College Admission Questions/Concerns

Applying to College
1

<p>Hi everybody,</p>

<p>I've just recently finished and submitted all of my college apps (very exciting...!) and I was hoping that you guys could look over my overall profile and tell me where the strong and weak points are. Also, I have a few questions below! I'm new to this site, (posting in it, that is), so hopefully I didn't do anything horribly taboo or wrong or something along those lines.</p>

<p>List of Schools:
Columbia Engineering
Princeton Engineering
Harvard
Cornell Engineering
Penn M&T / Engineering
Northwestern (McCormick)
Berkeley (Engineering)
UCLA (Engineering)
USC (Viterbi)
University of Washington, Seattle (Engineering)</p>

<p>SAT I: 2300 (770 CR, 770 M, 780 W)
SAT II: Math II (760, then 800), Physics (790)
IB: 7 Math SL, 6 IB Business & Management SL
AP: 5 Calculus AB</p>

<p>GPA: 3.98 (out of 4)
Class Rank: 16 out of 469 unweighted
Classes: All IB, fairly rigorous relative to what available at my school</p>

<p>ECs: Founded a nonprofit organization (read more at studentmusicinitiatives.com), Work at local science museum, President of school DECA chapter, Washington Aerospace Scholar (basically, an engineering thing), Sales intern for local screen printing company, tennis varsity, piano</p>

<p>Ethnicity: Asian American (Chinese)
Gender: Male</p>

<p>Letters of Rec: I think there were good - I really have no bearing. Counselor likes me.
Essays: Also, I think they were pretty good, except for that freakin typo (below).</p>

<p>Some Questions-
Firstly, do colleges know the other schools that you've applied to? And if so, does that seriously have a bearing on the admission decision?</p>

<p>Secondly, I found a typo in one of my essays to Columbia! I wrote briefly on the Arab Spring, but I accidentally wrote "Arab Springs". Is that a big problem? I'm actually really worried about that.</p>

<p>Thirdly, is there anything particular I should know about any of these schools? Or just to think about/occupy my mind for the next two-three months?</p>

<p>Finally, looking at my ECs, do you think I show engineering enough? I think I definitely think I come across as a business student, although I would prefer to go for engineering and take business on the side.</p>

<p>Thanks you guys so much! - Sorry for all the questions.</p>

2

<ol>
<li><p>they don’t know what other schools 1) unless you tell them or 2) unless you file a FAFSA and they look at it to see. For your schools I wouldn’t expect it to be meaningful.</p></li>
<li><p>It happens, oh well, I wouldn’t expect it to be meaningful.</p></li>
<li><p>You can read the individual school forums, sometimes current students post and it can be interesting/entertaining. You can ask questions if you have any.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Good luck, don’t forget to post results in the individual forums when the time comes.</p>