Chances of MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, etc.

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hello,</p>

<p>I'm stuck in the flat state of Indiana. I attend the arguably best public school in the state, Carmel High School. The school is VERY competitive with around 4,000 students. Unfortunately, the curriculum insists on preliminary Honors classes (Bio, Chem, etc.) before a student is allowed to take AP classes.</p>

<p>My top schools are:
MIT
Stanford
Berkeley
Carnegie Mellon</p>

<p>Backup is Purdue University in Indiana since I got a full ride in 8th grade due to MathCounts (w00t) and maybe Rose-Hulman.</p>

<p>I'm an incoming senior, Chinese (dang it sucks for MIT!).</p>

<p>Freshman year:
1 semester Honors Algebra II and 1 semester Honors Pre-calc (skipped half of both :D)
Honors Bio
Honors English
Debate
Spanish
Freshman Orchestra (section leader)</p>

<p>GPA: 3.97 or so I think 1 A- in English :(</p>

<p>Sophomore year:
Learned Calc by myself due to a dumb schedule conflict (only got 4 on BC part :( )
Honors Chem
Honors Physics (AP B)
Honors Orch
AP CompSci A</p>

<p>GPA: 3.97 or so, another A- in English -_-</p>

<p>Junior year:
AP Stats (out of math)
AP Physics C
AP CompSci AB
AP US History
AP English Comp
Honors Orch
Spanish III</p>

<p>GPA: 3.97 or so, another A- :P</p>

<p>Cum GPA is around 3.97, class rank is in the top 25 of a class of almost 1000 (unweighted ranking sucks).</p>

<p>SAT's: I - 1490 (old score :P), perfect math, got owned on verbal. II: Math IIC - 800, Physics - 780 :( Taking new SAT and hopefully acing and another SAT II this year.</p>

<p>Recs will be no problem, can get some from college professors if needed.</p>

<p>Extracurriculars...prepare for a long read :D</p>

<p>Research on Dynamical Systems (Chaos) at Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI); September 2003 to November 2004; presented at the University of Notre Dame in the Siemens Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science, and Technology – Bronze Medalist/Regional Finalist.</p>

<p>IUPUI Physics Summer Internship: June 2004 to August 2004. Developed a program using object-oriented programming to analyze, process, and display data from an atomic force microscope.</p>

<p>IUPUI Math Competition Class: currently ongoing since September 2001. This class prepares for general math contests like the Mathematics Association of America (MAA) contests: the American Mathematics Contest (AMC), American Invitational Mathematics Examination (AIME), USA Mathematics Olympiad (USAMO), and International Mathematics Olympiad (IMO).</p>

<p>Butler University Physics Class: June 2003 to February 2004. I worked together with Dr. Xianming Han of Butler University to start up the class. The goal of the class was to cover the material in AP Physics B outside of school in time for the AP test.</p>

<p>Awards:</p>

<p>National Honor Society
Spanish Honor Society
National Society of High School Scholars (bah had to pay to get in, shady)
Will be a National Merit Finalist unless I suck at writing the essay</p>

<p>Regional Finalists in the Siemens Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science, and Technology. This competition is much like the Intel Talent Search, formerly known as the Westinghouse Competition. Students present their research project in front of an esteemed panel of judges.</p>

<p>Won 5th place at the State MathCounts math contest and a full-tuition scholarship to Purdue University, 2001.</p>

<p>Tons of other math competitions, AIME qualifiers all years (started to late to make USAMO :( )</p>

<p>Member of the Science Olympiad team which placed 1st at Regional Contest, 2nd at State Contest, and 15th at National Contest, 2004. Placed 12th in Physics Lab event at National Contest 2004. 1st in State Physics Lab event 2005.</p>

<p>Clubs:</p>

<p>President and former VP of Math Club
Science Olympiad VP
Academic Superbowl Science Captain
Chinese Culture Club President
Key Club VP
Member of the Student Research Committee for International Baccalaureate, which was successful in convincing Carmel High School to implement the IB program.
Member of the Student Research Committee for Weighted Ranking.
Orchestra mentor</p>

<p>Volunteering:
Supported the Carmel High School Debate Team the summer of 2003 with more than 30 hours’ worth of candy sales.
Volunteered at the library for more than 20 hours.
Volunteered at the Salvation Army for more than 10 hours.
Tutor classmates in mathematics and sciences.
Teach ESL at Grace Community Church.
(haven't updated this section in a long time)</p>

<p>Current on a research internship at IUPUI again, preparing an individual project for Siemens/Intel.</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

2

<p>a good stats
do you have APs scores?</p>

3

<p>Those are kinda my shortcomings :(</p>

<p>4 on BC
4 on Physics B
5 on CompSci A
5 on Stats
5 on Physics C Mech
5 on AP US History
4 on CompSci B (teacher resigned 2/3 of way through year!)</p>

<p>Good thing I don't have to give these out when I apply :D</p>

4

<p>Gah, can't edit anymore :(</p>

<p>Been playing cello for around 5 years (bah started too late)
Came to the US when I was 8, so late start on stuff :P</p>

<p>Senior Year:
Multivariable Calc
AP Micro & Macroecon
AP English Lit
AP Gov
AP Chem
Independent Study CompSci
Honors Orch
Physics Conditioning (gotta stay fit :D)</p>

5

<p>i think your ap scores are good. </p>

<p>MIT - reach
Stanford - slight reach
Berkeley - match
Carnegie Mellon safety</p>

6

<p>Ok, thanks! More opinions please! Would MIT be slight reach/match if I pull off an individual Regional Finalist w/Siemens?</p>

7

<p>I think improving your sat score (CR) is one of important things.</p>

8

<p>Yeah, aiming for high 700's on new SAT.</p>

9

<p>Although you are qualified to go to UC Berkeley, I would be careful. They have to admit all qualified Californians before going out of state so although you are qualify, you might not get in because of the whole serve CA first thing. Otherwise, I think that you have a good shot at the schools you have stated.</p>

10

<p>You didn't mention what your major will be, which makes a huge difference for schools like Berkeley and Carnegie Mellon. Berkeley is a slight reach, not a match, for Engineering, which is very tough to get into from out of state, especially for EE and CS.</p>

11

<p>Oops, I will probably be majoring in EECS (kind of slipped my mind)</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

12

<p>You have an impressive resume. You seem to be a good test taker, so you will probably do well on the tests you have yet to take. Assuming that this is the case (2250 or higher on SAT, 750 or higher on SAT 2), I believe that you have a very good shot:</p>

<p>MIT: match
Stanford: match
Berkley: safety
mellon: safety</p>

<p>If you get individual regional finalist in siemens in addition to scoring high on the tests, they will all be safeties, as long as essays and teacher recommendations are good.</p>

<p>MIT and Stanford really like science research winners. You seem like their ideal applicant.</p>

13

<p>And by the way, you should not emphasize the honor societies because almost everyone is a member. You probably should not mention the society of high school scholars at all because that simply shows that the company was able to scam you.</p>

14

<p>Thanks for the tips tupac! Heh, I mainly applied for that NSHSS for the scholarship opportunities. I googled them up a bit and noticed their shadyness. Yeah, there's probably 200+ people at my school in NHS. National Merit Finalist is good though, right?</p>

<p>Oh, and MIT will be EA</p>

15

<p>Bump, oh noes this fell to the 3rd page :(</p>

16

<p>Yeah, you should list National merit finalist. You might as well list national honor society and spanish honor society as well. However, you should not list them under the section for your top 6 EC's.</p>

17

<p>Dude, you have so many sad faces all over this thread. Don't worry. You have great stats.</p>

<p>MIT loves research, so you have a very good chance there.</p>

18

<p>Just to temper this thread, I had very similar stats applying to MIT and Stanford (w/ research, even - morphine tolerance research) and I was rejected. However, my school had 2 triple legacy admits to stanford and we're not even remotely a feeder school... and MIT.. well, I don't know :)</p>

<p>so... _<strong><em>MIT: match
Stanford: match
Berkley: safety
mellon: safety</em></strong></p>

<p>I think this is drivel... no such a thing as a "match" for stanford and MIT, baring some sort of extraordinary circumstances... e.g. alumni donor... cures cancer.. etc.</p>

<p>W.r.t. National Merit, to get struck from Semifinalist, you have to either NOT COMPLETE THE APPLICATION, or not be recommended by your principal. There are 16k semifinalists, and 15k finalists.</p>

<p>Best of luck.</p>

<p>Oh, as a note, I'm now a Penn M&T (wharton/SEAS)</p>

<p>edit: i was also chinese. I had slightly higher SATs. I am a native speaker, not sure if that is the case for you.</p>

19

<p>ya no such thing as matches for MIT and Stanford, no way a safety at BERKELEY out of state either</p>

20

<p>A chinese male with a 1490 and everyone is claiming match and safety for the toughest school?. This is just so irresponsible! Berkeley engineering oos a safety??????????? MIT a match? These schools are reaches. CMU is the only match.</p>