Final College List and Chance Post- Wharton ED, UC's. NYU

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

This will be my final chance post before entering school. Assume that all grades and scores, especially standardized testing will not improve and that they are the highest they will be.

Demographics
-Asian Male
-California
-$200,000+
-2nd Gen

GPA and Rankings

  • 3.971 Unweighted (17 of 540, top 3%)
  • 4.543 Weighted (17 of 540, top 3%)
  • Unweighted GPA (10-12)- 4.0 (top in class)
  • Weighted GPA (10-12)- 4.8 (no ranking)
  • UC GPA- 4.33

Academics (Semester 1/Semester 2) (Sports and PE omitted)
Freshmen Year
-English 1 Honors: B/A
-Biology 1 Honors: A/A
-Geometry: A/A
-Korean 2: A/A
-Geography/Health: A/A
-Fine Arts (Summer): A/A

Sophomore Year
-English 2 Honors: A/A
-Algebra 2 Honors: A/A
-World History AP: A/A, 5
-Chemistry: A/A
-Korean 3: A/A
-Intro to Media (Summer): A/A

Junior Year
-English Language and Composition AP: A/A, 4
-Pre- Calculus Honors: A/A
-US History AP: A/A, 5
-Chemistry AP: A/A, 3
-Korean 4 Honors: A/A

Senior Year Schedule
-English Literature and Composition AP
-AP Calculus BC
-AP US Government/ AP Macroeconomics/Microeconomics
-Korean 5 Honors
-Journalism

Extracurriculars
-Head Boys’ Basketball Team Manager (10,11,12)- Score and record keeper, statistician, and analyst for Freshmen, JV, and Varsity teams, hundreds of hours
-CSF Tutoring Committee Member and Regular Member (10, 11, 12)- Oversees tutors at library tutoring sessions. 24+ hours worth of tutoring
-3rd Degree Taekwondo Black Belt, 13 years of taekwondo
-Student Instructor at Taekwondo School, 200+ hours
-Presidential Volunteer Service Award in Gold- 250 hours of community service in a year’s span, I achieved 252
-PAVA (Pacific American Volunteer Association) Member- 252 hours
-LA Mayor Service Award, October 2014
-Certificates of Appreciation from Councilmen Tom Labonge and Herb Wesson for volunteer work
-Member of Korean nature conservationist group “Moo-Goong-Hwa,” 84 hours helping the homeless at shelters and missions and cleaning up Griffith Park
-Student of the Month, February 2015
-Hollywood Christmas Parade 2014 Participant (80 hours of practice)
-David Ryu for City Council Campaign Volunteer/Intern
-Spartan Laurels in Social Science and English (Award given to top students in a subject by department head)
-AP Scholar with Honor

Standardized Testing
-October 2014 SAT- 2090/1340 Composite (670M, 670 CR, 750W, 8 E)
-January 2015 SAT- 2010/1320 Composite (710M, 610 CR, 690W, 9E)
-October 2015 SAT- TBD
-September 2015 ACT- TBD
-Superscore SAT (privates only)- 2130/1380 Composite (710M, 670 CR. 750W)
-SAT II World History- 690
-SAT II US History- 780

Letters of Recommendation
-Calc BC Teacher (2 years)
-English AP Teacher (2 years)
-Korean Teacher (5 years)
-AP US History Teacher (2 years)
-Basketball Coach (3 years)
-Councilman David Ryu (1 year)

Personal Statement- OK/Good. Spending fall and end of summer on them.

Colleges and Majors (Yes, UPenn, Columbia, UChicago, Harvard, and Yale are Reaches)
-University of Pennsylvania- Wharton School of Business, ED, Concentrations in Finance, Statistics, Accounting
-University of Chicago- Economics, EA
-Brown University- Economics
-Columbia- Financial Economics
-Cornell- Economics
-Harvard- Economics
-Yale- Economics
-USC- Economics
-UC Berkeley- Economics into applying junior year to Haas or Pre-Business Administration to Haas
-UCLA- Business Economics
-UCSD- Economics
-UCI- Merage School of Business with Concentration in Finance OR Economics
-UCSB- Economics
-UCR- Economics
-CSULB- Economics
-Cal Poly SLO- Economics

Sorry for mega wall of text, I will do my best to chance back anyone who wants me to

2

You have way too many recommendations. Be sure that each teacher says something new about you. Otherwise it will clutter and hurt your application. Upper Middle Class Asian male demographic is what it is I guess (I’m sure you know about it right now). I’m glad to see that you are honest about your test scores. They are the lowest part of your application. Raise it to around a 2200+ and I think you will be a competitive applicant at any of your schools. But you don’t stand out particularly to me in any way beyond that, so yeah all reaches are reaches, all crapshoots are crapshoots. Essays should be better than okay/good in my opinion as I feel that might be the only way you will stand out.

3

I guess what I don’t understand is the lack of universities in the middle. You have the top tier which is a big stretch, and then a range of CA universities, including several competitive ones. However, there are many economics programs across the country that rank higher than some of those lower CA options, and it seems like your parents could afford the OOS tuition. I have concerns about this being your final list. What if you don’t get in many except for the lowest couple on the list? Would you be happy with that?

You’ve done some really amazing and admirable things in high school and you should be proud of your accomplishments. However, at top tier universities, some of your competition for admission will have more national awards, and more activities focused on their intended major. For example, they might have several national awards related to business competitions or computational modeling, in addition to top test scores. Your choice of economics comes out of left field, since the only indication you have an interest (just looking at all your activities) is your econ classes senior year.

Have you considered a double major or minor, with the second subject being something you’ve proven yourself in, such as Korean? You’ll want to somehow present your activities that you did as relevant to what you plan to do in college. If that’s a struggle, then maybe reconsider your plans for a major and select something that reflects the real “you” that is reflected in all your actions to date.

4

What schools would you recommend for an economics major? Also, I will be going into law school or business school after I complete my undergraduate studies.

5

You can only have a max of 3 or 4 recs at a lot of schools and sending more can hurt. Cornell and Brown are also reaches. You’re qualified, just gotta prove it to them now.

6

I should have put possible recs, I’m not sure if some teachers will write some