Chances at Stanford SCEA (another white male)

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>I'm applying SCEA to Stanford (as a ChemE hopeful) this fall and then will follow up with MIT, Berkeley, Princeton, UT-Austin, UMich, and UMCP - it would be nice if you could be critical in your evaluation of my chances</p>

<p>Stats:
GPA - 3.96 UW, 4.5-4.6 in an intensely competitive public school (40-something on newsweek's list)
SAT I - will take in october (230 psat, expect around the same)
SAT II - 770 chem/710 iic/720 phys (didnt study enough first time, retaking iic and phys in november, want 750+)
AP's - 5's on chem, lang, gov, and 4 on euro (will take BC, Lit, and US as sr.)</p>

<p>EC's:
-volunteered at an assisted living facility 150 hrs
-jv basketball freshman year
-founder of ultimate frisbee club at school (quite an active club)
-founder of junior high robotics club
-HS robotics (botball) club for 2 years (reached nationals both times)
-nhs, science honor society, other bs</p>

<p>Work/Summer Experience:
-attended apogee summer program at northwestern 5th grade summer
-interned at texas tech university freshman summer in cardiology (acknowledged in a journal of physiology)
-interned at ncbi (national center for biotech info) soph summer, helped with some gene-related computer coding
-took a course in fundamentals of UNIX at the national institutes of health soph summer
-have created a ton of websites for random companies
-during upcoming school year i will be interning at the department of defense's naval research lab doing some sort of coding for sensors
-currently at NASA SHARP 2005 residential, UNM campus (am named as an author of a paper out for publication)</p>

<p>Other random stuff:
-skipped 6th grade
-took over a fuel cell design contest in our county's school district (140,000+ students) as a senior project (founder of contest is headed to princeton), last year the contest handed out thousands in prize money, my goal is to raise 10,000 dollars for this year
-speak/read/write armenian and russian
-born in armenia, naturalized US citizen
-nms semifinalist
-love to eat eggplant</p>

<p>Recs/Essays:
-Rec from counselor will be great, we've have talked alot
-Recs from teachers will probably be great but not the best (i tend to be overly social in class and sometimes get on the teachers nerves)
-Essays should be pretty good as well (i'm getting help from a harvard recruiter here at NASA SHARP)</p>

<p>Cons:
-kinda quit out of high school organized sports
-only taken two years of foreign language (span 1+2), hopefully my other languages will help that
-my current satii scores, hopefully temporary</p>

<p>i tried to cut out at much crap as i could think of to make it a quicker read, feel free to say anything youd like, thanks -Armen</p>

2

<p>I don't think you need to ask, you have a good shot at Stanford and that should be comforting enough, because, for most people, the answer would be Stanford is beyond reach.</p>

3

<p>" -volunteered at an assisted living facility 150 hrs
-jv basketball freshman year
-founder of ultimate frisbee club at school (quite an active club)
-founder of junior high robotics club
-HS robotics (botball) club for 2 years (reached nationals both times)
-nhs, science honor society, other bs"</p>

<p>these ecs can be your weak spots unless you have any leadership in them or elaborate your achievements in these activities on your resume.</p>

4

<p>I'd say Standford is on the reach side, but not by far. You have a good shot. Some of the research stuff you did sounds really cool. </p>

<p>Also, I would like to commend you for starting an Ultimate team. Yay for Ultimate.</p>

5

<p>regarding the comment that my ec's are weak, there is some other stuff that i have done in school, (chess club pres, head of robotics team this year) but otherwise i would generally agree. I was hoping that my senior project with the contest and all my internships would be enough, but if not, anybody have any suggestions?</p>

6

<p>"On the reach side but not by far."</p>

<p>That is a naive statement. As Curmudgeon wrote on another thread today, the 75% is average for a non hooked kid (athlete, URM, legacy, dev candidate). Stanford rejects the vast majority who read like this applicant. It really is time for many of you kids to understamnd this or we'll have a very unhappy April on this site.</p>

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<p>zagat, could you please clarify what you mean by the "vast majority"? I had always thought my app would be a little different from the norm -- how many students complete 4 lab internships in high school and are published twice, or run a contest that was featured in the washington post and is partly funded by the DOE?
I know my ec's are weak but could you might be underestimating the value of research experience.</p>

8

<p>Armenian Invasion, you stats are great, dont get me wrong. Just make sure you get great recs and essays, and you will have a decent shot at Stanford.</p>

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<p>"" -volunteered at an assisted living facility 150 hrs
-jv basketball freshman year
-founder of ultimate frisbee club at school (quite an active club)
-founder of junior high robotics club
-HS robotics (botball) club for 2 years (reached nationals both times)
-nhs, science honor society, other bs"</p>

<p>these ecs can be your weak spots unless you have any leadership in them or elaborate your achievements in these activities on your resume."</p>

<p>I think if you founded a club that demonstrates leadership--also part of the NHS application is leadership hours.</p>

10

<p>Willmingtonwave, really, do you think that NHS will make him stand out at when applying for stanford? Also jv basketball was just in freshman year -- meaning no passion and nothing special blah blah blah. Robotics club is impressive. Just doing 150 of volunteering isnt enough, did you do anything spectacular within those hours? Again, NHS is bs. Thousands of kids do it and the club activities are simple useless. Sorry, dont take me wrong, I am just being brutally honest.</p>

<p>Your work experience and passion for research is clearly outstanding. So, just concentrate your resume on that. I was highly impressed from your stats. Your work experience at these prestigious institutions will truly help you when you apply to stanford.</p>

<p>btw, zagat, are you an adcom?</p>

11

<p>I agree--I would avoid putting down ec's that lacked at least 2 years of participation in. NHS isn't a bad thing to put down. At my school we have to create a leadership project for NHS and it did take a lot of work. I organized and ran a drive that collected school supplies that totaled hundreds of lbs. and then shipped them to antigua and to the madonna house in my area.</p>

12

<p>You're right, I may be underestimating your research positions. If they were not paid for summers and your published work makes you stand out, the picture could be different.</p>

13

<p>isn't NASA SHARP really selective? It's not RSI, but I think that'd be a def. plus.</p>

<p>Your internships, etc. are great. People forget that the average applicant to Stanford has a 3.8 UW & a 1400 (2100) SAT w/ no more than a couple club presidencies. Your chances are certainly above average, but by how much...who knows? </p>

<p>Best of luck. You have the goods, just hope they go for it. What I have noticed among people w/ top stats is they almost always end up somewhere very good...but for you, there's a decent chance it'll be Stanford. :)</p>

14

<p>Stam, more to the point is who is accepted, and that's way above a 2100 at Stanford. Then look at those who are average and below, they are athletes, URMs, legacies and development candidates. Apart from those, the average aceptee needs to be at about the 75% for all accepted candidates.</p>

15

<p>LOL "love to eat eggplant"</p>

<p>Me too!</p>

<p>:)</p>

16

<p>I have a question to add on to this post. Would the admission officers make any expection to the fact that he is Armenian? I ask this for two reasons: one, there is a thriving Armenian student association at the school; and two, some people (with whom I don't personally agree with) think Armenians are not white—which leads to the other question, should an Armenian fill in "Other (specify)" in addition to "White" (I ask all of this as much for myself as for the the poster).</p>

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

17

<p>I think that he's in on the eggplant-eating.</p>

<p>And generally strong other stuff means a decent shot.</p>

18

<p>You can only include stuff that you did in high school. So, things like "founder of junior high robotics club" and "attended apogee summer program at northwestern 5th grade summer" need to go. </p>

<p>Other than that, I think you have a good shot at Stanford. Yes, your school-related EC's are lacking but you have awesome research internships on your resume. </p>

<p>By the way, don, doesn't Armenian = White? It's the same with Arabs. They're both classified as white.</p>