Do I have any shot at getting in?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cornell University
1

<p>Due to my class rank I've been told by a college counselor that my chances of getting in are about 15%. However, he told me that because of my school's reputation they get a lot of kids with class rank around mine into very good schools. </p>

<p>I go to a public school in Illinois consistently ranked as among the best in the midwest, and a top 100 school in the nation.</p>

<p>Colleges some of our most recent graduating class will be attending:</p>

<p>20 Ivy League (3 Harvard, 2 Yale, 4 Brown, 6 Dartmouth, 3 Penn, 2 Cornell)
3 Stanford
7 Duke
4 Georgetown
20 Northwestern
8 Washington-St. Louis
10 Chicago
7 Notre Dame
3 Vanderbilt
1 Emory
1 UC-Berkeley
2 Wake Forest
2 Tufts
8 Michigan</p>

<p>Our GPA system:</p>

<p>6- A in AP class
5- B in AP class or A in regular class
4- C in AP class or B in regular class
3- C in regular class
2- D in any class
1- F in any class</p>

<p>My information:</p>

<p>Male, Caucasian
GPA: 4.9
SAT: 2060 (740 Verbal, 640 Math, 680 Writing)----I've taken it once
ACT w/ writing: 31
SAT Subject Tests: Will be taking soon
Class Rank: 175 out of 620 (Top 28%)
Classes: Have taken 4 AP classes so far, will have taken 10 by the time I graduate. I have also taken 3 honors courses. I have one of the most, if not the most, difficult schedules in the school.</p>

<p>EC's:</p>

<p>Editor on an award-winning newspaper staff
Volunteer Work
Library Page</p>

<p>I expect to do well on my essays. An AP Lit teacher told me that I was the best writer she'd ever had in her 12 years of teaching. I also expect that my recommendations will be solid because the teachers I will be getting them from have known me for 3 years.</p>

<p>I don't have any alumni connections. My dad almost went to Cornell but chose UC-Berkeley over it. :-(</p>

<p>The kid who was ranked #175 last year ended up at the University of Chicago. A friend of mine got into Cornell regular admission for the class of 2009 with a similar record, but he got a 1550 on the SAT. He ended up going to Duke. </p>

<p>My counselor thinks I'll end up at either Northwestern, Chicago, Tufts, Carnegie Mellon, Michigan, NYU, Carleton, or Boston U. He said Chicago & Carnegie Mellon are the most likely.</p>

<p>If I apply ED, do I have a chance? Am I better off applying regular decision because my grades will likely go up? (With the schedule I have next year, if I pull a B in every class I'd get a 5.0. I'm expecting a 5.4 though.) Am I so unlikely to get in that I shouldn't apply at all? </p>

<p>Please respond.</p>

2

<p>I don't think this will make any difference, but I won the "Most Talented Writer" award at a workshop at Ball State University where students from across the midwest come in for a weeklong workshop and write articles.</p>

3

<p>I think your counselor's estimate was accurate</p>

4

<p>Hey I'm really curious as to what highschool you go to. I am from Illinois as well (South Suburbs of Chicago) and I just wanted to know which highschool you were coming from....you can pm me if you don't want to put all of your business out there.</p>

5

<p>Cornell will recalculate your GPA, unweighted. Recalculate according to this and get back to us.</p>

<p>A=4, B=3, C=2, etc. "+" gives the grade +0.3 except with A. "-" has the opposite effect. Examples: "A+"=4.0, "B-"=2.7</p>

<p>Ignore the fact that AP classes are harder. You'll get credit for your hard work when they look at your courseload/selection. Weighting GPAs would give some students a double boost, so colleges just do it seperately.</p>

<p>I'd say your GPA is probably around a mid 3, but lets hear what it actually is.</p>

<p>It's true that very competitive schools are forgiven for rank "deficiencies".</p>

<p>How many students at your school? #175 at my school would be in the bottom half, but at some schools thats in the top 5%.</p>

6

<p>i think you still have a decent chance! What college at cornell are you applying to? bit of advice:
1. DEFINITELY APPLY ED! this will show them that cornell is your first choice and will up your chances
2. write some killer essays.
3. get your SAT IIs way up there</p>

<p>they might not care too much about a bad rank if its really that well known</p>

7

<p>man your gpa system is wacked.
if we had a gpa system like that wow....
what makes your school a top 100? Please don't go by that guy's AP index thing.. he came to our school to give a talk last year(harvard shmarvard guy..) and he is stupid.</p>

<p>he doesn't even rank our school because its 'magnet' but in his words, 'this school is the best in the nation no doubt'... but then he doesnt rank us.. stupid guy</p>

8

<p>I haven't calculated the unweighted GPA yet, but I imagine it's around 3.4.</p>

<p>My counselor showed me a bunch of different lists ranking us in the top 100. The only one we weren't in the top 100 was Newsweek, who just goes by how many students take AP classes. I think Newsweek ranked us around 150 overall, 2nd in Illinois, and 5th in the midwest or something along those lines. </p>

<p>My school is pretty picky about who does and doesn't go into AP classes; if they don't think you'll be able to get at least a 4 on the AP test they usually won't let you take the class (With the exception of the history classes). That's probably why we are around 150 instead of the top 100. He said many schools in Newsweek top 100 strongly encourage everyone to take AP classes now matter how ill-prepared they are for them because they want to do well in the rankings.</p>

<p>My school has around 2,500 students. It's getting pretty ridiculous; about half the kids I know live over 40 minutes away from the school and they're 20 other schools closer to their homes than here but they always find ways to let the school take them in. </p>

<p>They all say their parents make them go here because they've been told the school will help them get into a good college. If your in the top 50% I'd say it helps, but if you aren't your better off going somewhere else. My brother, who is a year younger than me, is on the honor roll with a weighted GPA of 4.1 and his class rank is something like 570 out of 760</p>

<p>I'm planning on going into law school after graduation. Most people have told me it doesn't matter what I major in if I'm going into law school, while some people have recommended I major in whatever area of law I'm interested in. I'm currently leaning toward majoring in Economics, possibly double-majoring in something else. I believe Economics is in the school of arts & sciences.</p>

<p>If I apply, it's going to probably be ED.</p>

9

<p>If your school sends that many kids to such a range of elite schools, I'd bet any money that your counselor knows damn well what he is talking about. And I agree with him. That's all I'm going to say.</p>

10

<p>fantosme: Uh huh.. well just be glad there are ppl in tougher situations.. i go to a school that is ranked #1 in the country/world by many sources including: MIT, Director at NIH, SAT Average(1482 old), AP averages on like 12 different tests, most students sent to RSI etc etc..</p>

<p>The point is.. 3.4 at my school would definately take you out of the running for Cornell. Not that people with 3.4's can't get in to Cornell.. its just that at a school like ours and mine.. there are enough ppl applying to Cornell that they need to almost put a cap(limit) on how many they take.. to diversify. Don't believe me? The MIT admissions director puts my school(TJ) on the list of places to visit every fall. They always say they want to take more from our school, but because of diversification(taking kids from otehr areas.. other schools in our area), they cannot. Even though 10 people are attending MIT from my school from this last year's admissions, if the school had less people applying to MIT, the people who got rejected might have gotten accepted. </p>

<p>This happens everywhere. The only exception is our state school, UVA. They are happy to take most of the kids that apply because they believe everyone who deserves a spot should get in(regardless of school). Over 1/4 of our 2005 class, out of 412 students, will be attending UVA this September.</p>

<p>Your counselor knows what he is talking about.. It's called internal competition with other students in your school. Basically, if Cornell normally takes 8-10 people from your school every year, try to figure out if you fall in the top 10-15 people among your peers who are also applying to Cornell.</p>

11

<p>I never said I expected to get into Cornell, I said right from the get go my counselor said I had a 15% chance. </p>

<p>The whole purpose of this thread was to determine whether or not I should take a shot at Cornell ED, or whether I should be more realistic and apply ED to Chicago where my counselor thinks I'll end up.</p>

12

<p>ask around, do some research, find out what other kids are applying to cornell ED. We had 4/4 accepted ED and 0/"however many else" accepted RD. From a top 20 university feeder school like yours ED can be very invaluable, as schools want to know they're the top choice. Say they have a quota of 8. They might want to accept 7 ED if the students are above average in the applicant pool. They might sacrafice a kid who is even better who just wanted not to be tied down, but who cares, as the applicants are still bringing up their averages. Thats what happened at my school I think. We had a senior class of 268 at a non-magnet, public school with a relatively unachieving 10% minority population. 30% of the class is going ivy...you get the point.</p>

13

<p>I go to Walton HS in GA. Newsweek ranked it around 130 last time I checked. Weird huh? I mean, it's Georgia, the stupid state :(</p>

14

<p>I'm from Illinois what high school do you go to?</p>

15

<p>you can apply ED to cornell and EA chicago at the same time, because chicago is non-binding so you are not breaking any rules... SO APPLY TO BOTH ED/EA!</p>

16

<p>Walton? Anger....</p>

17

<p>You don't like Walton?</p>

18

<p>Lol, I'm from Florida, and i distinctly remember my H.S. academic team getting our asses handed to us by y'all in more than one regional invitational tournament....</p>

19

<p>lol. Yah i agree. in the past year, we made it to nationals i believe. It's amazing. The kids on that team are ridiculously SMART. </p>

<p>Wow, that's a relief that a student from Florida has heard of Walton High School... phew i just hope adcoms will know as well.</p>

20

<p>Hey AASSDDFF, that "ridiculously smart" academic team of yours....they were on the receiving end of a raping that featured the largest margin of victory in the history of the National Academic Quizbowl Tournaments. They pretty much got beaten in a way no other team has ever been beaten before. What's even funnier is that the team that beat them was from Thomas Jefferson High School in Fairfax County, Virginia, the eventual national winners and the best school in the country/world. I didn't intend for this to be a personal shot at you, I just wanted to point out that everything is relative. You may think those kids are brilliant, but if you saw that game you may think they came from your school's special education program. Besides, that was the best game TJ ever played and Walton does actually have a very good team who will be even stronger this year. I live in Maryland and I certainly know of your school. BTW, what school do you go to perro?</p>