I am an asian senior in CT interested in majoring in computer science. My top choice is Duke, at their Trinity College of Arts and Sciences.
Here are the important stats
UW : 3.82
W : 5.0
1550/1600 on the New SAT
AP Scholar with distinction
National Meri Semi-Finalist
National Honors Society
5 on computer science a freshman year, 5 on calculus sophomore year
13 APs including senior year :
AP CS A and AP Human Geo Freshman Year
AP stats AP calc BC AP world history sophomore year
Ap Chem Ap physics 1 AP english lang and AP USH junior year
AP Physics C, AP US Gov, AP English Lit, and AP Micro senior year
ECs : Marching Band (High Commitment), Varsity Tennis (High Commitment), Co-Captain of my Math Team (Consistently High Scorer, 3 time AIME Qualifier), Piano (10 years, Many awards), Captain and Founder of my science bowl team, Junior Achievement (Company of the Year, VP of Finance), Debate Team
Internship at high-level computer science company (since freshman year) for Javascript and HTML experience. Worked on a project to help those in failing schools in my district.
Based on this, what do you guys think my chances are looking like?
Any other suggestions for where to applying ED?
What suggestions do you have that could improve my application?
Thanks you for taking the time to reas and comment :)!!
@sgopal2 Will applying regular decision decrease my chances significantly? What other extra curriculars would have made me stand out more? Thanks again for replying!!
@pjames3, I think you’re a fairly strong applicant, but your demographics are tough. Your academics, curricular rigor and test scores are fine. Your ECs are reasonably solid, though not distinctive. Essays and recommendations will be key, along with how you present yourself. Why Duke? What can you bring to the Duke community? What matters to you? These are important questions. Crafting a coherent narrative will be important. ED obviously improves your chances, but you are still a fairly strong applicant for RD - but again, your demographics don’t help.
Yeah, not gonna lie; being an Asian male applying to Duke is difficult, even in the ED round. I had a look at my reader scores (the scores the admissions officers give your application based on 6 categories: Curriculum, academics, recommendations, essays, extracurriculars, and test scores), and they were all 4s or 3s (out of a scale of 5), even though I had pretty strong stats (2350 SATs, ranked top 10 in competitive public high school). In hindsight it probably must have been my essays that tipped the scales in my favor.
@idoc97 Thanks for the insight. Is there anything in particular that made your essay strong? And are there any examples you have of how I could explain that i am a fit for duke?
@ldoc97 is right. Very few students gets 5s across the board. Getting 4s and 3s is not uncommon.
ED will help boost your chances by at least 2 fold (from 10% to 26%). Unlike other top schools Duke gives an edge to students in the ED round. See here for more details
@DramaIce well actually they send the documents electronically to you. They used to include the reader comments by the admissions officers along with a summary of why they accepted you, but they now censor them but some strange reason.
@ldoc97 Do you mind sharing how they score or what kind of comments they made? I can’t believe a 2350 doesn’t get you a 5. Do I have any chance then as an Asian male with a 2190(converted from new SAT)?
@class0f2017 I’m sure there is some “objective” scale they use when gauging applicants based on the numerical rating system, but from my perspective there’s a lot of other subjective factors involved, i.e the race of the applicant. Would the admissions officer given me a 5 in testing had I been Caucasian?..Probably yea, but the 750 I got in math probably downgraded me; no matter what the admissions office tells you, being Asian puts you at a severe disadvantage. Duke is approaching 30% Asian enrollment in its undergraduate colleges, with the number of Asian American undergraduates remaining relatively unchanging over the last last few years, but the number of Asian international students gradually growing (which is a win for Duke since they can boast on how “diverse” they are while not spending any more money on financial aid). I heard that you need about a 45/60 admissions score in order for your application to remain “competitive” in the admissions office.
@idoc97 What was your major? I’m thinking Econ. I think it might be easier in the college of arts and sciences rather than engineering which usually has an even higher Asian population. Still though a 2350 being a 4 is just insane.
@class0f2017 I applied to Trinity and wrote on my application that I wanted to be a political science major at Duke, although I have yet to declare my major yet (I still have until my sophomore spring to decide). Economics is one of the most popular majors at Duke (thanks to the lure of Wall Street and Goldman Sachs) so I’m guessing that it will still be extremely competitive for you.
One of my professors at Duke I had for FOCUS who is an expert on a college admissions best summed it up one time when I went to his office hours:
When millions of Irish immigrants entered into the United States in the mid 18th century, the slogan by many Nativist employers was NINA (No Irish Need Apply); in the age of 21st century college admissions the slogan has become NANA (No Asians Need Apply).
@ldoc97: the scoring system for Duke admissions has been detailed in Rachel Toor’s book. Here is a brief snapshot:
6 items are rated from 1-5: HS curriculum, achievement, recommendations, essays, ECs and test scores. The test scores are not really rated, but done by simply dividing up the applicant pool into quintiles. The top 20% of scores gets a 5, second 20% gets a 4, etc.
For trinity each reader gives a score between 6-30. These two are summed for a max total score of 60. For Pratt, things are done a bit differently. The curriculum and achievement scores are doubled, and then the test scores are tripled. So the max score at Pratt is 100. Rachel Toor also wrote about an ‘auto-deny’ and ‘auto-admit’ threshold in her book. I think the auto-deny threshold for Trinity is about 45, and for Pratt it is about 65.
So I’m definitely surprised that you didn’t get a 5 for the test scores. A 2350 score is simply about as high as you can get. Its hard to believe that 20% of Duke students had even higher scores than that. They may have simply made an error when tabulating.
Did they send you an email with the screenshots? or did you have to go in person to admissions and review it?
@sgopal2 They sent my the documents electronically through my Duke email along with the names of the admissions officers who read your application. Oddly enough, Ms. Susan Semonite Waters was listed as my reader in both instances. Perhaps she had seen too many other Asian applicants with perfect 2400s before reading my application, and decided that my 2350 wasn’t deserving of a 5 and gave me a 4 both times she read my application. Who knows, the admissions process is a mysterious game…
All together my readers score was a 47/60, which is above the threshold but still too close for comfort in my opinion. Had I been a Caucasian applicant, I’m sure my reader scores would have been higher, but such is the fate of the Asian applicant these days.