chances?

Colleges and Universities A-Z The University of Texas at Austin
1

<p>i might have already done this before, but it's worth trying again.</p>

<p>unweighted gpa: 3.4
weighted gpa: 5.1 or 5.2 i don't remember
act score: 31
i'm in the IB program at a pretty competitive high school and i'm taking pretty much some of the hardest IB courses my school has to offer, with the exception of IB photography as my elective but that's still a lot of work.
at the beginning of the school year my percentage was top 12% but we haven't gotten our updated percentages yet after the first semester. my midyear grades were pretty good, mostly A's but a few B's here and there. i originally applied for engineering but i changed it to communications about a month ago. the admissions lady told me to submit a new essay so i did. i would say it's pretty good, i tapped into what made me change my major. my ec's are okay, i was in debate in 9th and 10th and i was treasurer. i have about 130 community service hours. i really don't have a lot of ec's other than that, and i worked for a few months in junior year. &lt;/p>

<p>thanks!</p>

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<p>out of state student?</p>

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<p>yeah, from florida</p>

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<p>You've got it tough just coming from OOS.</p>

<p>Top 12 with those ACT scores USUALLY gets in...but this year it's supposed to be VERY competitive. Getting in OOS at UT this year may be more difficult than getting in to an Ivy.</p>

<p>Taking a challenging curriculum does not help in going to UT. The only way it can help you is if your school's ranking system rewards you for it. They give you bonus points for doing more than the minimum units.</p>

<p>Going to the IB school doesn't help unless it is socioeconomically deprived. You get special consideration if you go to a lower-income school in Texas. I'm not positive about coming from OOS.</p>

<p>Good luck, I think you have a great chance if your ECs and essays are strong. Comm is a very difficult major to get in, but you have a good chance at least for Liberal Arts or Natural Sciences undeclared.</p>

5

<p>to maximize your chances, you should put different majors on your application from different colleges. something like 1.) communication 2.) liberal arts. then you can spend your first year taking core classes, and xfer out. i know that it's a lot easier (sometimes!!! maybe not into schools like engineering) to get into a major if you are an internal transfer.</p>

<p>i used to do the IB programme and i totally feel for your pain...IB is inherently more difficult than AP. i did both haha :O</p>

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<p>Well it's a little late for that...but yeah you should definitely apply to two colleges, with one of them COLA or NatSci.</p>

<p>inskeletonrock, did you transfer from Lamar to just McHigh?</p>

<p>I always heard that AP was harder from a few people I know at Lamar, but that may just be them. They did curse the fact they had to write an essay over the summer.</p>

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<p>Yeah getting into an Ivy is definitely still harder.</p>

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<p>no that's not the way it works. you still go to mchi if you go to lamar bc it's only a programme, not a separate school. i highly doubt anyone that took even a remotely rigorous set of subjects at IB said that ap was harder. i say that because you can get away with an insanely easy set of subjects (english, history, that bs computer class...which was recently exterminated haha..and biology SL, spanish SL, and math studies SL...) ap is an effing joke at mchi, all you do is make scrapbooks and do dialectical journals. and i totally forgot to answer your question, haha. i am not even in mcallen school district anymore. i kinda dropped out and went to a charter school in pharr. premier high school...worst name ever, but sweet school.</p>

<p>i got offtrack though, sry. inherently, the ap examinations versus ib examinations (with their counterparts...i.e. don't compare math studies SL to calculus bc)...just don't compare. for example, there is no way in living hell you could just sit through a semester, reading books and thinking about them, and expect to get a 7 in IB English. just...no way. but, you can do the same for english language and still expect to get a 5. i know, because that's what i did last year...and i lolled.</p>

<p>and beyond the examinations, the overall academic experience? puh-lease. i doubt in ap you are going to be asked to undertake a substantial, scholarly level work w/ COMPLETE synthesis of your own subject, scope, format. nowhere. at ib, it's required that everyone undertake it. you can make it pretty easy and bs, but if you want to make it good and do it well...holy ****. i spent my entire summer reading 15 nasty, slightly sexual (i kid) books for my extended essay, bc the subject was so rare (not a lot of research on LULAC has been conducted)...in fact, i ended up conducting interviews and going to museums looking for evidence.</p>

<p>that's not to berate ap. it's a damned fine program, but it's not top notch, yet. they need to change the entire structure of the program in order for it to be as rigorous as ib. and i think it's a shame that ap kids are going to have to compete on a global scale w/ kids that did ib. i have already derailed this thread MOREEEE than is necessary, so i'll stop, but this is kind of an interesting conversation :p</p>

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<p>Actually with the cuts P2 is making plus a surge in applications they are accepting about 20% this year. That is lower than half of the Ivies.</p>

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<p>cofaloaf...as much as that comment was worth stay on the topic...i hate it when people do that....sounds like you have a great chance to me...good luck</p>

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<p>theloneranger: you are incredibly proud and defensive about UT and Plan II, aren't you? </p>

<p>First of all, thousands more applicants apply to Ivies than Plan II. On the Plan II website it states that it accepts about 330 students out of 850-1100 applicants, shooting for 180 students to actually matriculate (<a href="http://www.utexas.edu/cola/progs/plan2/applicants/)%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.utexas.edu/cola/progs/plan2/applicants/)&lt;/a>. </p>

<p>330/850 * 100% = 39%
330/1100 * 100% = 30%</p>

<p>So, Plan II's acceptance rate is about 30-39%. NOT about 20%. Granted, there probably has been a surge in applications this year, but without any factual current numbers to refer to, I would not extrapolate that Plan II has scaled back to a 20% acceptance rate.</p>

<p>Harvard, on the other hand, just witnessed a record number of applicants, more than 27,000 students (even without early action), shattering the previous record of 22,955 set this past year (<a href="http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2008/02.07/99-admissions.html)%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2008/02.07/99-admissions.html)&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p>

<p>That being said, stop inflating Plan II to that of an Ivy level. Plan II is great, but it's NOT Ivy level. According to U.S. News, Ivies' acceptance rates are MUCH lower than Plan II's 30-39%:</p>

<p>Yale, Harvard = 9% acceptance rate
Princeton = 10%
Columbia = 12%
Brown = 14%
Dartmouth = 16%
Penn = 18%
Cornell = 25%</p>

<p>Here is the link to the source: USNews.com:</a> America's Best Colleges 2008: Lowest acceptance rates</p>

<p>Look, everyone knows Plan II is a great program that's hard to get in, but theloneranger, really, when you talk about acceptance rates and overall admission it's not as comparable to the Ivies. You needn't need to include with every other post that Plan II is as good as the Ivies or in the post above, more competitive than Ivies to get in; people know Plan II is a very reputable program, okay.</p>

<p>Ivy admissions are much more complicated or perhaps arbitrary and thus extremely hard to get in, the hardest schools to get into besides Stanford, MIT, Duke, UChicago, and a few others; Plan II on the other hand clearly states on its website the types of students its looking for and even suggests on its Essays page how to score well on the essays portion. </p>

<p>According to your logic, Plan II is more competitive to get into than Cornell, the Ivy with the highest acceptance rate of the Ivies. That is just completely wrong.</p>

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<p>loneranger, do you think it's a bad idea to apply to both natural sciences? cuz, that's what I did (1st-nutritional sciences; 2nd-biochemistry). mainly cuz I didn't want to have to get accepted to, say, economics, and then change major sophomore year, making me go to college for 5 years or something..</p>

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<p>Yes, especially because Biochem is fairly competitive. If you wanted Biochem at all it should have been your first choice. The most competitive majors won't even look at you if you aren't first choice. I don't think nutrition is too bad though.</p>

<p>NatSci takes a lot of undeclared majors so you'd probably be good. If you had applied to Engineering and Architecture, though, you could be in a lot of trouble.</p>

<p>But if you don't get in to Nutrition, I'd expect either an undeclared admission or outright rejection. Biochem is not a major people can put down as #2 and get in.</p>

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<p>^wow, I wish I had put some easier Natsci class for my 2nd major. Thanks for telling me, though. I really want to get into Nutrition, so I hope it's all good..
but yea, I guess for me, it's Nutrition or nothing pretty much..</p>

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<p>oh wow ur from florida and in the IB program? Me too! which HS if you don't mind me asking?</p>

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<p>i go to coral reef high in miami</p>

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<p>oOo koo i didn't know there was an IB program there, i only know of north miami, boyd, spruce creek, some other one, and miramar...which is where i go :)</p>

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<p>lol yeah, there's like 3 or 4 here in south miami. i guess the one at my school is good. we have other academies that pretty much hate us because we're the "smart kids" but a lot of the ib seniors are potheads and the like, haha.</p>

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<p>lol yea the regulars hate us cause we take over everything esp. the top 10%...08 senior class over at my school is pretty chill but kinda dry, like I probably hang out w/ more of my college and underclassmen friends rather than ppl in my own class lol kinda sad xD</p>

<p>hey, let me know if you get in okie?</p>

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<p>lol yeah our class also takes over like the first couple hundred of spots in ranking haha. but yeah i'll definitely let you know, hopefully it's by the end of next week though because i am totally freaking out :[
good luck!</p>