Class of 2019 Computer Science, Wanting Potential Chances (UIUC, Purdue, Cornell, Washington, Ivys)

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hi!

If you’re reading this, that means you either want to help a newer student like me, or you clicked the wrong thread to go to. It’s probably the latter, but I’m going to assume that you are here for the first reason. Rather than giving a barebones resume to look off of, I took the time to make a prediction of what it would look like by senior year, without any optimistic approach. Although I am looking for which ones would be a match, reach, or deny, I’m also hoping to get some comments on what could be improved or added in order to make my higher choice colleges. I’m looking to go into **Computer Science ** for the following schools (ranked in order of preference)

Illinois at Urbana Champaign (COE)
Cornell
University of Washington
Princeton
Harvard
Yale
Purdue (planning to be a safety)

SAT I
Math: 780
Reading: 760

SAT II:
Math Level I: 800
Math Level II: 790
Physics: 690

Unweighted GPA: 3.78/4 (my school puts weight on unweighted GPA for some reason, so I manually converted)

Freshman Year/u

Choir - A, A
English Honors - B, A
ChemBio I Honors (course where both are combined over two years) - A, A
Algebra II Honors - A, A
Speech - (only during 2nd sem), A
AP Human Geography - A, B
French II - A, A

Sophomore

Choir, A, A
English Honors - A, A
ChemBio II Honors - A, A
Pre Calc Honors - A, A
French III - A, A
AP Computer Science - A, A
AP European History - A, B

Junior

Choir - A, A
AP Lang - A, B
AP Calc BC - A, A
AP US - B, B
AP Physics I - B, B (if I get really lucky based CollegeBoard will give me a 2 on the exam)
AP Stats - A, A
AP French - A, A

Senior

Choir - A. A
AP Lit - A, A
AP US Gov - A, A
AP Macroeconomics - A, A
Calculus III (Honors weight) - B, B
French V (Honors weight) - A, A
AP Physics 2 - B, B
TA for AP Comp Sci

AP Exam Scores:

Human Geo - 4
Psychology (freshman self study) - 5
Environmental Science (freshman self study) - 4
Comp Sci - 5
European History - 4
Microeconomics (sophomore self study) - 5
Comparative Govt (sophomore self study) - 3
English Language - 4
Calc BC - 4 (AB Subset 4)
US - 3
Physics I - 2
Statistics - 5
French - 3
Literature - 3
US Gov - 5
Macroecon - 5
Physics 2 - 2

ECs:
Mock Trial Team (4 years)

  • Top team in state, placed in nationals

Debate Team (4 years)

  • Team Captain for 3 years

Club to help those with special needs (4 years)
Developed and had an Application published (going to finish around late sophomore/early junior year)

  • ~2,000 downloads

Volunteered at a food kitchen in order to bring cultural communities together (~100 hours)
Taught game design fundamentals at middle school programming club (3 years)

  • Helped to run such club
2

Forgot to add, I’m also an Asian male, income bracket $100,000

3

Didn’t Class of 2019 already head off to college?

HYP, Cornell are reaches
UIUC could be a high match but is very competitive in CS admissions.

Maybe improve SAT Physics to make you more competitive for top schools. CS extracurriculars look nice.

4

For admission only:

Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell: reach (for everyone)
UIUC, Washington: reach for direct admission to the CS major, though you may be admitted in another major or general admission (but then it is highly competitive to get into the CS major after enrolling)
Purdue: check on whether you can get direct admission to the CS major; if not, check how difficult it is to be admitted to the CS major after enrolling

Check financial aid with the net price calculator at each school. Show your parents the results. Four of your schools have no significant merit scholarships; of the three state schools, at least two will be expensive for you as an out-of-state student and should be considered reaches at best since you would need to aim for sufficiently large merit scholarships (may be out of reach if there are no such merit scholarships that you can get).

If you are not an Indiana resident, it is likely that you have no possible safeties besides your local community college.