<p>I go to one of the best private hs's in Los Angeles and, as you would expect, there are lots of really smart people there. My graduating class of 310 students has the highest average GPA in over 5 years, and i'm ranked 25 in my class with a weighted 4.3 GPA. I took 4 honors classes sophomore year, and 3 AP's and 1 honors junior year (APUSH, AP Chem, AP Eng Lang&Comp), and now i'm taking 5 AP's my senior year (AP Physics C mechanics, APES, AP Art History, AP Calc Bc, AP Eng Lit.). I scored a 5 on all 3 AP's I took junior year, and my SAT score will probably be around 2200 when I take it this fall, and I have a 750 on USH and 760 on chem SAT subject tests. Even though I may have gotten several B+'s and even one B (sophomore honors english), I have proven with SAT's and AP tests that I am competent at reading/writing.</p>
<p>My question is, what kind of a chance do I have at getting into Dartmouth/Stanford/Northwestern/Notre Dame? I feel like I definitely deserve to go to any of those schools with the difficulty of the classes and teachers I have had the last couple years, but I am interested to see how I rate against others...</p>
<p>Let's say about 10000 other kids with same stats as you applied to those schools. Yes you may deserve to get in but they also deserve to get in. It comes down to a matter of luck sometimes. Your chances are equally good (or equally low, whichever way you see it) when applying to super competitive colleges.</p>
<p>It'll depend a lot on your essays and ECs. From what I can tell, you're not a super academic applicant, so you'll need strong ECs and essays like everyone else.</p>
<p>"Deserve" has nothing to do with it, so you need to let that attitude of entitlement go. You have the same statistical chances as any of the the thousands of qualified applicants applying this year: approx 1 in 10 to Stanford, slightly better at Dartmouth, Northwestern accepts 20% of applicants. Your best "chance so far looks to be at Notre Dame.</p>
<p>Thanks for the feedback. I hope I can prove through my essays and EC's my desire to go to dartmouth as well as my personal qualities, which I think may help me separate myself.</p>
<p>If any of you guys know any (specific) characteristics of people who typically get accepted at Dartmouth, I would really love to hear about them. Thanks again.</p>