<p>My D just got her SAT2 Chem score back today and she got 770. Is it good enough for HYPS? Or she should retake it?
Her other scores are:</p>
<p>SAT (superscore): 2400
SAT2 Math2: 800
SAT2 MBiology: 800</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>Forgot to mention her major will be biology</p>
<p>This is a joke? :o</p>
<p>^lol
It’s a great score. Anything over 750 is fine for HYPS.</p>
<p>^ Jesus christ, seriously. She doesn’t need to be worrying about test scores.</p>
<p>In all seriousness, please do not retake. I saw in your past post that your daughter somehow chose to retake a 2340 on the SAT, only to get almost the same score afterwards (2360). IMHO there is no difference in ability between someone scoring a 2300 and someone with a 2400. The retake only showed how much effort was put into the test prep, which in turn only diluted my opinion of the high score.</p>
<p>Maybe you come from an area where high scores are prevalent, but across the country that is not the case and those scores are very much laudable. What should be concerning is that your D is so intelligent but doesn’t seem to have the initiative to take that ability somewhere. In other words, she never distinguished herself in any way. </p>
<p>I saw in your past posts that she participated in SIMR and had significant volunteer hours. Has she considered taking her research interest further, perhaps by participating in local science fairs and symposiums? Do you think her volunteer organizations will advocate on her account with a great rec letter? Those are more important at this point, not the minuscule points on the SAT.</p>
<p>^^^Amen. </p>
<p>Dave61, she should be concentrating on essays now if she is a senior. If she’s a junior, then her energy should be on keeping up her GPA and demonstrating passion for her primary EC pursuits.</p>
<p>xrCalico,</p>
<p>Thanks for some very good suggestions. She is using her SIMR project to apply for Intel and Siemens competitions. As far as letter of recommendation goes, she has a very good recommendation from her biology teacher, best student of his 15 years. I think his recommendation helped her got the Stanford SIMR spot.</p>
<p>Fauve,</p>
<p>She has been working on her essay for the last month and a half. Her English teacher gave her an A+ for it. The essay teacher, Harvard grad, at the local Elite center was also very happy about the essay. Her 9-11 grade GPA are 4.0 (UW) and 4.6(W). Currently her senior grade are 4 A+ and 1 A. as far as ECs is concerned, I am not sure what else she could do for the next couple of months that will significantly improve her chance?</p>
<p>Anyway, thanks everyone for your inputs. Will appreciate any other suggestion …</p>
<p>Congratulations on your daughter’s admittance to Harvard!!!</p>
<p>So, sounds like (almost) a shoo-in (if she’s not an Asian). Will be very interested to hear from you again on or after Dec. 15.</p>
<p>Xduckksx,</p>
<p>Thanks for your vote of confidence. But my D understands that admission to HYPS is a crapshoot. So she is just trying her best and hope to get into at least one of HYPSC.</p>
<p>Hparent,</p>
<p>Unfortunately, yes we are Asian (Vietnamese). I am not sure if it makes any difference or not if she is not Chinese or Indian?</p>
<p>Another question that I will appreciate inputs on:</p>
<p>Initially she planned on applying SCEA at Stanford, but after talking to several people based on past several years that kids with similar stats, GPA and ECs like my D applied SCEA at Stanford and barily anyone got accepted. So at this point, herr plan is to apply RD for all schools even though she is ready to submit the application. I just hope that we are making the right decision.</p>
<p>Your daughter has an outstanding profile, congratulations! You are right, there is not much more for her to do at this point. </p>
<p>If she really prefers Stanford, I would encourage her to go ahead and do the SCEA application. She is certainly qualified, and despite how other applicants in your area fared, she has as good a chance as anyone. In the worst case scenario, she may be deferred to Regular Decision, in the best case she may be accepted, and not have to continue writning applications.</p>
<p>Or, she could choose another top school, like Harvard, to go SCEA? With her impressive stats, I would encourage you to consider it.</p>
<p>SCEA at Stanford for asian students is very unpredictable, even with a outstanding academic records. If your daughter is really interested in Stanford, try for the RD round. Caltech and MIT may be better choices for EA and one can apply for both. Being female with a focus on science is highly desirable for these two colleges :-). With a EA admission in hand to eliminate anxiety, your daughter is in a good position to shop around for HYPS.</p>
<p>If I were her, I would do ED to Cornell/Dartmouth… because should would have a good chance of getting into either of those. HYSPMC look at more things besides numbers, so I would have to see more of her profile to give her an accurate read (if there is such a thing).</p>
<p>I wouldn’t do SCEA at Stanford. That’s where they accept all their auto-admit athletes, etc. Kids in our school who loved Stanford and did SCEA were all rejected; kids who did RD were accepted. SCEA at Stanford is a stupid choice – even Stanford tells you it is a stupid choice, as you get absolutely no “ED” boost from applying early; you just get rejected early, that’s all.</p>
<p>Also, I think being Vietnamese “Asia” is actually ok: the overwhelming Asians are mostly Koreans and Chinese – that’s where the nuttiness really happens (2 hours of sleep per night, no-pee piano lessons, etc.)</p>
<p>umm vietnamese is still a ORM and will really hurt you. I know a girl from my school who was a vietnamese student, got like a 2300+ salutatorian, and got rejected by ivies, and is now at RPI.</p>
<p>fauv:</p>
<p>Her 1st choice is Stanford, 2nd choice is Harvard. The reason she is not planning to apply SCEA at Harvard is she does not feel she could compete with other applicants in term of ECs.</p>
<p>Sheep, HP: </p>
<p>Thanks for the EA/ED suggestions. We will look into them.</p>
<p>Kellybkk:</p>
<p>It seem like her RD with Stanford is a correct one. Thanks</p>
<p>Sheep: </p>
<p>Thanks for the warning. At least now we know not to put much hope into any particular school.</p>
<p>Does anyone know if colleges have further breakdown in term of ethnicity? Or they would just lump all asian together? I always thought that chinese and indian are overwhelm majority in asian group.</p>
<p>@Dave</p>
<p>About SGP. There are also hundreds of white–and probably not an insignificant number of black and hispanic–applicants who get 2300+, very high class rank, but have almost nothing else going for them who get rejected from the Ivies and end up places like RPI every year. Trust me, if the admissions committees were even within three orders of magnitude of that racist, they’d get the pants sued off of them. It’s still really difficult to get into either Stanford or Princeton, but if your daughter doesn’t, it won’t be because you guys are Asian. Being a URM might provide a tip–and it provides some auxiliary benefits, like good essay topics, or ECs to be passionate about one’s culture, or working on diversity/equality/etc.–but it will never get somebody unqualified in, nor will being Asian ever move somebody’s folder from the “accept” to the “reject” pile.</p>
<p>Chinese/Korean/Indian/Pakistani are the majority of Asians, indeed, but Vietnamese people aren’t rare. I do continue to believe (in the complete absence of any evidence either way, admittedly) that being, say, Tibetan or Ainu would actually provide a URM-boost.</p>
<p>Good luck to your daughter!</p>
<p>^^^Spoken like a true scholar. Much respect Exultationsy! I agree 100%, I think people focus excessively on SAT scores and don’t take into account the value of extracurricular activities and community changing service projects. I believe the biggest “hook” anyone can have, is being someone who actually cares about something other than test scores.</p>
<p>Davev61: Don’t get me wrong, your daughter has amazing test scores. They are so beautiful they almost bring tears to my eyes and really any college would be lucky to acquire a student of that caliber! But is that all she focuses on? Is she just a compilation of a few high numbers?</p>