Cutting out schools and adding Safeties

College Search & Selection
1

I am looking at to Emory, Johns Hopkins, Notre Dame, Georgetown, UNC, Boston College, University of Washington, Washington University in St. Louis, Cornell, Northwestern, Vanderbilt. I need to cut down my list and add safeties because all of the above are high match through high reaches.

ACT: 34 (36S, 34R, 34M, 33E)
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 3.8
Weighted GPA (out of 5.0): 4.3
AP (place score in parenthesis): Biology (5), Human Geography (4), Psychology (4), Calc AB (5), APUSH (5), Language (5), Environmental Science (3) (I took it over the summer)
Senior Year Course Load: AP Calc BC, AP Chemistry, AP Lit, AP Comparative Government, Spanish Cinema
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): Duke of Edinburgh (Bronze, silver, gold), National Merit Semifinalist
Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): Started National Beta Club at my school (president, vice president, secretary), Student Body (President), shadowed a well known surgeon every summer, Soccer (Varsity 10-12), Managed different kids sports teams (10-12)
Volunteer/Community service: lots of fundraisers through National Beta Club, 400+ hours at hospital (worked in trauma for about 300 of them), Taught kids in Costa Rica (100 Hours), Dog shelter (20-30 Hours)
Summer Activities: Teaching kids in Costa Rica, Selective Research Program, Georgetown Medicine Program, Penn medicine program, shadowed a well known surgeon

Other
Intended Major: Biology; Pre-med
State (if domestic applicant): California (want to go to the east coast)
School Type: well known private school
Ethnicity: Hispanic
Gender: Male
Income Bracket: 200,00+
Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): Hispanic I guess and selective summer program

Let me know which I should cut out maybe because they aren’t even worth trying for and which safeties I should apply to.

2

For easier to get into colleges, why not a selection of UCs, including the less selective ones like UCSC, UCR, and UCM?

Note that UCR has a medical school, so it may have convenient access to pre-med extracurriculars. Some of the more selective UCs (UCSD, UCD, UCI, UCLA) also have medical schools. Being in California can also make it easier and cheaper to get to medical school interviews when you apply to UC medical schools (with lower cost than private and out-of-state medical schools).

3

I agree with ucbalumnus. I would also remove University of Washington and UNC from your list. You will get an equivalent or better education, for less, at a UC. Medical school is very expensive. It’s best to minimize the costs of your undergraduate because med school will cost 300K+.

4

What can your family afford to pay each year? Ask your parents to run the Net Price Calculator at each college/university website, and then discuss the results. Have adult beverages and a box of soft tissues handy. In that income range, you will probably be full-pay everywhere.

If you pursue merit-based aid, will what your family saves in tution/fees/etc. be put away to pay for med school?

A true safety is a place where you are flat-out guaranteed admission for your stats, and that your family can easily pay for without any aid other than standard student loans and merit-aid that particular college/university guarantees for your stats. Find ideas about that here: http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/

Your own high school guidance counselor can give you ideas about admissions safeties based on where people from your school with stats like yours have been admitted in the past few years. Whether any of them are also likely to be affordable is a whole other story.

5

This is not the way to pick safeties (asking a general question on the Internet). Get a copy of the Fiske Guide to Colleges and go through, looking for colleges where your stats are in the high range, the acceptance rate is fairly high, the description appeals to you, they are fairly strong in your major, and you can afford the school. You really should try to visit if you can. Students should start with finding mstches and safeties, not treat it as an afterthought, since the odds are high that they will end up at a match or safety. Just casually picking a couple “just in case” is a recipe for a very stressful April. Also, a lot of safeties & matches consider interest in deciding whether to accept you, and also whether to award you merit aid – so if you haven’t bothered to do that, you still might not get in.

6

For an opinion with respect to your medical school ambitions, this source lists a good sampling of colleges that may be suitable for you, some of which are among your current choices: “The Experts’ Choice: Colleges with Great Pre-med Programs.”

7

If you’re looking for safeties the CSUs are a great option. I know you said you want to go to the east coast but t you’re going to have to compromise at some point. As others have said you should also apply to the UCs.

8

Notre Dame is a reach for everyone but, as an Hispanic student who is, presumably full pay, with strong stats, you are a stronger candidate than some.

Match/safety schools for many students looking at ND often include other midwest Catholic schools, like Marquette in Milwaukee, Xavier, and University of Dayton, all three of which would likely give you merit aid – always a good thing for a student contemplating med school debt. What about Holy Cross, in Worcester, MA – D1 school, smaller student body, could be a match. A non-Catholic match/safety could include Univ Pitt – which would offer merit, I believe as well as has EA, so could have an early acceptance in hand. Appropriate UC schools, which your guidance counselor can advise you on, could be match/safeties.

I agree Univ of Washington can come off the list, just seems the outlier, an out of state public. I would think travel from CA to Cornell would be exhausting, so if I were looking for a reason to remove a school, that might be a reason – Ithaca is not accessible the way that schools up and down the Boston to DC corridor are.

9

Thank you for all the information I will for sure look into all the UC’s and cut out University of Washington and possibly cornell.

10

Here are various biology subject area rankings that may give you some ideas as you complete your list:

http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/nrc41.html#area13
http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/nrc1.html#RANKBYAREA

http://www.shanghairanking.com/FieldLIFE2015.html

http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/biological-sciences-rankings

http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/genetics-rankings

http://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/biology-biochemistry

http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/university-subject-rankings/2016/biological-sciences#sorting=rank+region=+country=+faculty=+stars=false+search=

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/2016/subject-ranking/life-sciences-0#!/page/0/length/25/country/93/sort_by/rank_label/sort_order/asc/cols/rank_only

http://nturanking.lis.ntu.edu.tw/Default.aspx
http://nturanking.lis.ntu.edu.tw/DataPage/countries.aspx?query=LifeSciences&country=USA&y=2015

Although west coast, Washington (along with the mid-tier UCs) should be a solid match and is one of the best schools on your list for your intended major, which presumably is why it was there in the first place. Check out the new Life Sciences Complex they are building: http://www.biology.washington.edu/life-sciences-complex

Biology is also a top prospective major for students in Washington’s Honors Program: http://depts.washington.edu/uwhonors/apply/freshman/faq/

However, an instate UC (many of which also appear at the top end of these rankings) would probably save you at least $8,000 to $16,000 per year for tuition, room and board, depending on whether and to what extent you receive an OOS merit scholarship from UW or any scholarships from UC.

Thus, due to its particular strength in the biological sciences and relative affordability, UW would become a good option for you if you were shut out of your preferred UCs, but with your excellent record, that is unlikely.

You should have a lot of great schools to choose from in the spring. Good luck with all of your applications.

11

I agree with @happymomof1 that you should give some thought to looking for merit aid if you want to head out of state. You family income might put you at full-pay or close. Your parents might well be reluctant to pay that if you get into a good UC, which would be a lot cheaper. With your stats and ECs, you should be able to find schools where you can good merit aid to bring the cost down to UC in-state level at least.

Also CC posters with med-school experience usually suggest to choose your undergrad schools carefully to make sure you have a good shot at getting the necessary undergrad grades so you can get into med school.

12

You seem to like interesting & well-rounded schools. I’d delete Cornell, Hopkins, & Wash U. in St. Louis. I’d add a few from this group: Miami of Ohio, Wisconsin, Virginia, Florida, Miami of Florida, Michigan.

13

My school does have problems with getting kids into UC’s. I don’t know why this is, but we typically only get 1 maybe 2 kids into a UC each year. I will be sure to apply to some, but they wouldn’t be true safeties. Money isn’t really a problem, as I have won a good amount of scholarships. My parents are willing to pay as much as is needed, but it would be nice to find a cheaper school. I will be scheduling visits with a lot more schools this summer, most of which will be safeties. Thank you all again for your information, you were all very helpful.

14

Perhaps the students at your school apply mainly at the UCs which are reaches for them, leaving out those that they have more realistic odds of getting admitted to? Also, if they tend to apply for popular majors like CS or engineering majors, then their apparent matches may really be reaches, etc…

15

Our school is well known for its ability to get kids into good colleges. My guess is maybe many of the kids at my school don’t tend to apply to in state schools. Most of the kids don’t think about prices either. They are very smart and stuck up so I would think they may be applying to popular majors and big high ranked colleges.

16

Something isn’t right…

You go to a well-known private high school, but the school as problems getting kids into UCs?? As @ucbalumnus says, maybe they’re only applying to UCLA and UCB.

Wouldn’t the top 4% of the senior class have assurances of getting into a UC?’’

If you’re serious about being premed, and Calif is miserable for that, then look to states where you can create another tie.

17

If the high school participates in the ELC program, then applicants whose UC-weighted GPAs exceed the top 9% threshold UC-weighted GPA calculated from past classes at the high school get admission to UC Merced if they get shut out of other UCs and there is space available at UC Merced.

18

My mistake I wasn’t thinking. We do have kids going to UCB. There is one going to CSUN, and I think one going to UCSC. I will try to visit UCLA, UCSD, and UCD. I have heard that those are some of the better UC’s for Biology. I also want to look into BU, Case Western, Wisconsin, and Brandeis. Could those be considered low match/high safeties?

19

I’m thinking of a school like Harvard Westlake where very few kids go to UCs. http://www.hw.com/about/School-Profile/Matriculation

Looking at where HW kids go, I’m sure that if they applied, they could have gotten into UCs. Did they apply and get rejected? Did they apply and choose not to go to a UC? Or did they look down their nose at the UCs and not apply?

We’re at an affluent public school and there are lots of people who snub the UCs as not being good enough. In the spring when kids are making choices and families compare the tuition at NYU to UCLA, the tone often changes. We also have students who apply ED to high tuition private schools and the families have no issue paying 100% full tuition.

OP, you probably need to delve further into whether or not kids from your school have a problem getting into UCs or if they chose not to apply or chose not to go to a UC.

20

UCB, UCLA, UCSD, and UCD are unlikely to be anything close to a safety. Note that biology is an impacted major at UCSD and UCD, so admission to the major may be more difficult than the campus overall, and transferring into the major after enrolling may be difficult. So if you apply to the UCs, include some of the less selective ones (UCSC, UCR, UCM) in your list as low matches / almost-safeties if you are willing to attend.