn't have many ECs, I think I did do a good deal of extra work in the activities that I was in. And I'm going to make sure to talk about that in my application.</p>

<p>I'm also going to be doing volunteer work over the summer and the fall, and will do some more ECs as a senior, assuming that won't look too much like I was just trying to get more in at the last minute.</p>

<p>In terms of the SATs, I know they're decent, but kinda on the low side, so I am retaking them in the fall. And I haven't taken SAT IIs, yet.. I'll be doing those in the fall also.</p>

<p>Here are the main colleges I want to get into:</p>

<p>Reaches:
Yale
Harvard
Dartmouth
UPenn
Amherst</p>

<p>Matches:
Berkeley
Bowdoin
Cornell
Tufts</p>

<p>Safety:
Boston College</p>

<p>What do you think?</p>

2

<p>My guess?</p>

<p>Impossible Reaches:
Yale
Harvard</p>

<p>Very difficult Reaches:
Dartmouth
UPenn
Amherst</p>

<p>Reach:
Cornell</p>

<p>Slight Reach:
Bowdoin
Cornell
Tufts</p>

<p>Match:
Boston College</p>

<p>BUT if you can raise your SAT your chances will improve at all of these. My advice is to dump the impossible reaches and add more in the reach, slight reach, and match categories. I would add Northwestern, Middlebury, and maybe Rice. As a true safety look at a school like Bates or Hamilton.</p>

3

<p>slipper... thanks for your thoughts. Yeah, I definitely plan to raise my SATs, especially since that was the first time I've taken them. </p>

<p>Anyway, I wouldn't agree about Yale being impossible for me to get into. According to my school, of the 4 people admitted to Yale in the past few years who applied EA (out of 13 applicants), their average GPA was 96.72 and the average SAT was 2110. (The latter score is admittedly a little hard to believe, but it is what it is.)</p>

<p>So I'd definitely say it's a high reach, but I don't think it'd be impossible. Unless you think my ECs are the main problem?</p>

4

<p>actually, HYP are impossible reaches for you, like slipper said. those who got in with low stats def. have much better ECs or some hooks</p>

5

<p>Cal is a reach if you are OOS, otherwise it is a match.</p>

6

<p>And what is your UNWEIGHTED gpa?</p>

<p>I think people NEED to ask that before they start giving results, as colleges don't care if your school calls every single class "honors" and gives an extra grade point. The unweighted GPA is generally more important than the weighted.</p>

7

<p>CorsicanUpstart:</p>

<p>Asssuming you are a California resident,
UCB: Match</p>

8

<p>Thanks for your opinions, guys. Unfortunately I'm in NY, not California. So that would make Cal a reach?</p>

<p>As for my unweighted GPA, I honestly don't know what it is. My school's never given it out, although it's probably around 2 points lower.</p>

9

<p>Boston College isnt a safety.</p>

<p>yeahhh had to say it.</p>

10

<p>CorsicanUpstart,</p>

<p>Let me preface that I am not wanting to discourage you, rather offer a dose of reality. During the past admissions "season", I watched many of my daughter's classmates with superior GPA's, test scores and # of AP classes taken REJECTED at all of the colleges you mention. Your REACH schools are definitely extreme REACH for you, given your lack of standout EC's. The schools you consider to be MATCH are all slight REACH to weak MATCH (i.e., Tufts being the weak MATCH). Boston College is no slam dunk for SAFETY... perhaps a weak MATCH to MATCH. For Out of State, UC Berkeley is a REACH (and even if you were CA Resident, it would be a slight REACH, IMHO).</p>

<p>Most all of the private schools you list will consider intangibles such as your essays, your EC's, teacher recommendations and your character (sometimes gleaned through interviews) as important factors. Perhaps some of these factors will make up the difference for what you acknowledge to be weak EC's. It would definitely serve you well to search for some other SAFETY schools. Good luck!</p>

11

<p>CorsicanUpstart:</p>

<p>UCB: Slight Reach (out of state)</p>

12

<p>Alright, thanks guys. I'm kind of surprised that people say BC wouldn't be a safety, but okay. What do you think about Brown and JHU as reaches, CMU as a match, and Villanova as a safety? And assume for the sake of argument that I do at least 50 points better on the SAT when I retake it, since I didn't really prepare much the first time.</p>

<p>Also, in terms of getting accepted at medium reaches, do you think the limiting factor for me would be more grades or ECs? And if ECs, how much of a problem will they be?</p>

<p>And I also realized that I'll be adding practicing Kung Fu as an outside interest for 9th and 10th grade (possibly 11th, but I wasn't practicing it quite as much by then). I've also been invited to the National Student Leadership Council for the past few years, although I'm not sure how presitgious that is.</p>

<p>Thanks again...</p>

13

<p>Yale: Extreme Reach
Harvard: Extreme Reach
Dartmouth: Major Reach
UPenn: Major Reach
Amherst: Major Reach</p>

<p>Cornell: Reach
Berkeley: Reach</p>

<p>Your weighted GPA is quite low.</p>

14

<p>Hi!</p>

<p>You do have to remember that coming from our school in the very upper middle class area we live, the accepted people with low SATs and GPAs are most likely legacies. For example, the boy this year who got in (curly black hair) was in that accepted group you mentioned, and he had a father and a grandfather who went to yale. And his father was an associate professor. You can check out his specific stats if you look at the naviance scattergram for yale and set it to SAT 2400... he had about a 95.7 and low 2100 SATs, just a little bit lower than your stats. I think his ECs were comparable to yours, maybe a little less committed. </p>

<p>In my opinion, apply to reaches. Apply to mega reaches. It's worth a shot. But you might have high hopes, so apply to mega safeties.</p>