Chances for RSI 2019?

Pre-College Issues Summer Programs
1

Hey everyone, I’m looking to apply to RSI 2019 (rising junior rn). Please give some feedback!!

State: Missouri
School Type: Large Public High School
Demographics: Indian Male, Upper Middle Class

ACT: 35 (E 36/M 36/R 33/S 35) with 10 on writing
SAT: N/A (taking in October)
PSAT/NMSQT: 1500 as a sophomore (no study)
SAT II: World History 800
APs: Calc BC (5), World History (5), Physics 1 (5), Comp Sci A (5)
Junior Year APs: Chemistry, Lang, Stats, Spanish, Physics 2
GPA: 4.0 UW/4.52 W (4.7 if all A’s junior year)

Clubs/Extracurriculars:

Outside school

  1. Student researcher in neuroimaging at Washington University in St. Louis under a major consortium under key professor for national project; writing paper (second author) and will be submitting by the end of this semester (around November/December)
  2. Current summer intern (and continuing into school year) at a neuro-opthalmalogy lab at the University of Pennsylvania on neuroimaging and visual connections with brain; writing paper (first author) and will be submitting by end of semester (October/November) Note: This is was my summer internship for this year, this was an independent project that I secured by emailing the PI and getting a rec from my professor at WashU. He doesn't actually take High School interns, but he made an exception because of my unique background and experience. He basically paid for me to come to Philly and it's also a paid internship, so it's quite substantial. It's also a great experience to be at Penn (alone) for the summer bc it's my dream school!
  3. Working with an NYC-based neuroinformatics startup on PET imaging analysis as a collaborator
  4. Founder and CEO of a global youth-driven consulting agency that works with small-scale high-potential startups in emerging markets like West Africa, Southeast Asia, and parts of Latin America. Currently working on major deals with companies in countries across the world, and also have a team stationed in many different countries. We have already secured close to $2-3K in corporate deals with over 4-5 companies in the first month.
  5. Started a small company that collaborates with STL startups to build partnership networks of biotech and medtech companies. This wasn't something I did for profit, more to help establish connections between companies in the community. I am no longer working on this as I began my other startup.
  6. Midwestern Outreach Administrator for a youth-driven national non-profit educational equity startup seeking to provide more academic opportunities for students of all backgrounds across the US.
  7. Taekwondo athlete for ~10 years. Instructor at my local dojang and state/national level competitor (gold medalist at Missouri and Illinois state, silver medalist at Kansas state)

Inside School

  1. Founder/President of Students for the Advancement of Interdisciplinary Science, a club/organization that aims to explore and educate students about the alternative opportunities one has outside the traditional clinical medicine or hard bench science. We explore different career paths that integrate these aspects of science into different fields like business, marketing, law, etc. It's actually based off a similar student society I learned about at UPenn, so I got the help of the Penn student to found this in my local community.
  2. Founder/President of Investment and Economics Club, where we explore the nature of investing in different types of securities like different types of stocks, bonds, and cryptocurrencies. We utilize a lot of simulations.
  3. Regional chair of the STL Model UN. Administer 2 conferences every year with over 20 schools and 500+ students.
  4. Member of Science National Honor Society (SNHS) and Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA)

Comments: As you can probably tell, my application is split between and also integrates two quite separate fields together: science research and business/economics. I have a passion for both of these fields and I seek to integrate them greatly in an interdisciplinary career path. In the future I hope to do some healthcare consulting for some time, get a Ph.D. or MD Ph.D., and then pursue a career in Pharmaceutical R&D and administration (like MD, CMO, CSO positions in pharma). I really want to focus on my research passions in my career and also integrate them with my passion for leadership and changing the world through business/entrepreneurship.

I hope my kind of “split” personality won’t pull away from my chances in RSI. It’s basically my dream summer program! Especially because MIT is one of my top choice schools (because neurosci AND Sloan!).

Will appreciate any feedback!

2

Ah I’m sorry I missed one of my major upcoming ECs (it’s research related so it’s important). Here it is:

I am also starting to do research at Wharton (Penn’s Business School) under one of the most renowned professors of neuroeconomics (a very interdisciplinary field) this fall. He basically founded the field in the late 1990s/early 2000s by writing some very interesting papers on them and is one of the most famous professors here on campus, especially because he works in Wharton, Perelman (school of medicine), and the college (in the department of psychology). Having read them and some books on neuroeconomics, I see a lot of potential and decided to pursue work in his lab. I will be doing some neuromarketing analysis with him and a CS-grad student in his lab regarding eye-tracking and some analysis of ways advertisements evoke specific emotions and senses in people. Again, you can tell it’s very interdisciplinary and combines my interests quite well.

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bump

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bumppp

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b u m p

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bump

7

nice stats!! just wondering how are you working at upenn if you live in missouri?

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@coronaa Thanks! I got a summer research internship through my WashU professor to work with a similar project over at UPenn. I met the other UPenn professor from Wharton there too. I’ve been working with them remotely now (since I work in neuro imaging, all my data analysis is done through the computer since it’s a dry lab). It’s amazing how I can work on the project from thousands of miles away!

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@coronaa What do you think my chances are for RSI with those stats?

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oh cool!! i think you have a good chance for rsi–i dont think theyd mind the stem + business as long as you integrate them in your essay.

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@coronaa Thanks! I hope I can show them my passion well in my essay.

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Very high chance but not guaranteed. Only people I know personally that got into RSI were both google science fair finalists and they both went high in Siemens and other science fairs. Your research stuff seems very solid though. You should also apply SIMR (Stanford) or SIP(UCSC).

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you may be better off sticking with research instead of going to rsi; not saying rsi would hurt you, but research is valued equally at ivies/mit/stanford

14

I think you have a chance, my sister got into RSI a couple years ago and she’s currently at MIT. Have you won or gotten into the semifinal/final stages of any national competitions? If you go to RSI, do you have an idea of what you would like to research? Have you had any papers published in higher-profile journals like Nature, or can you see the research you want to do at RSI getting published in those sorts of journals? Have you gotten into similar programs at other high-ranked universities (e.g. Harvard, Stanford, etc)? I’m not saying you need those things, but that seems to be the main difference that I see between her application and yours (other than demographics, but there’s nothing that can be done about that).

Your essay is also pretty important, if I remember correctly, so make sure that’s strong. I also don’t think that stem+ business is a problem at all: without getting too specific (I’m not about to identify my sister on here!), my sister had research that combined CS+neurosci+humanities, so being multidisciplinary is good so long as you have a clear goal in mind. Hope that helped!

Edit: I just noticed your SAT (or that you didn’t take it yet). Assuming my sister got in on a minimum, you’re probably going to need a perfect score for that, especially if you’re already in your junior year right now.

15

Just for reference, I was selected as an alternate for RSI last year. Here are my stats:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/2100728-chance-me-for-top-cs-schools.html#latest

I would think you have a shot, but as stated above, you probably need some type of award. Research under professors is surprisingly easy to find. It’s whether the research is of any use.

16

You have an impressive application! Did you end up getting into RSI?

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^ ^ ^

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@GoBears2023 I was looking at your stats posted in September 2018, very impressive!
May I ask at the time when you submitted the RSI application, were you already a Siemens semifinalist?
Thanks!