Chances at Northwestern

<p>Ok, decisions are coming out soon, and I'm so anxious. I've never made a chances post before, so here goes:</p>

<p>Gender: Female
Ethnicity: Caucasian
School Type: 1300 kids, public, not very competitive. I believe the average act is 21-22. Most kids go to Madison, or other UW schools. A very small amount of kids go to schools like: Notre Dame, UPenn, WashU, UMich, Northwestern, etc...</p>

<p>Unweighted GPA : 3.9</p>

<p>-Weighted GPA: 4.1</p>

<p>rank: 7/292</p>

<p>senior year schedule:
AP English Literature
French V
AP Chem
Trigonometry (honors)
AP Psychology
Pre Calculus (honors)
Vocal Ensemble
Senior leadership</p>

<p>I've always taken the most challenging schedule possible, and took all APs as well last year, when many of my classmates with similar stats were still at the honors level.</p>

<p>I'm a very good math student, and it may seem like taking pre-calc as a senior is not very advanced, but no one from my middle school was placed in geometry freshman year because of our horrible teacher. So, there are only 6 kids in AP Calc, all of who had went to a smaller middle school with a stronger math program. It's really frustrating to be stuck in easy pre-calc, when you know you have the potential to excel in AP calc. But oh well, what is done can not be undone.</p>

<p>Last year my APs were: AP English and Composition, AP Biology and AP US History</p>

<p>ACT: 32</p>

<p>Extracurriculars:
Choir- 9-12, Junior & Senior year in top ensemble group. Perform for community, especially at Christmastime.
Drama- 9-12 Several roles in musicals and straight plays. Most recently, I played Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. Most sucessful show in my high school's history.
Senior Leadership: Group of 10 seniors who have a year to complete a service project. This year we chose to raise money for our local state park, so we have been fundraising like crazy, and recently held a environmental film festival, which was successful. This is very time consuming, and we meet every day during eighth hour.
French Club- I'm very involved with French, and have won a few awards from the department. We host a cabaret every year and I actually traveled with some classmates to France, and stayed with a host family in Blois and attended a French Lycee. We also visited Paris, which was amazing.</p>

<p>I also tutor after school through NHS, and I have tutored elementary school kids in reading after school through the READS program.</p>

<p>employment -- I've worked at a shoe store downtown since the summer of 2006, before junior year. During the summer I work about 30-40 hours a week, and during the school years I only work one day on the weekends.</p>

<p>honors/awards
high honor roll, of course
AP Scholar
NHS
school academic awards
a few school music awards
participation in 1st and 2nd annual southern lakes honors choir
WSMA solo & ensemble-
9-1st on solo
10- 1st on solo
11- went to state for solo, got a second at state. Went to state with my ensemble group: got 2nd on madrigal, got 1st on vocal jazz
12- going to state for solo, and also going to state with ensemble group for madrigal.</p>

<p>essays:
Common app: I really liked this one. It came to be at like 2 in the morning, and I just wrote it on the spot. It was about the mona lisa and how even the most acclaimed work of art can have its imperfections. Nobody is perfect, essentially.
why northwestern: I think i put across my enthusiasm for the school</p>

<p>I signed away my right to see my teacher and gc recs, but I'm sure they were great.</p>

<p>I sent them an update with some stuff I had been up to like the winter play, solo/ensemble, and a senior leadership fundraiser.</p>

<p>My parents know someone on the board of reagents at Northwestern and they had him bring the dean of admissions my application and had my application marked that I was especially interested, if that counts for anything.</p>

<p>Thank you so much for your time! If you need to know anything more, I'll try to fill you in.</p>

<p>Oh, let me just add a few more things I thought of.</p>

<p>I sent a recording of myself singing a few songs, and a music resume, because I plan on continuing all things music in school.</p>

<p>I also want to go to medical school, so I wrote an additional essay on how I became interested in medicine. Who knows if they used this at all.</p>

<p>I should also tell you about the other kids who applied to NU at my school:</p>

<p>For one of the valedictorians, Northwestern was her dream school so she applied ED and was rejected. She took a few APs (one last year, 3 this year + 1 self study), ad scored an 31 on her act. She's a very smart girl, and one of the nicest people I've ever met. I think the reason she was rejected because the adcoms might have thought she was just a little boring. Maybe nothing jumped out and grabbed them.</p>

<p>The next two are ranked 3 and 6. They got a 28 and 26 on their ACT, respectively, and are each taking their first 3 APs this year. They don't want to go to Northwestern (they'll probably enroll at UW-Madison), and only applied because I did, and they want to show that anything I can do, they can do. I think they were hoping they would aggravate me by doing this, but it just turned out to be a waste of their 60 dollars. These girls are supposed to be my friends, so why would I care if they applied? I even took them with me to visit NU. I don't think they'll get in, just because their scores are too low and I don't think they look very interesting either. There is nothing they really excel at.</p>

<p>The other valedictorian, I think, has a good shot at getting in. He got a 31 on the ACT as well, and is taking his first 3 APs this year. He is a very interesting applicant, and has done cool things like done a foreign exchange in Japan. He's also a musician, and involved in theatre. I'm sure his essays are excellent too, so I think the NU might be interested in him.</p>

<p>Will my classmates have any effect on my admission?</p>

<p>umm, chance me please?</p>

<p>115 views and no replies? you guys are laaaame.</p>

<p>I don't know if I missed it, but you say you're good at Math, and that's great, but it would be nice to have something to back up your passion ... do you have a good subscore on it in the ACT? I guess it's too late to take an SAT II Math 2C, but I think being like an AMC school high scorer or something would show that. I'd say it might be a bit of a stretch, but you have a shot. I'd say about a 35-45% chance, but hey I'm not always right and you looked like you wanted any response ...</p>

<p>Ugh, I was going to take the AMC, but couldn't because I had a test that hour and my teacher wouldn't let me out. I do take the Wisconsin math contests each month unless I'm really tied up and score highly, so I'm sure I would have done well.</p>

<p>And I didn't take the Math 2 SAT IIs because I didn't have pre-calc until this year, and my guidance counselor said I should take math II or nothing.</p>

<p>My subscore on the ACT is high though, so I guess that helps.</p>

<p>This info might not be helpful to you but I will tell you about my friend who got into NWU this year as an ED applicant. He took only AP chem and AP Cal BC which he got 5s for both. He was top 10% in his school. No special ECs.</p>

<p>I asked him why the university decided put him in; he replied, NWU considers SAT score as a single most important measurement. He got 2210 in SAT. That was all. He got acceptance in NWU pre-dental program this year.</p>