Hi! I am an international student from India. I have applied to Princeton and Columbia for class of 2025. I have not given SAT/ ACT. I have 1 year gap in between 10 and 11 grade due to health issues.
My grades in high school-
Class 9- 9.33 GPA out of 10
Class 10- 94.2%
Class 11- 81.2% ( due to health)
Class 12-Above 80% expected(due to health)
Extra Curricular Activities-
1.Winner of school merit certificate for scoring highest marks in social science and Science
2. Selected for Youth Assembly from India
3. Secured gold medal in Martial Arts championship at state level
4.Secured Gold medal in GK Olympiad
5.Secured bronze medal in Social Science Olympiad
6.Selected as finalist in the International Essay Competition held by an international organisation of UK from India
7.Secured gold medal in English Olympiad
8. Secured silver medal in science Olympiad
9. Winner of School Debate Competition
Kindly predict my chances!
The top colleges have lots of international applicants from India each year. Of these, they will take a handful from India.
Let’s just take Columbia for an example. According to their website, a total of 2544 offers were given to the class of 2024. Of this approx 12% were internationals, or about 300. These 300 offers are usually evenly split between males and females. The country distribution is not equal, but is split among 74 different countries. They probably take a lot more students from China and India as compared to smaller countries. For the sake of argument, let’s estimate that 1/3 of the international offers are given to India/China, of which 30-40 to Indian nationals. But of these, a handful are given to athletes, legacies and donors. So let’s say half of these seats are given to engineering and half to Columbia College. Then half again by gender. That leaves you with about 8-10 seats each year. As you can imagine competition for these slots are intense.
It is also important to note that Columbia is not need-blind for internationals. This means that they take ability to pay into account for international students. They do admit internationals who need aid, but given the number of full pay students from India, they will be able to choose among them. In general for internationals they will expect high test scores, high class rank, along with some measure of national level or international level recognition.
This is a long way of saying that the chances are tough for internationals, but not impossible. Hope this helps.