Hi everyone! I’m really new to College Confidential and was wondering if you can give me your honest and critical opinion on my admission chances for Caltech, MIT, Princeton, Columbia, UC Berkeley, or UCLA (all RA)?
Gender: F
Location: Sydney, Australia (international applicant)
College Class Year: 2020
High School: Private
High School Type: sends some grads to top schools
Academics:
GPA - Unweighted: 3.67 (??? don’t really use GPAs in Australia)
GPA - Weighted: 4.17 (??? I used an online calculator, but it was hard to allocate AP/Honours difficulty to my classes)
Class Rank: top 5%
Class Size: 300
Scores:
ACT: 32 (English 30, Maths 34, Reading 32, Science 33, Writing 36)
SAT II Math Level 2): 790
SAT II Physics: 730
Extracurriculars:
Significant Extracurriculars: Competed in selective school choir and debating, was an editor for the school newspaper, conducted mentored research in relativity and quantum mechanics
Leadership positions: Founded a “student government” IT subsidiary and was “president” for 2 years
Volunteer/Service Work: Weekly at the Sydney Observatory and at school IT department
Honors and Awards: Distinction in Australian Physics Olympiad, Silver in da Vinci Decathlon, Duke of Edinburgh silver, recipient of the school’s Distinction Prize for all 6 years of high school
Your ACT scores are not near the range for those schools. Most schools recalculate the GPA’s and a 3.67 will be on the fence.
Are you applying for admission in 2020 or to graduate in 2020?
The deadlines for Fall 2016 admission have all passed for Regular Decision. Example: The UC application period runs from Nov 1-30 for admission to the following Fall class. So in Nov 2016, you would be applying for admission to August 2017. Most schools have deadlines in January for the Fall.
Can you afford most of these schools? Example: The UC’s are California public universities and have little to no financial aid for non residents. Costs to international and OOS students are $55K per year.
Thank you for your opinion! I really appreciate it 
Yeah I know my ACT scores aren’t brilliant, but I’m sure they will consider how different US testing is compared to Australian testing (I basically wrote 21 hours of essays for my Australian final exams). And as for the GPA, I really don’t know how it’s calculated or how grades are given in the US compared to Australia - we use ranks in each subject to measure academic performance, and usually use the report card to measure class involvement or attendance (I got a B because I had serious pneumonia for a long time and missed so much class, but I’m actually the top of that subject).
And don’t worry! I’ve already applied to the schools - just want some opinion on my chances while I wait for decisions. And I’m fortunate enough to say that finance isn’t an issue - I’m not applying for financial aid and my parents have agreed to pay for my college education.
So I guess I’m still hoping. I won’t be too disappointed if I don’t get into any of the schools I’ve applied to since they were all “reach” schools to begin with…my “target” and “safety” schools are all in Australia, and I got into all of them since there really isn’t much to compete with here.
Anyway, thanks for reading my post and replying! Have a nice day!