[ED] Carnegie Mellon School of Comp. Sci. Chances?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

SAT (Will retake on October 6th):
Reading - 630
Math - 720
Writing - 590

SAT II:
Math Level 2 - 800
US History - 670 (probably will not send)

Chemistry - 760

GPA: 3.82
WGPA: 4.51

APs:
AP Chemistry (4)
AP US Histroy (3, not my proudest)
No other options available junior year or before (currently taking AP Calc BC, AP Physics C, and AP Lit)

Recs:

I have my APUSH teacher and my Pre-calc teacher (junior year, also one of the coordinators for the Math Team).

EC:

Out-of-school:

Violin 1 Seat 2 of local youth orchestra

All-New England 2nd Violinist (freshman, sophomore)
All-New England 1st Violinist (junior)
Southern Regional Violinist (2013-15)

2013 - 2014 summer - Food Pantry - CTY (writing class)
2014 - 2015 summer

  • Yale Young Scholars (Biostat lectures, learned R [used in stats], lunch lectures with professionals in field)
  • Worked at middle school as janitor (no idea if I should put this, probably not?)

2013 - current

  • Head artist of small online game project - worked along with programmers, learned from programmers

2014 - current

  • Head artist of small online game project - worked with programmers on rendering graphics

2015 summer - current

  • Designer of fighting game with two friends in same grade

In-School:

  • Captain of Math Team (monthly meets against schools in southern region of the state, yearly state-wide competition, second best team in CT for school size)
  • Cofounder of e-sports team - Captain of Starcraft II division of the team
  • Technology Student association member (1st place and 2nd place finishes in a few competitions)
  • Java and Blender teacher for computer club (2013-current)
  • Junior Varsity Fencer - top 64 in southern region - have had good streaks (defeated captains and have gone without a loss in meets)
  • Track and Field - 100m sprinter and discus thrower
2

I forgot… I’m also taking AP Macroeconomics.

3

Isn’t their acceptance rate less than 5% for computer science?

Sorry your chances realistically are 1-2%

And the 25th percentile for that program is 2260…

It’s a tremendous program but probably a very high reach for you

4

Apply and find out! No one on CC can tell you an accurate chance since college admissions are getting harder and harder by the year.

It would be a plus if you have significant programming experience but I know someone who didn’t program at all and still got into CMU CS. So don’t stress it! I wish you the best of luck. :slight_smile:

5

@ClarinetDad16 Oh god… Yeah… My SAT score isn’t that well, but I should do better on the SAT this time around. Should…

@StanfordSwag :smiley: I have a lot of programming experience with Java and C#. Just recently I’ve had to work with a lot of Lua because of the first game project.

6

You mentioned that you are captain of the math team, but how have you performed on math contests such as the AMC and the AIME? To be competitive, you absolutely need to get your SAT up. Realistically speaking, a 1940 isn’t going to cut it for most top tier schools.

7

@givemethtcheese I didn’t do too well. I don’t actually remember in terms of the AMC. I know I didn’t get to AIME. It was just last year. Nobody in my school got into AIME. And yes, I know about the SAT. I am confident that I will get my math score up to 800. I’m not sure about the reading and writing. I’ve already finished the SAT Reading and Writing Bibles. I feel prepared. But I don’t actually know how well I’ll be able to do on the actual test.