General Information: International student(India), No IB/Cambridge board hence no APs. Preparing for the entrance test here in India(IITJEE). CBSE board.
Stats: 1310 SAT, Subject Tests canceled, Took Duolingo English Test got 125 which ~ 100+ Toefl. 95.2% 10th board and 80% 11th grade.
Extracurriculars: Developed an online travel agency application using python and mysql, made it till prequarters of a nationwide it-quiz, silver medal in informatics olympiad, bronze in english, silver in state level karate championship, prize at a nationwide art contest.
Essays: My mom was diagnosed with a malignant tumor in her endometrial gland(in layman words- cancer) this august, so family responsibilities came upon me. I couldnt take sat/toefl because mom was bed-ridden. My covid-19 essay revolved around the circumstances above. For commonapp I took the “which problem would you like to solve” one and derived a contrast between cs and social good. In a nutshell, my essays were pretty strong I believe.
Scholarship: applied for none.
Extra- My sister is in Stanford for CS MS. I don’t believe that this bit helps/boosts my application but since it was asked in the commonapp, I specified here too. So thoughts on this one? At the end of the day they want ME and not MY SISTER. So not expecting any lead from here.
Colleges: UC SD, UIUC, PURDUE AND UC BERKELEY (all reaches lmao, living on edge)
I’m sorry to hear about your mom.
I can’t chance you because there is much information we don’t know, starting with your grades/GPA and relative strength at your current school.
You are correct that all of these schools are reaches, and you will have to be a top candidate from India to garner attention. UCSD and UCB are test blind, I’m hoping that you applied test optional to UIUC and Purdue…did you?
I assume you didn’t apply to Purdue EA, because you would have your decision already…Purdue will fill most CS spots in EA. Did you apply EA to UIUC?
It sounds like you aren’t applying for financial aid, is that correct?
Have you applied to other US schools? If not, have you applied in your country? EU?
Thoughts @MYOS1634?
Thank you for reaching out to me.
I am in the top 10% in my school along with the only person having a stellar record in Mathematics (full scores in every internal examination). In my recommendations by my principal and my computer science teacher, they have talked about my academics, my leadership, volunteering experiences and genuine interest and aptitude in the subject. I have already submitted my application with my SAT so can’t do much about it. RD for all. No Financial Aid. Yes, we have an entrance test in India and I’ve been preparing for it since 4 years so I do have a backup here. My sister had encouraged me to apply abroad and hence I researched and liked their CS programs. No, I haven’t applied to any other US universities.
Edit: We don’t have gpa system in my board curriculum so I have a predicted 95% in 12th. So there’s that.