If you’re interested in doing research, apply HEOP to Hamilton, Vassar, Skidmore. The professors there do high level research and because they’re undergraduate -focused, they involve undergrads. (at nyu i’m not sure how easy it is to know your professors, let alone work on research for them.)
If you’re a girl, look into Barnard.
The six-week transition program is very good: it helps you make friends, find resources, get used to college demands (not just academic but rather everything else !). If was set into place and made mandatory because most students wouldn’t think it applies to them since by definition they’re excellent students ; then something normal would happen, like a C on an exam or a paper, and they’d be flummoxed, ashamed, depressed. The transition program ensures that when you get that C (like all freshmen do) you know how to react and how to work through it to get to a B or an A, from knowing what you’re supposed to do about it with the professor, to who you’re supposed to reach out to, to asking the right questions vs. “not knowing what you don’t know”.