Hi everyone! Chance me please? (schools at bottom)
I am Asian, female, and attend public school in West Virginia; school overall is not very competitive or anything, and my class size is around 500.
Academics
GPA (unweighted): 3.86 / 4
SAT: 2210 (CR 790, Math 680, Writing 730)- 1st time taken, will probably take again to improve math score
SAT Subject Tests: Chemistry- 750, US History- 800
ACT: 34
AP: World History (5), Human Geo (5), Environmental Science (4, self study), Chem (4), Psych (5), APUSH (5), AP Lang (5)
Senior year classes: AP Bio, AP Physics 1, AP US Gov. and Pol., AP Lit, AP Stats, Spanish 3, Band
School doesn’t do class rank
Academic Awards/Honors
Won a couple school/local awards for writing, and almost definitely will get semifinalist for National Merit.
Extracurriculars
- Clarinet (8 years): Member of school band and in Wind Ensemble (highest of four groups). Section leader for 2015-2016 school year. All State Band in 2015. I also play in a community orchestra.
- Green Initiative Club - Environmental club- recycling, planting trees, etc. No leadership position.
- Environmentors- Program where you get paired with a research mentor, usually grad student, and do a research project on some environment-related topic and present a poster. Mine was related to well water quality in areas near fracking sites.
- In National Honor Society and Science Honors, and will be in National Spanish Honor Society this year.
Volunteering
- Teacher at a Sunday school program at my temple (I’m Hindu): Teach classes for the 5-8 yrs. age group. Developed a new summer curriculum for the program, since the old one wasn’t working well. Organized a kids craft sale for a local charity event. Only teen teacher.
- Assistant coach for elementary school Math Olympiad team
- Volunteer at local hospital: In addition to the normal volunteering stuff, I do arts and crafts sessions for pediatric patients.
- I do Relay for Life almost every year, making and selling jewelry to raise money, and am usually the top fundraiser on my team.
Essay- haven’t even thought about it yet, much less started writing it, but writing is my one major talent so let’s assume that it’s very good.
Recommendations- One will be from my 11th grade AP Lang teacher, and I think it’ll be very good because I did extremely well in that class, she likes me, and I’ve heard she puts a lot of effort into rec. letters and tries to make them all unique. I don’t know who the other one will be from yet, but it’ll probably be fairly good. As for the counselor rec, I’ve only met my counselor twice–which is more than the norm at my school–and only for minor scheduling things, so…I really don’t know what that will be like.
I don’t have any of the “hooks” like first generation, legacy, etc., and I haven’t visited any colleges or done interviews, if that counts.
Schools: As of now, I haven’t decided where I’m applying, only considering these. Assume regular descision everywhere, or early action/decision only if it’s non-binding, because I’m really not sure where I want to/will be able to afford to go yet.
University of Pittsburgh
West Virginia University
Ohio State University
Case Western
University of Maryland- BC or CP, I don’t know which yet
Boston University
UNC- Chapel Hill
Wellesley College
George Washington University
Cornell University