Chances at top colleges without standardized tests

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

I am planning to apply to Harvard with EA and other top schools during regular decision, however, I don’t think I will submit a test score. Stats are shown below.

Asian male, middle class, first-gen in US college, planning to major in EE, 4.4 GPA
Relevant classes: AP Physics I & II, AP Calculus AB & BC, AP Computer Science, AP Art Studio

Experiences

ISEF finalist in 2018, 2019, 2020, won Grand Award in 2019, Guest speaker at Society of American Military Engineering Conference, personally invited to the Teledyne Brown Engineering Factory, ASM Materials Most Outstanding Exhibit winner, Team leader of the school robotics team (qualified for state), Varsity science olympiad (went to nationals since 2017), B-division prac teacher in physics events, an associate member of Sigma Xi research honor society, alumni in Society for Science and the Public, Scholastic Art & Writing silver medal, Engineering award recognition from the dean of a local university, first author published at Elsevier journal (IF: 4, acceptance rate: 35% for phD), single author published at SAE International, having another paper processed in IEEE, State science fair best of research in 2018 and 2019, science fair state 1st place categorical winner in 2019, community service in STEM-related events for 2 years, president of school’s TSA, school ambassador, currently developing fuzzy-logic AI for medical diagnosis website with my friends.

Will my extracurricular activities influence the holistic process in a way that the lack of test score would not harm me in the admission?

2

Your awards are impressive. The lack of a test score should not be a problem.

3

My jaw is still dropped, reading your resume. Was it that you couldn’t get a standardized test, or that you did, but weren’t happy with your score? (And my jaw is still on the floor)

4

My main question for you is again: why Harvard? Based on your interests you should be applying to Stanford, MIT, Cornell, Berkeley, GTech, CMU, Michigan, Harvey Mudd, or Caltech. I really do not see Harvard as the best place for you. The opportunities at the other colleges (or at Harvey Mudd) for a budding engineer are far wider than they are at Harvard. They all have far better engineering programs than does Harvard, and far better internship and job opportunities for engineers as well.

As for your chances - you are pretty competitive for anywhere. First authorship on peer reviewed articles in not common for high school students.

That being said - you need matches and a safety.