Good College List?

College Search & Selection
1

Hi all,
I’m a junior (with school letting out in about two weeks) and I’m trying to form a list for colleges to apply to in the fall. I’m going to be paying for the college application fees with money I’ve made from tutoring, and my parents really don’t want me to “waste” my money/time applying to colleges I don’t really want to go to/won’t get accepted in. I do agree with them, but they don’t want me to apply to more than four colleges (which I think is too few), but I also think I can convince them to let me apply to 1-2 more.
I’m a California resident with an SAT score of 2290 and an UW GPA of 4.0 (which I doubt will change in the next two weeks) and a weighted 10-11 GPA of 4.65 (I haven’t calculated my UC GPA yet). I’m ranked 7/365 (I think? It’s around 360 students) as of right now, and I go to a medium-sized public school. My SAT II scores are 780 Bio-M, 780 World History, and 690 Math II (retaking tomorrow).
As for my preferences for a college, I want to go to a school in a large city/near a large city (and by near, I mean a bus ride or short drive away). I would rather go to a larger school, and I would prefer to go to a public school mostly because it’s cheaper (my older sister will be going to college this fall), but I have no qualms about going to a private school with generous financial aid (like Stanford’s financial aid, although I doubt I’ll get into there).
My major EC’s are hospital volunteering, tutoring, a member of Explorer’s Post, secretary (and VP next year) of HOSA, member of CSF, and being a member of Red Cross. I have over 250 volunteer hours, I placed in the top 10 for my event (Medical Reading) at SLC (state HOSA competition), and I have a Presidential’s Bronze Award.
I plan to major in human biology or physiology/anatomy.
So far my list of colleges that I plan to apply to are:
SDSU (safety)
UCSD (match?)
UCLA (high match/reach)
UC Berkeley (high match/reach)

What other colleges do you suggest I add to the list? Am I wrong about my evaluation for what my schools are? (ie, is UCLA a reach? is UCSD a high match?) Or is this a good list of colleges?

2

I think your evaluation is right. Perhaps you may want to add USC (you may get some tuition cut?). Only one safety is not a good idea. Add another (LMU?).

3

@uclaparent9 Thank you so much! I’ll be sure to add another safety in that case. I’ve considered USC but I’m afraid I won’t get enough financial aid.

4

If you get national Merit finalist (and I would assume your PSATs are in range considering you got a 2290) you get automatic half tuition at USC (although it doesn’t guarantee getting in)

5

@nac7890 Thank you for the information.

6

4.0 and 2290, stat-wise, make you a competitive applicant anywhere. 2290 is, I believe, above the average SAT score at every school in the US (except maybe Caltech…), and one cannot do better than a rigor-laden 4.0.

Since you are in-state, I actually think that Berkeley and UCLA are matches for you, given how much weight they place on GPA. I don’t think any of the schools you’ve listed are reaches for you.

Reaches for you, IMO, are the schools that are reaches for most other high-stat applicants: Ivies, Stanford, UChicago, MIT, Duke, Caltech, Northwestern, Hopkins, WUSTL/Rice/G’Town/Vandy/Notre Dame/Emory, top LACs, etc.

So if you are from a family that could receive some decent financial aid – or one that could afford to send you without taking on loads of debt, even without aid – and given your stated interests, I think you might want to look into schools like Harvard, MIT, Columbia, UChicago, UPenn, Brown, Northwestern, Johns Hopkins, WUSTL, Vanderbilt, Rice, Georgetown and Emory.

All are medium-sized at least, offer excellent financial aid packages (run the NPC for each for an estimate of what your family would be asked to pay), and are in or close to cities.

Harvard, MIT - Boston
Columbia - New York City
UChicago, Northwestern - Chicago
UPenn - Philadelphia
Brown - Providence
Johns Hopkins - Baltimore
Washington U - St. Louis
Vanderbilt - Nashville
Rice - Houston
Georgetown - Washington, DC
Emory - Atlanta

Princeton, Yale, Stanford, Duke, Dartmouth, Cornell and Notre Dame are also great, but they’re quite a bit farther from an urban center than the schools I listed. I didn’t list Caltech because it’s very hard to do anything but a STEM major there. In case you changed your mind, you’d want to be somewhere you could do something other than STEM.

Anyway, if you research those to figure out which one or two you like best and then apply, those would represent your reach applications.

I think you should keep SDSU but maybe add one more safety – maybe another CSU or a lower UC.

In all apps, make sure you actually like the school and can afford to pay for it (run the NPC…) without taking out too much debt. That’s important because you wouldn’t want to end up with acceptances only from schools you didn’t really like and/or couldn’t afford.

Here’s a plan that maxes out at 7 apps, which broadens the range of schools to include your true reach schools:
Reaches: (pick one or two from above list…)
Matches: Berkeley, UCLA
Low match: UCSD
Safeties: SDSU, other UC/CSU

7

I’m on your side in that I think 4 colleges is far too few, especially because you have a shot at some highly selective ones.

I paid all my college apps myself too. But I applied to 14 schools. Granted, had I not been so impulsive, I could’ve narrowed that list down to 8 or so that I was genuinely interested. But still, it’s nice to apply to a lot of schools to keep your options open, especially if you change your mind on some things throughout the school year.

If you like Stanford it wouldn’t hurt to apply. While the nature of the admissions process makes it a reach school for anyone, I think you have a chance. The app is expensive though - $90!

How far are you willing to go? Tulane’s a pretty prestigious, medium-large school near a big city with pretty good financial aid, and also has no application fee. Butler is similar (though maybe smaller than you’d like), Case Western… but all are rather far away from California. I would take a look through colleges with no application fees to make your parents (and you) happy. While you do still have to pay to send ACT scores and the CSS profile, if applicable, they are significantly cheaper to apply to.

Also wondering how large of a city you’re looking for. Most of the cities I listed above are only around 300,000 in population, so maybe you’re aiming for bigger.

8

@prezbucky Thank you so much for your answer! I’m honestly kind of flattered that you think those are matches, I’ve always thought that my extracurriculars are so sub-par that my stats don’t make up for it. Do you know of any CSU’s or other UC schools that have strong bio programs?

9

@dragonfly26 Thank you for your comment. That must have been so much money in application fees :open_mouth: I’m from a city of about 1.5 million so I was looking for a city similar in size.

10

Berkeley, UCSF, UCSD, UCD, and UCLA are all top-25 in the US News grad school rankings for Biology. Usually, if the grad school is quality, so is the undergrad equivalent.