Do I stand a good chance? or is it out of reach?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Vanderbilt University
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<p>White male. Tennessee private catholic school- Recently awarded a Top 50 national catholic high school award. top 10% of class. UWGPA 3.85 WGPA 4.15. ACT: Composite 32, math 34, English 28 (have a 32 for this subject on a composite score 31 test), reading 32, science 32. Almost completely straight A's with only 3 B's or so. AP's include AP Chemistry (5 on exam), AP Biology(not taken yet), and AP US History(4 on exam). Dual Enrollment English, and pre calc. All other classes are honors.</p>

<p>Varsity Cross country- Captain, 1 year
Varsity Crew rower.(3 years)
Symphony member, (Have been a cellist for 9 years).
Eagle Scout - I heard colleges look very favorably at this?
Theater- 2 years in 3 different performances,
In the national honor society, as well as Mu Alpha Theta- the math honor society.
100+ hours of community service.
Member of student government (Committee Chairman)
Member of student enhancement committee- a fund raising committee.
Was just elected "senior captain". We operate on a 4 house system, with students from each grade broken into them. I am in charge of mine. So essentially 1 of 4 co-presidents of the entire school.
Model United Nation 1 year
School spirit club, 3 years, captain 1 year
Some School tutoring in AP Chemistry and English.
received American citizenship award- for students with exceptional leadership and academics.
received school awards for Honors physics, Spanish, and honors English as well.</p>

<p>Can get great letters of recommendation from science teachers.</p>

<p>I also spent 5 weeks at the Tennessee Governor's School for Humanities- was very competitive for admissions. Spent 5 weeks at a university of tennessee campus taking college courses, completely paid for by the state. I got A's in both my classes. This is one of my common app essays. I figured being a prospective engineer showing he can also have an English side would look good.</p>

<p>I also attended the American Legion's Boys State school for a free 1 week camp this summer. It focused on leadership, citizenship, and the government. It's the number one boys state program in the nation.</p>

<p>Essays on common app are pretty solid. </p>

<p>Interested in Chemical Engineering.
I am also considering army ROTC. Would this influence my admissions chances?</p>

<p>I understand it's a reach and I know that if I bump up my ACT to a 33, etc. i will have a better shot, but my question is what are my chances right now with these stats? high match, low reach, far reach? what? 50/50 shot? 20% shot? </p>

<p>Thanks for all the help!</p>

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<p>Daughter is a Jr there studying Engineering. She was 1 point lower on her ACT (31) and a little higher on her GPA. Her activities, like yours, look impossible to us mere mortals. She was very late doing visits and at the time she applied (Dec) Vandy was not her first choice. She ended up being accepted everywhere she applied (8 other schools) except Vandy which wait-listed her. By this time (April) she had come to the conclusion that Vandy was where she wanted to be. She & I kept in constant contact with her admissions person and she ended up getting accepted in mid-May. It was quite stressful but it’s been a great experience and she’s excelled there.</p>

<p>In hindsight, the mistake we made was a) Not recognizing earlier in the process that Vandy was choice #1 and b) not building a strong relationship with the admissions person assigned to her high school earlier in the process. I firmly believe that had she communicated that “Vandy is my #1 choice and if accepted I am 100% coming to school there”, my daughter would have been accepted in the first round.</p>

<p>That being said, I know other kids with better grades, similar activities, and even parents who were alumni (sometimes multi-generations) who were not accepted. They don’t seem to like to take too many kids from the same HS (or state for that matter) so you’re somewhat at the mercy of the application pool as to whom you’re competing against.</p>

<p>Good luck … you’ve got great opportunities ahead of you wherever you end up!</p>