<p>Hello, I'm a junior in a Maryland high school.</p>
<p>SAT I: 770 reading, 740 math, 740 writing.
SAT II: History 800, Math 1: 710, taking literature this fall and expecting to do pretty well.
Unwieghted GPA: 3.7, lots of high-level courses, competitive school</p>
<p>Problem is, I have a distinct lack of good ECs. I took a summer internship for 2 summers in a research lab, and around 80 hours community service, but nothing else worth mentioning.</p>
<p>Do I have any chances with Northwestern, Columbia, Duke, Michigan, Penn, Chicago, Cornell, colleges of that calibur? What are the best academic schools I'd have a chance of getting into?</p>
<ol>
<li>What's your rank?</li>
<li>Not really in a position to know, blah blah blah, but with your good numbers you will probably get into somewhere prestigious (which seems to be your main goal). However, since im assuming you just started your junior year, which is your most important one, it's a little bit harder to say what your chances are. those ECs are fairly weak, however, i think you would have a good chance at Michigan, Northwestern, and Cornell.</li>
</ol>
<p>are you in any sort of organization or club? list it all. how did you spend your time?</p>
<p>Sorry, I'm actually a senior in HS (hard to believe I made that mistake.)</p>
<p>No, I'm not a member of any clubs. I've been a pretty reclusive student for my entire high school career.</p>
<p>My school doesn't rank, but I suspect I'm in the top 10% or better.</p>
<p>I really have no clue as far as your chances. What I would do if I were you, and you are really serious about getting into one of those schools, I would organize some sort of fundraiser of charity dealy at your school. Heck, why not two?</p>
<p>Northwestern, especially, will want to see that you are involved at school. So I think the aforementioned things would really help.</p>
<p>during your senior year, look for things that genuinely interest you, and get involved in them. if you are truly passionate about that EC, it will show through in your interview and essays, and may help to redeem your relatively apathetic approach to ECs in your past HS years.</p>
<p>Thanks, but while I will take some EC's this year and get involved, I think its too late to really make a difference--it'll be obvious I did it just for the purpose of admission. Anyone else have any ideas/advice?</p>