Choosing Matches and Safeties

College Search & Selection
1

<p>I am a current massachusetts student and I am having trouble deciding on matches and safeties.
Scores: SAT 2250 CR:800 Math:770 W:680(****ty I fell asleep during the essay)
Math II: 720 Bio M: 780 Us history: 760
Ap Us History 5 Ap Bio 5
I'm currently takin Ap Calc and Ap Brit Lit
Ranked #1 in my class GPA unweighted 3.98
Varsity Captain in Soccer and Track
Eagle Scout</p>

<p>Top Schools: MIT, Princeton, Yale, Columbia, Tufts(maybe)
Matches: IDK Maybe Duke, Wake Forest, Tulane University
Safeties: UMASS Lowell, UMASS Amherst</p>

<p>Anyone have any suggestions for matches? Are those safeties fine? Most likely I'll be majoring in Mechanical Engineering, Mathematics or Physics aka I'm not sure. I'd really appreciate any help.</p>

2

<p>A safety must be certain for admission, certain for affordability, academically and otherwise suitable (i.e. has your major), and a place you like.</p>

<p>Wake Forest and Tulane do not have ABET-accredited mechanical engineering majors. Duke is probably a reach-for-everyone type of school.</p>

<p>If affordable, have you considered Minnesota, NCSU, Virginia Tech, and Stony Brook?</p>

3

<p>More matches: Rice and Wash U in St. Louis</p>

4

<p>Wake Forest doesn’t have engineering, I believe. </p>

<p>I assume reaches are <30%, matches between 40-90% and safeties 100%, with the probability of admission rounded to 1 significant figure. I assume that you are a senior. You are a top candidate. </p>

<p>Reaches: MIT, Princeton, Yale, Columbia, UPENN, Cal Tech, Stanford.
Matches: Tufts, Cornell, CMU, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, WashU, Rice, Michigan, Lehigh, Illinois, Harvey Mudd, Duke, Vanderbilt, UC anything (Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD, etc).
Almost Safeties (I can’t see you getting rejected): Northeastern, RPI, Rochester, WPI, Georgia Tech, Wisconsin, Illinois.
Safeties: (A properly filled out application by the deadline (some of which are Dec 1) will get you in.) UMASS, McGill, Toronto, Penn State, NC State, Virginia Tech, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Delaware, any SUNY, Ohio State, Minnesota. </p>

<p>Forget UMASS Lowell, there is no way that you don’t get into Amherst.</p>

5

<p>How about WPI?</p>

6

<p>Look at Cornell and maybe as more of a safety Carnegie Mellon, URochester</p>

7

<p>UMass Lowell and UMass Amherst are **both **good safeties. UML will likely offer you a complete merit scholarship (full tuition, fees, room, and board) and placement in their honors program. UMass Amherst may do the same or perhaps offer a less in scholarship than UML. Both have excellent engineering programs.
Cornell’s acceptance rate is less than 20%, and Tufts is at 22% so they are reaches for anyone. </p>

<p>Tweaking your list also involves knowing what you can afford. Some of these are more generous with FA, others offer merit aid to top students like you. RPI, WPI, U.Rochester would all be safeties that would offer merit aid.
**What kind of school are you looking for? **CMU, MIT are very tech-oriented (also RPI, WPI) while other schools on your list are more liberal-artsy or balanced. And there is a huge range of environments you have listed: big city, suburbs, middle-of-nowhere, and range of sizes as well. What are you really looking for?
Lots of good suggestions by other posters for good matches and safeties…</p>

8

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<p>No they are not. Looking at our Boston area public high school’s Naviance, in the neighborhood of this guy’s stats, the probability of getting into both is about 50%. </p>

<p>I wouldn’t call UMASS Lowell excellent. It cheapens the word excellent. I have yet to see a UMASS Lowell resume that I phone screened for an interview.</p>

9

<p>CRD, Having those stats from your school may not equate to the the same from the OP’s school. Naviance is school specific. Colleges look at grades and class rank from disparate schools differently.</p>