College List

College Search & Selection
1

<p>I thought I might as well start getting opinions on my college list, lol. I still need to visit most of these schools, but any input is appreciated.</p>

<p>SATS: 2180 (700 W, 710 CR, 770 M) (I just took them for the first time a month ago but I'll probably take them again, and I'll also try the ACTs in June)
206 PSAT (don't know if i'll be commended)
Classes: All honors, 3 APs this year, 4 APs next year
4.0 UW gpa, top 3% class (I go to a pretty good private catholic school, usually 3-5 get into ivies each year, class sizes are about 150)
ECs: jv indoor track, sailing team, 100+ hours hospital volunteer, 200+ hours helping out with medical research(in a lab and entering data at the hospital-my name is getting published in a paper), math team, secretary of club we have that's kind of like a community service/charity-driven club), ambassadors club, math tutoring/mentoring, nhs, nat'l english honor society, excalibur science honor society, mu alpha theta, summer course at brown about being a doctor in 2008</p>

<p>What I'm looking for in a school:</p>

<p>Medium size: 6,000 to 15,000 (that's slightly flexible)
Urban area or at least very close to/accessible to a big city
East coast school
Warm weather is a plus, I hate snow
Good biology/pre-med program
Undergraduate research opportunities
Not a super-uptight student body, work hard, play hard
Any merit aid would be great</p>

<p>Schools I've already visited and am definitely applying to:</p>

<p>UMiami (LOVED it, and great merit aid)
Vanderbilt (i'm a little nervous about the large greek presence)
Brown (grew up near it, i love everything about it except that its so close to home and providence isn't all that exciting)</p>

<p>Schools I'm looking at: </p>

<p>Boston University (i like boston and it's close to home, just not sure about the cold)
Columbia University
Fordham University
New York University (i would probably be okay with the cold in nyc, since its such an awesome city)
Duke University (i hear durham's kind of a sketchy place so i'm not sure)
University of North Carolina- Chapel Hill
University of Virginia (i know unc and uva are not big city schools, but i'm hoping that when i visit i'll also like the college town feel)
Emory University
Georgetown University
George Washington University
Johns Hopkins University
University of Pennsylvania </p>

<p>Any input or suggestions? I'm still looking for good safety schools and maybe a couple more matches, so anything's appreciated.</p>

<p>Thanks :)</p>

2

<p>bumppppppp</p>

3

<p>All of those schools are solid.
Based on your other schools I would think you would like Emory, Duke, UNC, GWU (great merit aid), UVA, NYC, and probably most of the others</p>

<p>The only ones I would be more skeptical of are fordham, BU (both a little bit below the rest of the schools you are looking at, plus cold) and JHU (really stressed/ intense campus, or at least thats how i felt when i visited)</p>

<p>If I had to choose 8 (arbitrary number, you don’t have to choose 8, im just slimming the list):
UMiami
Vandy
Brown (because your applying to these anyway)
UNC (def of Work hard/play hard)
Emory (atlanta=warm)
GWU(for the merit aid/safety+ In the middle of DC)
Columbia(or penn really whichever Ivy you would prefer, I know you like NYC)
and Duke (work hard play hard/ great academic/warm+ durham isn’t as bad as its rep)</p>

<p>Also have you looked at Tulane or Rice? Rice = middle of houston, great academics
Tulane =New orleans</p>

4

<p>Thanks, that’s helpful.</p>

<p>And I actually visited Tulane and didn’t really like it. It seems like a great school but New Orleans and the campus just didn’t appeal to me. Rice was originally on my list, but I decided that Texas seemed a little too far away.</p>

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<p>bumpp…anyone else?</p>