<p>At this school a chance won't even get you in the ballpark for if you'll get in or not. I'm living proof of that. I never asked for a chance for UofC but I know that If I had the response would have been "time to look at other schools". I had a 3.53 uw GPA. I go to one of the top schools in chicago so I had more than 20 APs to pick from and I never took an AP class. Not until my senior year anyway so they won't even see that grade or AP score. My superscored ACT was 31 but I never took the SAT. I'm not the president founder or leader of any club. I didn't win any awards or competition. I never did sports. I did, however, write a good essay and that's why I got in EA with a University Academic Scholarship. So to all you regular decisioners need to just relax. I remember beating myself up over not taking more APs but UofC saw beyond that so just remember if I can get in there's hope for all of you! Relax, enjoy senior year!</p>
<p>^ whoa seriously?</p>
<p>One of my best friends was asking me about UChicago EA the other day, and so I checked out this thread. I certainly don’t think youre ■■■■■■■■, but just to get the full picture out for applicants/future applicants,</p>
<p>1) How about your classmates? Did they, like you, not take any AP’s until senior year (some high schools don’t apply students to take AP classes until senior year)? How was your rank?</p>
<p>2) Did you have some kind of special talent, hook, or connection (URM, 1st generation, parents donated a lot of $, legacy, national ranked violinst, etc.?)</p>
<p>Those and some other scenarios can drastically change the scene. Nevertheless, congrats man on your EA acceptance to UChicago!</p>
<p>??
31 ACT is a middle 50% number.</p>
<p>1) I would say most of my classmates took at least 1 AP last year (with the average being 2). Within my group of friends (which is just a small sample and not really representative) I’m the only one who hadn’t previously taken an AP class. My school doesn’t rank either so I wouldn’t be able to say =/</p>
<p>2) No talents, or hooks whatsoever. Both my parents went to college and they’re elementary school teachers , I don’t play an instrument or know anyone at the school or anything like that. Perhaps ( as tylerb7 so RUDELY and ARROGANTLY pointed out) it could be in part because of my race (50% African American) but I know plenty of kids at my school of various minority groups (Chinese, African American, and Hispanic) who were all deferred Early Action. </p>
<p>I mean I would say my application wasn’t particularly loaded with flashy things or anything like that. Thank you btw. UChicago does pride themselves on taking the essay into consideration and I think that this is just a case where my essay saved me (PM if you’d like to read it or have any other questions in general). This is why I think people shouldn’t get too hooked on grades and transcripts because for UofC it’s definitley not a top priority.</p>
<p>Definitely had a similar experience last year. My unweighted GPA was lower than his, however. And before you scream affirmative action–I’m not a URM (Asian-American).</p>
<p>Edit: I did take as many APs as my high school offered though, no special clubs</p>
<p>And remember me? I read your Why UChicago essay draft and said that I didn’t particularly like it :p</p>
<p>Haha debarghya9 you were definitley right. I scrapped that version and about a million more versions after that but thanks again for the constructive criticism!</p>
<p>Well, I’m happy to see that you got in. Congratulations!</p>
<p>Thanks very much!</p>
<p>What is your race?</p>
<p>Yeah, I’d say race played a factor. But regardless, an acceptance like this must only make you want to work harder. Congratulations :)</p>
<p>To be fair, your GPA makes you an outlier. It would be silly for us to be overly optimistic about the chances of most of those with 3.5’s. And chancers rarely advice an applicant not to apply; more often, they simply urge a realistic list in addition to dream schools like Chicago.</p>