<p>I come from one of the poorest counties in America.</p>
<p>Despite being one of the poorest counties, I come from a well-off family that just so happens to live in such an area because of my fathers work. The high schools are decent, at most, the AP program is horrific, and there aren't many courses that offer me the challenging course work I deserve to prepare me for the ACT/SAT. </p>
<p>Despite all this I managed to pull off 5's in some APs and I'm ranked 3rd in the state for high school mathematics. I also got a 31 on my ACT and a 1920 on my SAT, both of which I plan to improve in September/October, which subject tests in November. </p>
<p>I'm not looking for excuses such as I don't have the luxuries as many others to achieve better scores and whatnot, but I've been told that based on where you live, these universities set different standards and expect different score ranges. Such as a 31 in my area is probably above average to the highest degree (the average being a 15), but in a New York area (used to live there) it would be considered above average, but not by much. Is this at all true?</p>
<p>Those aren’t terribly competitive standardized test scores for this level of college. You will be judged in accordance with the opportunities you have had but if one or both of your parents are college educated, then I don’t see how much leeway you will be given in that your family is “well-off” and presumably you had other opportunities. Rather than bemoan the fact that you feel you have not had many courses that offer [you] challenging coursework you deserve, why don’t you take advantage of non-school academic opportunities or self study to show the admissions office what you did to create opportunities for yourself. Assuming you are a senior, there were tons of academic summer programs you could have done in high school especially if your family is “well-off”. An elite college might wonder if you would make use of its vast resources if you lacked initiative to use all available resources to challenge yourself academically prior to matriculation. If your recommendations said you were the most talented and finest graduate the writer had seen in decades/career, that might put you in better perspective for the admissions committee if your achievement is so far outside of the community norms.</p>
<p>Geographic diversity is not county by county, but by region like, northeast, mid-atlantic, south, midwest, west. You are in the northeast, which Yale has plenty of. </p>
<p>My guess is you do not come from one of the poorest counties in America given the conditions you describe. It may be a poor county, but having actually lived in one of the top 20 poorest counties in America (though not any more), I can tell you that people tend to look at their own county and if it isn’t beverly hills, then they are “less privileged.”</p>
<p>It’s a little more nuanced than that. A student from a sparsely populated state like Wyoming contributes to a school’s geographic diversity. One from Denver, Colorado doesn’t, even though Colorado is in the west, and directly contiguous to Wyoming. Similarly, a student from a private prep school in Jackson, Mississippi won’t get a geographic diversity boost, but one from rural Mississippi will. </p>
<p>OP: You have posted that you are from an affluent family and that one of your parents is a physician. Despite the limited opportunities available at your high school, your application will likely be evaluated according to a different standard than an application from a typical student attending your high school. It’s good that you have gone beyond your high school’s mediocre curriculum to take college classes. Try to improve your SAT.</p>
<p>…and there aren’t many courses that offer me the challenging course work I deserve to prepare me for the ACT/SAT. </p>
<p>I think it is great and important that you are doing those college courses but then I wonder why you say you are lacking course work to prepare you for college entrance examinations. I trust that you have many A’s in the local college work and you probably should work to improve your SAT since unfortunately I agree that your circumstances are not going to cover for lackluster scores.</p>
<p>I’m not looking for excuses such as I don’t have the luxuries as many others to achieve better scores and whatnot…</p>
<p>In fact it sounds like you do have the luxury to achieve better scores since your classmates need minimum wage summer jobs to pay for basic expenses and community college fees while you have the opportunity for more academic pursuits.</p>
<p>Keep taking the most challenging course work you can find and “suggest” to one or more of your teachers who are writing letters that they mention how you so exceeded the opportuinities at your high school that you have been supplementing them with all this college work.</p>
<p>Thank you for all the responses, they are helping a lot. </p>
<p>Also, Orange, I wouldn’t say I’m from one of the poorest counties if I didn’t look up the statistic. I’m taking the SAT this October, my ACT this September and 2 subject tests in November. I’m hoping for a 33+ on the ACT, an 800 on the Math 2 subject test, and I’m not quite sure what the other one I’m taking is, although I’m considering physics. I don’t know if it would be beneficial to send in my SAT score if it doesn’t exceed 2100+, despite the fact that one of my best friends scored a 2080 and was accepted at Yale.</p>
<p>Question: So I live in semi-rural above average village in WI. I’m guessing that that doesn’t really pose any geographical benefit to me, but I was looking at it and each year, from our area (I am well connected with other schools in the surrounding area) we only have 10 or so kids apply anywhere outside of the Midwest. Pretty much 95% of all the kids in our area apply to Madison or something else in the UW system. Would I then have any sort of geographical advantage?</p>
<p>Also, I’m not trying to make up for less than stellar stats or anything, we have plenty of opportunity in the area. I was looking at it from a lack of representation from WI.</p>
<p>Wisconsin is not an underrepresented state. The fact that most of your peers choose to apply to the excellent public flagship will probably not help you out. Colleges value geographical diversity because it’s often associated with diversity of life experience. A kid from a sparsely populated state like Wyoming brings an unusual set of life experiences to campus, experiences that an applicant from an “above average village” in Wisconsin probably can’t match. (I’m speaking only of geographic diversity here; you may well bring a bunch of interesting life experiences to the table, just not experiences based on where you live.)</p>