Final Chance Me

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Major: neuroscience, neurobiology, if not offered biochemistry

Sat: 1540
Sat II:
800 chem
770 math 2
780 physics
770 literature (not sending, just did it to force myself to improve my skills)

Honors/AP Classes:
H English - 11
H Bio- 11
H History- 11
Apah- 11

GPA:
W GPA: 3.7 (upwards trend…but yea its bad. screwed up freshman year so no honors freshman year and sophomore year. My school has strict pre reqs and teacher recs are useless and looked down upon, so freshman year is messed up in all cp (my grandpa became a heart patient and his heart was basically dead and my parents were working to pay of the medical bills and I had to prioritize my siblings and their hw/test over mine- not having gc write about this because theres people in worse situations who did better), sophomore year is all A in cp classes, Junior year is honors and one AP, Senior year is all 2 honors and 4 ap +gym and lunch )
UW GPA: 3.56

Senior Year Classes:
ap chemistry
ap biology/research
ap psychology
calculus H or bc calc
gym
lunch
ap English
senior internship at the hospital (a program through my school)

ECs:
-Pre-med (9-12) president- under my leadership we raised enough money to restore the vision of 5 people in underdeveloped countries
-Founder and president of science research club(11-12) - we have a website, student conduct their own experiments and write professional research papers
-science league
-Worked with a charity to raise money to pay for 5-10 children’s education for a year in Africa (they organization decides which country) (the cost per child was 120; i tried my best, I know the number is small)
-Internship/shadowing with surgeons (neurosurgeon and plastic surgeon)
-Tutoring a child with dyslexia in English

Demographics
Asian, Female
No hook
lower middle class
will apply for fa
North NJ
Parents are not fluent in English (I’m kind of in this alone since none of us know what we are doing)

Schools that I know for sure I am applying to after visiting, searching, meeting people, etc. (let me know if I should add or remove any)

Matches:
American University
Northeastern (High match/low reach)
NYU
Lehigh
UPitt
UMass

Safeties:
Seton Hall University
Stevens IT (my school is a feeder school for them)

Reach:
Brandeis
BC
BU

Schools I am thinking about but do not know for sure if I should apply as reaches or not:
JHU
Tufts

I am open to constructive criticism and feedback and recommendations. If you have advice for the admission process I am open to that too. Thank you for reading this.

2

Bump

3

Your chances for Stevens - the best school on your list of candidates- are competitive based upon your test scores, grades, and ECs. Stevens is not a safety by the way. Admissions today have become quite competitive, as Stevens has many times the applications from excellent students (such as yourself) than seats in the freshman class. Best to you in your academic endeavors. You won’t do better than Stevens.

4

BU, BC and Northeastern are all matches.

5

Have you run the NPC on your out of state schools? Do you know what you can afford for undergrad? I am guessing from your ECs that you are considering premed. If this is true then you will want to budget for 8 years and try to avoid debt for undergrad. From what I have heard several of these schools including NYU are likely to be expensive.

U.Mass has a good premed program. JHU and Tufts look unlikely to me due to your GPA. However, the upward trend will in general help significantly, as will your SAT scores.

What is your unweighted GPA if you don’t count your freshman year at all?

6

@Engineer80 Stevens is 10 mins away from my school and my school is a feeder school for Stevens, according to naviance and my friends who got in this year and the past two years, Stevens takes kids with GPA ranging from 2.6-4.6 at my school and the average GPA of the accepted students is 3.0. I understand my chances are not guaranteed but they are pretty good considering my school sends 15-20 kids to Stevens annually

7

@DadTwoGirls I did run the NPC and for most schools, it came to about 4000-5000 and NYU was 6000, which my parents are comfortable with because I am helping to pay.

My school doesn’t do unweighted GPA, I had to calculate that my self, but without freshman year my weighted gpa would be 4.0 (predicted because junior year isn’t over yet

8

@TomSrOfBoston I was told by my friends that BC is a reach for me because their academic profile is comparable to top 10 schools and people with way higher gpa’s than me are applying from my school. Honestly, I was thinking of kicking it off the list, but then I thought what do I have to lose, my first choice is Upitt or American

9

https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/bcnews/campus-community/students/class-of-2021-profile.html
That is not the case. BC’s average stats are in line with BU and Northeastern. Admission is quirky and two students with the same profile, one will be admitted and the other will not be at all three schools.

10

@DadTwoGirls should I even consider JHU or Tufts because if those 160 dollars can be used towards my charity fundraiser or taking my family out, I’d much prefer to do that than applying somewhere I have no chance at

11

I think Lehigh would be a low reach with your GPA, especially for a pre med tract. I wouldn’t bother with JHU.

12

The average GPA of Stevens students overall is 3.8, so your GPA would be on the low end of the 25-75 percentile range, though as in many schools the admissions office would take into account other factors such as test scores, interview, and any extenuating circumstances.

13

@bbixl145 ok. Like you’re set. Don’t even worry. You have awesome test scores and though your GPA is a bit low, it is outweighed (in my opinion) by Pre-med club and the club where you paid for 5-10 children’s education in Africa (assuming all of this IS true and not over-exaggerated as many CC kids like to do). And, I wold revise your list a bit. Get rid of JHU and Tufts. No one needs them anyway : )

14

Are colleges going to mind that i only took 1 ap that has nothing to do w my major (but i have a lot of ap senior year) bc i screwed up freshman year and my school is strict on pre reqs (theres pre reqs for the ap classes that collegeboard said doesnt have a pre req like ap psych) so i couldnt take honors or ap until senior year.

15

I don’t think you would be wasting your money to try for Tufts or JHU if you are interested in them. The odds are against you - they both turn down lots of excellent students - but with good test scores, good essays, and an upward trajectory for grades, you might get lucky.

Run the NPC for all these schools first!

16

Head’s up on financial aid: the NPC is not always helpful, and is only ever an estimate- not a promise. In particular, only 9% of the students who apply for financial aid at NYU have their need fully met; the average award is $37K (COA is $72K). You could be one of the 9%/19% who have their need fully met, but the only person that I know of directly who had their need met at NYU was a superstar applicant.

As a reminder, JHU is very big on GPA- they rate it as more important than test scores.

Not having your GC note the challenges of Grade 9 on the grounds that ‘other people had worse problems and did better’ is poor reasoning. It is your job to show yourself in as strong a light as possible. A sentence from your GC along the lines of ‘OPs grades in Grade 9 reflected some difficult family circumstances, which in turn has limited OPs opportunities to take more AP classes. OPs academic strength and commitment to academics can be seen in her grade progression and achievements in advanced classes’ is appropriate.

Also, why would you not send a 770 in Lit?? It’s the same price to send all of them, and imo it adds substantially to your profile.

17

@collegemom3717 I didn’t think sending the sat litt was necessary bc it has nothing to do with my major, however if it improves my profile I will. Thank you for your advice!

18

I disagree that it will “add substantially” but I see no reason not to send; it won’t hurt, and may help a little. Those are all great scores.

19

Maybe not “substantially”- how about materially?! Balance strong STEM scores with strong English. Remember that US colleges are less focused on you ‘proving’ that you are good for your planned major- lots of students change that- they look at your whole profile.

20

You’re a very good candidate, most of the colleges on your list are matches or safeties, outside of Tufts and JHU. As you mentioned, if your HS naviance (or other scattergram tool) shows that most of applicants with your stats get into Stevens or any other college, you could consider them as safeties, but do some digging if you can on the high school/college numbers, maybe with your GC.

You may have a hook as a female applying in STEM, however your UW gpa is a little low for the more selective schools. Write about your personal situation, working to support the family is a good story, don’t blame it for your gpa, just accept responsibility for that. I would add RPI as a match, remove JHU as others have said, maybe add another reach or two to Tufts - Cornell, CMU, and if any of your reaches are without question your first choice, you can apply ED as that will help. Good luck!