Female applying to engineering - chance?

Hi all I was wondering roughly what my chances of getting into Cornell engineering is for RD and ED. Cornell is one of my top choices, but I don’t know if I want to commit to ED at this point unless my chances are low for RD. My other dream schools are more selective than Cornell so if my chances are low for Cornell RD then I probably don’t have a shot at those either, and I may apply ED.

SAT: 2290
GPA: 4.0 unweighted, 4.73 weighted
Rank: somewhere between top 5-7%
(Took the most challenging courses, but our ranking system is a bit weird)
Public school

EC: lots of leadership… president of math club and science bowl team, both successful (top 3 in respective competitions at regional/state level) A few other positions in other clubs
Volunteering: scattered volunteering between 9-10th grade. Started volunteering for an organization consistently starting 11th grade and am now the head of a small student program (11 people)
Awards: nothing significant. A few regional awards in math and science. I did decently in AMC and AIME (combined score of around 180)

Asian female
Fairly low income (Would that help or hurt? And how would I even show that on my application if that’s not the topic of my common app essay?)
Essays and recommendations will probably be OK, but not amazing.

Overall I feel like on application I am the typical STEM-nerd asian, minus being good at music, having national awards, and being involved in significant research… With average recommendations and average ranking, I don’t think I will attract any attention from admissions. I think a plus that I may have going for me though is leadership. What are you guys’ opinions?

Here’s the thing…on paper you look great. But so do 500,000 other people. Did you know that Stanford turned away 650 applicants last year who had perfect GPAs and 1600 SATs?

What you didn’t indicate was whether or not you visited Cornell and spent any time poking around on campus. Everything I have ever heard about the most selective schools is they want strong proof of interest. That doesn’t mean just signing up for their endless emails. It means investing the time to go there, talk to professors and/or students, and them regurgitate back in your essays why you think Cornell is the best fit for you. They will smell a generic essay 1000 miles away. They get boilerplate narratives with the “insert college name here” template all the time and its an immediate turnoff. At least it would be for me.

So, regardless of your cultural background, grades, test scores and extracurriculars, can you answer the question definitively “what will you do for Cornell?” Or are you just pushing a dozen applications out there hoping some school will just randomly choose your profile from the thousands of other applicants who look EXACTLY like you?

You have great credentials. But what are you going to do to stand out? You don’t have to “attract their attention” with your statistics. It’s time to get creative with your story. They have literally read everything. Give them something new.

Good luck.

Your essay just can’t be ok. It has to be great. Being Asian you are just held to a higher standard; it is what it is. But I agree with above poster. You need to stand out. Does being “fairly low income”(this could mean entirely different things) work into your personal story? What are your match and safety school choices?

I did not have the opportunity/resources to visit Cornell yet. I really do like the school though and it is definitely not just an application I’m sending out randomly - it is one of my top 3 choices and I am seriously considering applying ED. When I said that the essay will be OK, I was mainly referring to the common app one since I’m not the greatest writer. Obviously I am trying to remedy that. As for recommendations, I’m sure the teachers I asked like me decently at least, but I have no reason to believe that they will give me a super amazing recommendation so the best I can say is that they will probably be above average. Thank you for your input though and I will try to focus on the personal aspects of the application.

Being low income is not my essay topic. Will the fact that I applied for fee waiver show my financial situation? I am applying to my state school as safety and a few schools like RPI as match.

Also I thought Cornell did not consider demonstrated interest?

Cornell is need blind, meaning that your financial situation is not relevant to admissions. The only way your financial circumstances would come into play is if they have been so impactful on your life as to truly warrant being the subject of a personal essay.

That said, you have strong credentials. As a prospective female engineer, do not underestimate your chances of admission. Best of luck! And let us know how it turns out!

And you are correct, Cornell does not track demonstrated interest as a factor in admissions.

What are your dream schools that you alluded to? Maybe you should apply early to one of them and RD to Cornell.

My dream school is MIT, but Cornell is also very high up on my list. I considered applying ED to Cornell because it will increase my chances significantly while MIT is a super reach in both EA and RD. If my chances for Cornell RD is good though then I will probably apply MIT early and Cornell RD.