Computer Science major: chance at various schools

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Demographics: white male, no “hooks” (I don’t believe in those anyway)

Intended major: computer science

Academics:

Mostly honors, dual enrollment, and AP. My APs are Environmental, Chem, English Lang, APUSH, Bio, Calc, and US Gov. Scores are mostly 5s with the occasional 4. UW GPA is around 97 or 98 (4.0 I believe) while weighted is 101-102. Class rank is 1st. SAT II’s are in Chem, Physics, Spanish, and Math II. All 800s or high 700s. SAT I is 2200 and ACT is 32.

Extracurriculars:

This is where it gets rough. I have Spanish National Honor Society/Spanish Club which I’ve been doing since 9th (well I went to like four meetings that year but I was technically in it) grade. I’m not that involved in it however. No leadership positions, no extreme dedication. I mostly go to and participate in the events (mostly community service) but that’s about it. Other than that I have a summer job at a day camp where I’ve been working since the summer before high school. First two years as a volunteer, second two paid. This is probably my strongest EC and it’s something I could write a lot about. Besides those two, that’s really it. I know it seems like nothing, but really none of the other opportunities interested me. Maybe part of it was my social anxiety (not asking for sympathy here), but I just didn’t feel like doing any of the other stuff. I suck at sports, I suck at music so no band, really the only thing I’m talented at is school, which isn’t an EC. If you’re asking what my “passion” is and why I didn’t follow it into the stars, the closest answer I could give you (although I’d call it an “interest”) is technology. There was a club for that which I did in 9th and I really liked it and we helped a lot with the school community and everything, but it was shut down that year with nothing like it to replace it. Since then I’ve been pursuing technology on my own (now you’re thinking “oh look, he does have an EC, he just doesn’t know it!”), but there really isn’t anything to show for it. Like any good prospective CS major, I do engage in recreational programming quite frequently, but there really isn’t any “external validification” of it. No publishes, no sales, no downloads. I just do it for fun, not to show the world how brilliant I am. At this point you’re probably thinking that I actually do have ECs, they’re just hidden by my misconceptions of what ECs are. I can assure you, I don’t. Yes, I have indeed spent the past four years doing nothing meaningful. I watch TV, play videogames, read, hang out with friends, and of course I code. Really, that’s it.

Schools:

Because of my predicament (having the grades for Harvard but the ECs for community college (don’t accuse me of hyperbole)), I’m applying to schools with a wide range of selectivities. Some of these schools are matches on paper but reaches in real life, while others are safeties on paper but matches in real life. I’ll list them in order of selectivity.

MIT (the only way to have a 0% chance is to not apply, right?)

Cornell

UC Berkeley

Georgia Tech

UC Irvine

SUNY Stony Brook (in-state for this one)

UT Austin

UW Madison

Purdue

UIUC

Texas A&M

Virginia Tech

Questions:

Nothing really that I haven’t addressed. If you’d like to critique my choices or advise for or against them or suggest more, go ahead. Before you do though, a few quick things: money isn’t an issue, location matters but not that much, and I don’t want to go international. Other than that, there are a few more things I forgot to mention: recs are pretty strong, I’m a fairly decent writer so I think my essays are okay, and I don’t have any ED/EA (too many schools for that). Thanks in advance for whatever help you can provide.

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Im guessing you are a senior, so you don’t have much of a chance of improving your ECs. Unfortunately for you, colleges want to see well rounded students, so without much extracurricular work, you don’t have that much of a chance at top CS schools. However don’t fret: you can still get into a good school and have a great computer science education. I would recommend UIUC especially if you are in state, as it is a top 5 CS school. In your essays you need to portray your love of coding very well. I got into many top schools for computer science, and I think that is mainly because of my extracurricular work in the area of CS. Anyways, it is unfortunate that you don’t have any ECs but you can go to a decent school, and start working your way up from there (get involved, do research, etc)

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@“CS Wiz”

I know the ECs (well, lack thereof) are a major problem, which is why I’m viewing the top schools I listed (probably all of them up to Stony) as reaches. I’d probably even see UIUC the same way since from what I’ve heard, the CS acceptance rate is not 60% like the overall school is, instead it’s more like 20 or 25. Not Ivy-level but it’s up (or down) there. But I’m not too worried about that since, like you said, going to a decent school instead of a top 20 or elite level one isn’t a death sentence. Skills and networking is what matters in the field, although better education does help with the former. But it’s not completely necessary. All that being said, getting into a great CS school is pretty important considering the quality of education, the more bountiful employment opportunities (let’s be realistic, tech companies don’t recruit at all universities equally), and the increased likelihood of getting a good job. Which is why I’ll take your advice about the essays to heart and I’ll try to turn programming into my “peak”.