<p>Hi guys,
I was wondering if you guys could assess my "resume" to see whether I have any chance of getting into Cornell Engineering. </p>
<p>So here it is:
School: Paramus High School, Paramus, NJ (not really a great school)
GPA: 4.1 Weighted (No ranking) (around 3.9 -4.0 unweighted?)
Courseload: Chemistry AP, all honors except College Prep English in freshmen year
Planning to take AP Bio and Physics next year, Spanish for two years
ACT: 31 (Not planning to send score)
SAT: 2050, 640 CR, 690 W, 720 Math (I'm taking it again, aiming for 2200+)
SAT IIs: Waiting for SAT Physics and Math Level 2, Chemistry 800</p>
<p>Extracurriculars:
-High school band and wind ensemble for 4 years (hopefully a section leader or drum major next year) (also orchestra)
-All-state, regions, county band on clarinet and alto clarinet
-Math Club for 3 years (treasurer this year, probably president next year)
-Club that goes to nursing home frequently (secretary this year) (2 years)
-AMC 10, 12, and ARML participant (does this benefit at all?)
-ABRSM Piano Playing Auditions Level 5 and 6 (passed and passed with merit)
-ABRSM Theory Exam Level 5 (passed)
-Local community band for 2 summers
-school clarinet choir for 2 years
-peer tutoring math
-Church chamber orchestra for 2.5 years (have been temporary conductor for couple of months) (concertmaster role)
-New Jersey Science League (Chem I and II) (ranked 80th for Chem II) (is rank worth mentioning?)
-New Jersey Governor's School of Engineering and Technology
-Volunteer at a library
-possibly Columbia SHP</p>
<p>It's not much but i hope you guys can give me some feedbacks and tips.</p>
<p>need more engineering related ECs imo, or make the ones you have seem more important</p>
<p>SAT could use a raise, but it should be fine as is</p>
<p>is the average amount of APs taken that little at your school? is that as many as they offer? i’d take as many as possible but definitely without making yourself feel like committing suicide</p>
<p>I agree with you, but I am not sure what else is possible. Do you think a high school student could intern at Exxon-Mobil? Yeah, I think my most important one would be Governor’s School, which is actually somewhat selective program, since high schools all over new jersey pick 1 candidate per 150ish students, and only 60ish were accepted this year.</p>
<p>And as for the APs, yes I know I lack on the APs. I’m not too good at history so I was only able to take Chem, which takes 2 spots out of 8 in my schedule (so does AP Bio and Physics). Rest were filled with required courses, and I would have not done well in courses such as AP Government and Politics and Macroeconomics. Those courses would have affected me negatively. But would it have been better to challenge myself and take those courses? But we do have a decent amount of APs. I tried to focus on taking AP courses that relate to my major.</p>
<p>You’re going to need to either increase the SAT I or ACT.</p>
<p>Other than that, you have an earnest shot but again nothing in admissions these days is guaranteed, but I feel you’ll get a good look.</p>
<p>A recommendation from me would be to contact some local colleges and see if you can do some research this summer. Would help your application a LOT.</p>
<p>try and do what roneald said with the research, and if governors school is the best EC you got, make sure you capitalize on that and try and stand out in that, and show cornell what you’ve learned from it</p>
<p>yuyis09:
Most people say usually 33+ is a good ACT score to send, and I don’t plan on taking it again. I could probably get 33 if I put the effort in to prepare though.
roneald:
That is a good idea, but unfortunately governor’s school takes up most of summer vacation, so I only have less than a month to do anything else. Perhaps I could continue it through the school year?
Feral24:
Thank you for the input. Yeah, hopefully I will learn a lot and be able to write a good essay on that.</p>
<p>^I started research around the second week of August and did it through the first week of December, and I think that was a big reason of why I got into the schools I got into. I would definitely take a look into it.</p>
<p>If youre looking for ways to get into it, decide on a topic your interested in, look for a professor at a local college that’s doing something along those lines, google their name, find some paper theyve written on the subject, and when you go talk to them tell them about how how yous stumbled upon this paper of theirs that you thought was fascinating and you had questions to ask them, and would possibly like to do research with them if they’re available.</p>
<p>chendrix:
Yeah, that might be a good idea. But lot of people in my area seem to take more SATs than ACTs. Would it matter if I use ACT as my “high” score?</p>
<p>roneald:
I looked at couple of professors’ profiles, but even if I googled their papers, I can’t find the actual paper. Is there some sort of database that I can access these papers?</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter whether people in your area take more SATs than ACTs. SAT tends to be more northeast, while ACT is more southern, but it doesn’t matter where you are from. They are equivalent, and you can use either as your high score.</p>
<p>It just so happens that most people think the ACT is significantly easier in material and in study preparation.</p>
<p>I dunno, I know people who did quite well on their SATs (for which they had taken the Princeton course) and did quite badly on their ACT. Which only goes to show that the tests don’t measure ability to do much besides take that particular test.</p>