<p>Hey guys,</p>
<p>Now that my application is pretty much complete as applications season is coming around, I'm curious as to how I might be seen by some of these by some of these elite schools. Any thoughts are much appreciated.</p>
<p>Random notes:
- Born in a small eastern European country, though moved here (US) as a young child. Heritage and being brought up in their culture (I also visit relatives there every other year or so) mean a lot to me; most if not all of my essays are in some way related to it.
- 16 years old due to skipping a grade (7th). Not unique among HYP obviously, but a little distinguishing, I think.</p>
<p> SAT I (breakdown): 690CR 800M 800W; 1490/2290 (680 CR in single-sitting)
PSAT: 220 (NMSF)
ACT: 34 (32 Reading, 36 English, 34 Math, 32 Science, 9 essay..)
SAT II: 800 Math II, 730 Bio M, 710 USH, 680 Chem (sophomore year), 650 Spanish (it's my fourth year of studying Spanish)
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): ~3.99 (one A- sophomore year); mostly A's, decent amount of A+'s (upward trend)
School: Small, prestigious private prep (~25% of ~100 members of class of 2011 attend top 20 schools)
Rank: Top 10% (distinguished by Cum Laude award, otherwise DNR)
AP: (AP/IB not offered; got rid of it a few years ago in favor of equally challenging and less restrictive "Honors" level ones) "Honors" - 9 courses (2 A+, 6 A, 1 A-); 5 more Senior year (3 A+, 2 A as of quarter 1)
IB (place score in parenthesis): None
Senior Year Course Load: Most demanding offered (as has been all 4 years)
Awards: Physics award (9th grade), History award (11th grade), Yale Book Award (11th grade) - no idea how much these mean, probably nothing, right?</p>
<p>Subjective:</p>
<p> Extracurriculars: </p>
<p>School Newspaper (3 yrs + 1 yr Editor in Chief)
Columbia Univ. Silver Medal Designation (2011)
Robotics (3 yrs + 1 yr Captain)
World Championship Qualifiers (2011); A few hundred teams qualified though, mostly US
Mock Trial (2 yrs)
Started off as JV witness, V lawyer this year
Tour Guide (2 yrs)
Sports (never found a passion there, like 5 different ones over 4 years)
Diplomacy Society (3 yrs, 2 yr President; Diplomacy is basically an extravagant form of chess)</p>
<p> Job/Work Experience: </p>
<p>Research in an Endocrinology Lab at an Ivy over the summer, six 40 hour weeks
Part of a research program offered by my school; we're currently writing a scientific research paper about it and have written a literature review, will be making a presentation, etc.</p>
<p> Volunteer/Community service: </p>
<p>Hospital (9th-11th grade)
- ~150 hours of patient transport, office work, filing, etc.
Sunday School (12th grade) [related to my nationality]
- Sundays for 3 hours</p>
<p> Summer Activities: </p>
<p>Tennis (last couple years)
Travel (back to birthplace, last summer also visited Spain)
Educational travel (last summer with Spanish class to Costa Rica)
Online courses with JHU's CTY program
Some computer science camps</p>
<p> Essays: CommonApp one was described by my counselor as "one of the best I've read in the past five years" (probably holds a decent amount of value considering the caliber of students at my school), Supplement was noted similarly, "two very solid essays"
Teacher Recommendation: Probably outstanding. English teacher who is also advisor to the newspaper (I haven't seen the rec but he told me how he talked about my transformative impact on the previously underachieving newspaper, as well as my exceptional writing skills), and Calculus/Economics teacher known for writing great recommendations (have received A+'s in his classes and he regards me rather highly)
Counselor Rec: Told me it was "a good one" (he only has about 30 kids, and we have had numerous one on one sessions where we talk about everything so he knows me well enough)
Additional Rec: From the summer research lab's professor, pretty renowned person; counselor told me the rec was decent
Interview: Will probably be average, interviewing probably isn't a strong point of mine. I do feel like I have interesting things to talk about though so it should be fine. </p>
<p>Other</p>
<p> State (if domestic applicant): PA
Ethnicity: Caucasian
Gender: Male
Income Bracket: Upper
Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): Perhaps my nationality, doubt there's many if any students of high enough caliber from there to be considering applying to HYP
Intended Major: Computer Science (with Pre-Med)</p>
<p>Harvard (EA), Yale, Princeton, Brown, Johns Hopkins, Penn, Cornell, UChicago, WashU (Danforth Scholar?), Northwestern are schools I'm interested in (don't worry, I have safeties).</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>