Chances for HYSM? -international

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Schools I plan on applying to, in order of preference:
Harvard
Stanford - possible EA
Yale - possible but not likely EA
MIT
UC Berkeley</p>

<p>Gender: Male
Ethnicity: Korean
International Student</p>

<p>Location: Fairly competitive school internationally, In top 3 in Korea,
School type: Private
Graduating Year: 2010
Graduating Class Size: IDK. Medium-sized
Class Rank: School doesn't rank, top decile
GPA Unweighted: 3.91
Junior Year GPA: 4.00 </p>

<p>Well, here's my situation. My dad's company is planning to send him to the U.S for the next several years, so I didn't even plan to write to American colleges until April. So no AP's, and I only got to take the SAT once.</p>

<p>SAT I: 700 CR 780 M 690 W without preparing, taking again in October.
Expecting something in the range of 730~770/ 780~800 / 750~770
(After taking the test in May, I went and bought some SAT prep books and also took copies of actual tests. They helped.)
ACT: didn't take
SATII: 800 Math IIc, 800 Physics. Planning to take Chinese + USH in November.</p>

<p>APs\Honors Taken: </p>

<p>Frosh, Soph, Junior: none - my school doesn't have honors courses, didn't take AP's b.c. I wasn't planning to go to American colleges at the time. By the time I knew I was going to America, it was too late to register for AP's</p>

<p>Senior Classes
AP Statistics, AP Calc B.C, AP Physics C + Numerous other regular classes</p>

<p>ECs:
Math Competitions: 6 years, see awards
Science Competitions: 3 years
Secretary of school English club. (Second position next to President)
Founder of School science bowl team.
School scholarship winner twice in a row.
School top honors for academic achievement. (not sure this is the correct translation though, but recognition for being one of the top people in my grade)</p>

<p>Awards:
KMO Gold (among top 5 in grade),
KPho Silver (silmillar to U.S Physics semifinalist)
5 time Math Olympiad training participant (equivalent of MOP)
Some state-level science olympiad awards + over 10 little math awards.
Economics Olympiad Honorable mentions</p>

<p>Employment:
Summer Internship at internationally recognized law firm
Summer Internship at local accounting office</p>

<p>Projected essays:
Challenge in preparing to come to U.S (pretty interesting and great according to my friends)
How moving back and forth between countries shaped my personality (not written yet)</p>

<p>What are my chances for these schools?
And where should I use my early for best chances? There seems to be an abundance of Korean international math people applying to Stanford.... (one is an IMO gold and one is and IMO silver, rest are simillar to me except for that they have much lower SAT's)</p>

<p>+) I do have a lack of EC's, darn....</p>

2

<p>Hey, I’m an international student as well (well, white but I go to an international school).
Harvard - reach for anyone. I saw a kid with very similar stats to you (absolute math genius) get rejected last year. Then again, his brother (also a math genius) attends.
Stanford - mid reach
Yale - low reach
MIT - mid reach
UC Berkeley - safety</p>

3

<p>clo28 has given you false information. Yale is decidedly not a low reach for you (easily a mid to high reach). Furthermore, Berkeley is definately not a safety. That claim is absurd.</p>

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<p>hello silverturtle! out of curiosity - are you an international student? (from an international school - i’m american/white.) if so, perhaps we have had different experiences. if not, trust me, the international situation is a little different. </p>

<p>i have seen people with vastly inferior resumes get into Berkeley. While “safety” may have been generous, “that claim is absurd” is quite a stretch. please don’t pretend you’re an expert on everything to do with the college process simply because you have 800+ posts on this site.</p>

<p>perhaps you are secretly on the admissions board at yale, in which case you WOULD know. otherwise, quite simply, you wouldn’t. </p>

<p>i reiterate that i have seen people with worse resumes get in.</p>

5

<p>@ clo28 Let’s leave general anecdotes out giving advice. What is true is that Internationals are held to a higher standard.</p>

<p>@ Original Poster
The most important factor in any college admissions are GPA and courses taken, which you are at a severe disadvantage, but both are subjects in which other Asian applicants excel as well. That being said, your ECs are quite average in comparison to the rest of the applicant pool within the schools you hope to apply. I would say mid to high reach for HYSM.</p>

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<p>@samsunimomo
My school is not an American school - the AP’s are not part of the regular class schedule. Rather, they are offered during summer school or as an after-school program.
EDIT: They go on the transcript, but without grades.</p>

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<p>@afterrainthesun
I see. Better ask your counselor.</p>

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<p>@samsunimomo
point taken.</p>

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<p>I am not in a uniquely special position to offer advice on Yale’s or Berkeley’s admissions procedures for internationals. However, I am knowledgable enough to know that claiming Berkeley to be a safety for this student is inaccurate.</p>

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<p>I would have to agree that clo28 does not understand what is expected of internationals. Frankly, Yale would be a mega reach if you were American.</p>

<p>There are many, many highly qualified Korean students, strong in math, but with close to perfect CR an W scores too. The standard is beyond high–they will only take a few and have many with national level honors and awards to choose from.</p>

<p>In all honesty, if your school offered APs–no matter when–and you didn’t take them, getting into any of the schools on your list is very unlikely.</p>

<p>All of those schools accept Korean Olympiad winners and those with national level achievements.</p>

<p>There are many good US schools you can get into, but I think you need to look at less competitive schools although Berkeley is a possibility.</p>

11

<p>@hmom5: posting as reply b.c. somehow I can’t edit my posts.
I asked my conselor the wrong question yesterday. I just got a call saying that the AP test grades go on the transcript, but not the courses. All AP courses are unofficial. (In other words, the school does not offer AP courses.) Thank you for your advice.</p>

<p>Additional information:
Teacher Recs - PERFECT. really perfect.
Conselor Rec - Great.</p>

<p>Although I have a LOT less AP’s than my peers, I had an unfortunate situation that made me unable to take AP’s during junior year. Since Korean high schools start in 10th grade, the sophomore year was the only chance for me to take the AP’s, and I missed it.</p>

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<p>@all here.
haha, sorry for trying to give advice based on personal experience! clearly, there are enough experts here already. sort of incredible, to be perfectly frank. thanks for the 2 hours of memories CC, good riddance! </p>

<p>afterrainthesun, best of luck with the process. i still bet you get into berkeley if you write decent essays and have good recs.</p>

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<p>The problem with HYPSM is they have tens of thousands of applicants with near perfect grades and scores, great ECs, amazing recs, awards and honors…that they don’t parse excuses for what’s not there. They can only accept a small fraction of the applicants who have it all.</p>

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<p>bump, bump, bump.</p>

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<p>O.o top five in korea, so that means you were on the imo team? I don’t know how intense math is in Korea, but that is a very strong asset. Unless there are only like 5 spots given to korean students or something, then you would have a tough time because of the imo gold medalists (remember, colleges aren’t going to take all math majors). Apply MIT early, its probably the best school for you.</p>

16

<p>Bump. Can someone clarify on how to make my profile better? </p>

<p>@hmom5, thank you for your advice. However, there has been precedent (a Korean math/science person going into Princeton, Yale, Stanford w/o AP’s).</p>