White Male, NC, Pre-Medicine (chemistry but interested in a pharmacology focus), Legacy, Applied ED. I attend by far the best school in my area we send a lot of kids to UNC-CH and have sent a handful of kids to Princeton/Harvard/Cornell over the past 10 years, we are still a public school though.
Stats:
-ACT: 34C(34E,35M,35R,32S)
-SAT 2: 800 Math 2
-GPA: 3.95UW, (1 B in freshman English) but also dual enrolled (doesn’t show in GPA) I got A’s in College Physics 1 Lecture+Lab and I am taking Calc 3 and College Physics 2 Lecture+Lab. I transferred schools and didn’t have access to APs/Honors at my old school, so my weighted isn’t important.
-First quarter grade report was straight A’s.
-AP Scores: Calc AB (subscore) - 4, Calc BC - 3, Lang - 3, Lit - Taking this year, Chem - Taking this year.
ECs:
-Published research at the university I am dual enrolled at. I already have a poster published, but my mentor and I are working on a full-blown paper that will be published in early 2019. The research is on polymer solar cells and uses a ton of chemistry/materials science.
-Stepbrother has a significant disability and cannot walk/talk. Throughout high school, I have volunteered at a lot of events that are run in the disabled community.
-I shadow surgeons at a local hospital and have watched several heart surgeries/neurosurgeries.
-I tutor during the week through Mu Alpha Theta/Math Team.
-Varsity Science Olympiad for 3 years, competing in Genetics, Boomilever, and Astronomy events. I also mentor a JV member who has autism.
-Math Team
Recs/Interview:
-Got a rec from my AP Lang teacher who liked me a lot, definetely a good rec.
-Got a rec from my College Physics 1 professor who also liked me, I don’t know if it will be as strong as my AP Lang one, but since it’s a professor I would think it would be good.
-Got a rec from my research mentor who is a physics teacher. He likes me a lot and wants me to get into at least one of my reaches.
-Got a rec from my tutor who is in the Army, taught at Westpoint, and has a degree from MIT. I viewed it, and it was a very good rec.
-The interview went very well, and she said that she would give me the best rec she can. She said that if Duke didn’t accept me that they would be missing out.
Essays:
-Wrote my CommonApp essay about growing up living with Brazillian au-pairs after my father’s death when I was young. It’s a solid essay, but I don’t know it’s not the best essay I’ve ever written. Although I am my own worst critic a lot of times.
-Wrote my WhyDuke essay about how when I was in middle school some Duke MechE students made a machine that would rotate a painting canvas for my stepbrother so he could paint much easier. Definetely one of my favorite supps I have written.
-I also wrote the Diversity essay. I talked about how growing up with Brazillian au-pairs, a British mother, and living throughout the US (seriously I moved from NC to CA to a town of 6k in the midwest) has changed my perspective. It’s a good supp.
Overall: I think that I have a very good shot of getting in due to my research/volunteering, legacy, good academics, and interesting essay topics. I know that AP scores aren’t a major part of admissions and since my academics are otherwise good I don’t expect them to drag me down too much. Though I worry that for Duke Pre-Med I am not nearly as competitive as I think I am. I am also applying to MIT/UChicago, but I do not at all expect to get into those schools due to not having a legacy/ED boost.