Hard Worker...Needs Advice PLZ

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hello, I am currently a junior (white male) at the most competitive private high school in the midwest. It has a great reputation with many of the top universities across the country. For example we are getting kids with 3.2's and 1300's on SAT's into Washu and USC(La). </p>

<p>There is no class rank system at my school b/c it is so competitive, but I would def. be in the top 30%</p>

<p>GPA Unweighted=3.58
SAT-Math:730 Verbal:700 Writing:700
I have not taken the ACT, and don't plan on it.</p>

<p>I will have taken for AP's by the time I graduate, but I have not taken any AP exams yet so I am unsure of my scores. The AP's are in Economic, Biology, AB calculus, and Statistics.</p>

<p>EC:
Sports-2 years of Varsity Football (I'm not very good)
3 Years of Varsity Wrestling and CAPTAIN of a team of 30. (State Qualifier)</p>

<p>I have been in the Boy Scouts of America for 8 Years and I am an Eagle Scout with many high additional Honors.
I direct and complete service projects once a month with my troop, and I have directed projects with over 200 man hours involved. For Example: I made wallet sized I.D. cards for poor city families and their children. These were equipped with fingerprints and proper photo I.D. and information on the cards. This project was highly recognized and a GREAT success that I will expand on to the colleges. I am of course still a very active member and leader of the troop.</p>

<p>Boy Scouts is the one EC I have totally dedicated my High School life to, so my school clubs are weak with only being an active participant in Cultures Within. </p>

<p>I will have excellent recommendations from my teachers, for I am a hard worker that has a great relationship with all teachers inside and outside of the classroom. And My essays will be great...but this is all incomplete so I can't bank on it just yet.</p>

<p>I am currently undecided, but I am interested in business.</p>

<p>Many belive my GPA is not fit for these schools, but my GPA is very high for this competitive institution. How do you rate my chances at these recommended places given to me by my college counselor...
Reach- Stanford, UVA, UCLA, Georgetown, Dartmouth
Match/Slight Reach-UNC, Northwestern, Wake Forest
Match-Washu (instate and legacy), Boston College, Michigan-ann arbor, Davidson, Colgate
Safety-USC(La), Pepperdine, University of Wisoncon, University of Miami</p>

<p>Thanks for all your advice and help...MUCH appreciated</p>

2

<p>Try to raise your SAT by 100-200 points for Stanford, Georgetown, Dartmouth, and your EC's are quite weak, however a great essay and req's could make up for it.</p>

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<p>how do my slight reaches look?</p>

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<p>...plz....</p>

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<p>you shoudl probably take the ACt considering you want to apply to Wash U. (prolly a 32 and above...99th percentile if you will)
Your EC's are just a little weakl though...</p>

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<p>aside from washu (lock b/c of legacy and my high school has same founder as washu), what else do you think about my matches/slight reaches? Also, why is it bad to have one extrememly stong EC such as boy scouts. It is a huge time commitment, and my counselar said colleges love it.</p>

7

<p>I think you might be aiming a little high. Your slight reaches are probably reaches, and your reaches are improbables. UVA and UCLA are state schools and have to accept a certain percentage of in-state applicants by law. This makes it much, much harder for out of state students to be accepted and you have to look at the 50% SAT ranges in that light. Wash U is a private school and they could care less about your in-state status. In fact, they are looking for people from farther away since they want to be a national university. Stanford, Northwestern and Georgetown are going to be tough.</p>

<p>You mentioned that people with lower stats have gone to Wash U. I think that the published 50% SAT ranges can be misleading. It is much easier to be accepted during early decision than during regular decision. Also, it is easier if you are a legacy, minority, athlete, development case, or VIP. I think that to be a strong candidate as a white guy during regular decision, you should be in the top fourth of the 50% range. For example, if the range is 1300-1500, then a "non-special" applicants needs to have a 1450 to be a strong candidate.</p>

<p>Your SAT scores are good for a junior. They will go up when you retake the test. Your gpa isn't that high but it's good. Your comment about being in the top 30% wasn't as impressive, but you said that your school doesn't rank. Totoboyo said that your EC's were weak, but I don't think he is giving enough credit to Boy Scouts. However, the truth is that admission officiers at Stanford don't give enough credit to Boy Scouts either. It sounds, though, as if you have really devoted yourself to scouts. Admission officiers really like to see "passion" in one or two activities. I would stress your involvement in scouts in your essay, and you should do very well there.</p>

<p>I think that you are a very strong candidate to any but the very top schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, etc. If you are considering Washington U, I would suggest that you also look at Tufts, Emory, and Vanderbilt. I hope this helps.</p>

8

<p>^^^helps a lot dufus, thnx very much.</p>

<p>Would you feel that I could achieve the quality of a school like Northwestern, UNC, or Wake Forest? I realize the difficulty with UNC, but I spoke with an admission officer the other night at a college fair and he liked my GPA and test scores somehow. By the way, how much would it help if I applied early action to most of these schools?</p>

9

<p>I don't know enough about Northwestern and Wake Forest to answer your question. Northwestern is tough. They have a tough application form compared to other schools with a lot of essays.</p>

<p>Don't trust admission officers. There are a number of books being published now such as "The Gatekeepers" that talk about what it is like to be an admissions officer. Consider Harvard. You would think that Harvard has enough quality candidates applying so that they don't have to go out and market the school in order to get more people to apply. Wrong. US News and World Report started publishing a ranking of the top colleges in the country. It distinguished the magazine from Time and Newsweek and sold a lot of magazines. A big part of the ranking formula used is the selectivity of the school. The more people who apply, the more selective that the school is, and the higher its ranking is. The job of admission officers is to get everybody possible to apply. Under the right conditions, they admit that they continuously encourage people to apply who they know are going to be denied. They will never say not to apply. If you ask the Harvard admission officer whether your 1200 SAT score is a problem, they will answer that they consider a lot of factors besides the SAT.</p>

<p>I will hedge my answer about Early Action. Early Decision will greatly improve your chances of being accepted. A school may accept 15% during regular admission and 40% during early decision. In addition, they may fill up 40% of the available slots during early decision. I'm not sure about Early Action. Early Decision is binding, and Early Action isn't. I don't like the idea of using Early Decision as an acceptance strategy. You might decide during senior year that you picked wrong. Also, if you are applying for financial aid, you have to accept whatever they give you without comparing packages from other schools.</p>

<p>Incidently, I don't mean to say that you shouldn't apply to any school. I would just be realistic about which ones I expected to get into, and have my safeties properly positioned.</p>

<p>As a final comment, I would consider financial aid as a junior. If a family has an income of $70000, then the financial aid package at a school might include a $20000 or $25000 grant per year. That makes a college with a $32000 tuition affordable. The guides will say not to worry about how expensive the college is when you pick where to apply, but it is good to know how much of you "need" is likely to be met when you apply. There are online calculator on the web to calculate how much a college will expect you to contribute.</p>

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<p>I think you are okay for Wake but not UNC.</p>

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<p>what could i change for UNC, and i also would like to know if you think USC has a solid program running b/c a lot of my friends are going there and it seems very good.</p>

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<p>...bizump...</p>

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<p>stlrams2006:</p>

<p>UCLA: Reach (out of state)</p>

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<p>^^^ yaaa kinda figured, ty</p>

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<p>bumpers.....</p>