<p>These kinds of things inevitably turn out to make the poster sound pretentious, so please bear with me. I hope that the next wave of potential Hoyas will benefit from this info.</p>
<p>Decision: Accepted early action, SFS</p>
<p>Objective:
• SAT I (breakdown): Single sitting 2120/1420 (770 CR, 650 M, 700 W), superscore 2210/1430 (780 CR, 650 M, 780 W)
• SAT II: 730 Spanish, 720 English Lit, 710 US History
• Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): school doesn’t use it, so not sure. Maybe a 3.6??
• Weighted GPA: 4.20
• Rank: 36/690-something
• AP (place score in parentheses): Spanish Lang/Comp, World History, English Lang/Comp, US History, Spanish Lit/Comp, Env. Science (all 5s)
• Senior Year Course Load: APs: Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, English Lit/Comp, US Gov, Comparative Gov. Honors: Physics. Languages: German 3, Japanese 1 (online)
• Major Awards: National Achievement Finalist, AP Scholar with Distinction, a couple of Model UN awards</p>
<p>Subjective:
• Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): Model UN (president), leadership committee (coordinator), modern dance
• Job/Work Experience: administrative assistant for 3 years; intern for state legislator
• Volunteer/Community service: member of city school board for 2 years; campaign volunteer
• Summer Activities: VA Governor’s Language Academy; gov’t-funded summer program in China (not NSLI-Y); intern for state legislator
• Essays: I think they were pretty good. None of the people I asked had much to add to my Common App essay, which I used for the general “tell us about you” essay. SFS-specific essay was about child labor and trafficking; related it to myself by explaining the prevalence of child trafficking in the country in which my parents lived prior to emigrating and how my mother’s decision to come to the US before I was born allowed me to not get married at age 13.
• Teacher Recommendation: Didn’t see them, but I’m assuming they were good. I’m pretty close with those teachers.
• Counselor Rec: Probably awesome, since I’m in my counselor’s office a lot.
• Additional Rec: From an experienced administrator and education policy expert with whom I’ve worked since freshman year. Because of the length of time that I’ve known her, I think it may have even been stronger than my teacher recs, and on par with my counselor rec.
• Interview: I think it went well! I brought my resume with me, and my interviewer said that only a handful of the students he interviewed brought theirs. He skimmed through it and asked me about some of the entries. I asked him some general questions about GU at the end. It didn’t hurt that the interview was inside my favorite coffee shop, making me feel less jittery. :^)</p>
<p>Other:
• State (if domestic applicant): VA
• School Type: public; top 5% usually go to UVA/W&M, but lately a handful of Elite Private University acceptances have cropped up as well.
• Ethnicity: Black
• Gender: Female
• Income Bracket: about $68k (including dad’s pension and Social Security benefits)
• Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): URM (+ child of recent immigrants). No current significant financial hardship, but money was tight until I was in 7th grade.</p>
<p>Reflection
• Strengths: essays and work experience
• Weaknesses: I didn’t take a math class in senior year, because the only options available at that point were AP Statistics and AP Calculus (AB or BC), and either one would lead to Very Bad Results. This decision might not be so bad for SFS students, but if you’re applying to any of the other schools, don’t do what I did. It’s too risky!
• Why you think you were accepted: I took classes in four different languages (Spanish, German, Japanese, and Mandarin Chinese) throughout high school. This seemed to impress my regional admissions counselor. (In retrospect, this is a bad idea if you want to be fluent in any of the languages, but it was fun to get a taste of German and Japanese. I was already near-fluent in Spanish before starting HS, though.)
• Where else were you accepted: UVA, William & Mary, Northeastern (University Scholars), American (Honors). No rejections or waitlists! These schools were waaay too expensive, though, even with federal aid, outside scholarships, and in-state tuition at UVA and W&M. Hoya Saxa!</p>
<p>General Comments: Most students who applied from my HS this year (maybe 6? 7?) were waitlisted. I’m a local student and I love DC, so it’s nice to be able to call it home for a few more years.</p>