Chances Please!! ( ED/RD)

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cornell University
1

<p>I visited Cornell few weeks ago. I loved the campus, location etc</p>

<p>General: Rising Senior, Female, New Jersey.
Ethnicity:Asian.
Career Interests: Biomed/CompSc, Premed, Med.
School Stats:</p>

<p>GPA: 3.7 Unweighted. 4.15 Weighted.
AP : Junior Year - AP Chem, AP US History, AP Lang, AP Calc BC
( Exp. 5 in all)
: Senior Year - AP Biology, AP European History, AP Economics, Physics
Hons, Multivariabe Calculus.</p>

<p>Taken Toughest courseload offered.</p>

<p>Rank: Our School doesn't Rank</p>

<p>Standardised Testing: </p>

<p>ACT: 33
SAT II: Math II - 800; Chemistry - 790</p>

<p>EC's:
•Tennis –part of the high school girls team
•Swimming –a member of the X-cel Swim Team, Princeton
•Golf – member of the varsity golf team in school
• Community Helpers –at the middle school, traveled to nursing homes and soup kitchens to help the needy
• Volunteer Services –at two different hospitals for three years
( more than three years, 350+ hours todate)</p>

<p>Research:</p>

<ul>
<li>Attended a Summer Program in Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University</li>
<li>Did a cancer research for 5 weeks in Medicincal Chemistry at Rutgers
University</li>
<li>Doing Internship at Johns Hopkins Medical School (Summer 2008) for 10
weeks</li>
</ul>

<p>==</p>

<h1>I am planning to apply to Cornell, Northwestern, Duke, JHU, WU, Case Western, UMich, Brown, and Carnegie Mellon.</h1>

2

<p>Again, I will say that the Ivies will be a lot more difficult for you with the current stats. Maybe not impossible, but definitely more difficult. </p>

<p>Your best chances will be at NU, Duke, JHU, Case, UMich, Case, and CMU.</p>

<p>Out of those? I would choose JHU, Duke, NU, UMich, CMU, and Case in that order.</p>

3

<p>^I agree with Jman21, but I'll actually explain why.</p>

<p>You seem to be on par with most of the average applicants to the schools that you're applying to: Good (but not stellar, although aided by a very respectable AP score record) GPA, and your lack of a class percentage (Top 5%, Top 10%, etc.) isn't helpful to us or to the colleges. A respectable (but again, not stellar) ACT score - and no SATs, a bit odd in New Jersey (where most students take the SAT). Academics are not your weakness, but they are perfectly average in the applicant pools of that sort of schools.</p>

<p>Extracurricular-wise, you are weak. You have no leadership whatsoever, and your most extensive EC (volunteering) appears to be only dutiful hour-plugging and little accomplishment. Your research is better (and it's a plus that you're doing it somewhere as well-known as JHU's medical school), but you haven't (as far as we know from what you described) won any awards or contests for it or been published. It also has no correlation whatsoever to your school-year ECs, which would have helped. </p>

<p>Third Strike against you: You're an Asian female who wants to go into biology/biological engineering. At Cornell - a school coveted across the country by aspiring biology majors. At Cornell - a school which also happens to select its students (well, CALS does, anyway. I'm not certain about the other schools) specifically based on how well they fit their intended majors. </p>

<p>In short, you are up against freakishly accomplished people with 4.0 GPAs, 10 APs, 2300+ SATs, etc. who've been in national/international olympiads (including the USABO for biology), been recognized in national/international science fairs, been published in huge science journals, AND done all this while being President/Captain of 4+ clubs/teams and, I don't know, building orphanages in Bosnia. The odds aren't good. </p>

<p>It's not IMPOSSIBLE for you to get into any of the schools you listed - as application numbers swell, admissions is becoming more and more of a crapshoot (but the "crapshoot" element tends to be among the very elite applicants, such as the ones I've described to you, and less among the average applicants). In summary: You need some safeties (colleges with much, much higher acceptance rates than the ones you've listed). Like, 3 of them.</p>

4

<p>I would personally add in Vanderbilt. I think you could much easier get into Vandy and that would help to have a safety-net school that is still a great academic institution.</p>

<p>I would probably say:
Reach: Brown and Cornell
Competitive Chance: Northwestern, JHU, Duke, WU
Probably Safety: UMich, Vanderbilt (if you added it), Case Western, and Carnegie Mellon</p>

5

<p>I think people are exaggerating the caliber of accepted students. Your gpa is probably your biggest weakness but I think you have a good shot at Cornell.</p>

6

<p>I think you're doing well. Extracurriculars imo make up for the GPA.</p>

7

<p>I'm gonna disagree with some of the people above and say you have a very very good shot of being admitted, low reach. Your gpa is fine, test scores good, ecs are good assuming you did those sports all 3-4 years, and the stuff you put under research is excellent for someone interested in science related fields.</p>

<p>Also i would put put comp sci down as your intended major when it asks for it rather than biomed if you are equally interested in both, since being female will help more, and its not like its binding in any way.</p>

8

<p>Prism is correct...the CompSci would be helpful, and people do things like that all the time. Your major is not really "definite" until you declare it, and even then its not really "final."</p>

9

<p>i think everything is really good except maybe the GPA. good luck!</p>

10

<p>I'm not really sure what the first posters were talking about. You have a great chance of getting in. I had similar stats, and I got into Cornell.
I might think about taking the SATs. I would definitely send in those SAT II scores with the ACTs. If you got a 33, you could probably break 2200. Also, consider other lower ivies, dartmouth/brown/columbia/penn.
And, if you're studious: University of Chicago might be a great fit.</p>

11

<p>haha muerteapablo I've had some disagreeing points of view with you in the past when I read your posts, but that post just made my day.</p>

<p>viva cornell.</p>

12

<p>LOL. I had a way worse stats than you, and I got in! Be confident, at least be a believer!</p>

13

<p>Thanks Tsengun. It gave me a good feel. Any more suggestions you can provide besides GPA and Test Scores.</p>

14

<p>I also think the caliber of applying students is being waaaaay exaggerated. Of course they will be some elite USABO people but there are only a couple of finalists (like 20 i think) as well as Intel kids and kids w/ major publications. The ACT score is fine. ECs are your major weakness. I think you have an above average shot for Cornell.</p>

15

<p>your ECs arent weak they just arent well rounded...if athletics is your passion than you have an edge over other stereotypical asian female applicants...</p>

<p>whats your income status?</p>

16

<p>You can definitely get in if you write my name correctly. I guarantee you. LOL</p>

17

<p>if you apply ED you have a great shot of getting in</p>

<p>as far as RD or even ED for that matter to truly truly TRULY increase your chances (like two-fold) i suggest you don't apply to College of Arts, Letters, and Sciences (CALS) and instead apply to Human Ecology. I am in the class of 2012 in the college of human ecology and my stats were much much MUCH lower than yours. HumEc has a bio major, you just simply apply to the specific major within the college. Fewer people apply to the specialty colleges (particularly HumEc) you can always transfer into arts and sciences if you want. Additionally you take the same classes as those in Arts and Sciences</p>

<p>good luck, hopefully i'll see you on campus!</p>

18

<p>just for clarification, CALS stands for College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.</p>

19

<p>^uh, for one thing cals is the college of agriculture and life sciences, and secondly she said she was interested in comp sci, and biomed(which I assume means biomedial engineering), both of which are in the college of engineering.</p>

<p>EDIT: Beaten to the punch by chendrix</p>

<p>also the fact that your taking multivariable and will have 2 ap sciences looks quite good aswell</p>

20

<p>ah chendrix beat me</p>