Help Deciding on colleges

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hello I'm new to this forum and ya. A little about me is I am finishing up Junior year in a very competitive and rigorous high school and I am a perspective electrical or mechanical engineer. </p>

<p>I've been looking at different schools and I have a list of about 20 but I'm having trouble narrowing it down so I would appreciate some help based on chances of acceptance as well as people who have or are going to the school giving some feed back on it. </p>

<p>High reach schools
MIT
Cornell
CMU </p>

<p>High to mid match schools
Northeastern U
RPI
U of R
BU
WPI
Lehigh
G tech </p>

<p>Other schools
Drexel university
Syracuse
RIT
Virginia tech
Lafayette
Stevens institute of tech </p>

<p>Ok so I live in NJ
My GPA is weighted a 4.3 and uw about 3.5-3.6 (not really sure) my GPA would have been higher however my school kind of screwed us over this year by changining the grading policy and the weight of grades</p>

<p>SAT only taken once so far 1870 (650 math 620 writing 600 CR) I expect to end up with a little more than 2000 on SAT</p>

<p>ACT only taken once 28 (29 math 29 CR 28 writing 25 science) should improve substantially next time as that test was with little practice </p>

<p>EC
3 and going on to 4 years marching band as well as section leader. Very competitive marching band that has won many prestigious awards </p>

<p>Varsity bowler for 2 years going to 3. We have won county championships and I have been individually recognized </p>

<p>Member of school CPU club which is basically all about computer programming. </p>

<p>Part of Schools robotics club. </p>

<p>100 plus hours volunteer at local rehab center and going to volunteer during summer at public library. Also have done about 50 hours volunteer at local soup kitchen and food pantry. </p>

<p>I started my own small business under dads company name of repairing internally and externally damaged mobile devices like iPods and I phones and made good money off it. </p>

<p>Very good background and experience in working with electrical and mechanical systems to put on my essay. </p>

<p>Also classes I have taken and stuff
All honors classes. My school does not allow you to take ap classes before junior year. So far I am taking ap language and composition as well as ap us history. Next year planning to take ap calculus ab and ap physics c and ap world history. Oh I have also taken ap computer science. Also have taken and will take electives like electricity class, java, programming in c++, Photoshop. I also am in my schools honors wind ensemble (highest level band) and take piano class. Thanks for any help. </p>

2

<p>Here is my advice for narrowing the list. DONT!
Well kinda do… Do this…</p>

<p>Look up which schools you can apply to early action as opposed to early decision. Make a list of early action schools (schools that don’t bind you to going if you get in). Then if the list is small-ish (9 schools maybe?) apply to those ones in early action. Then use the results you get to judge where to apply in regular decision. For example. If apply to mit early and you get in, why bother applying anywhere else??? But if the best school you get in early is rpi, then maybe in regular you apply to only the schools you would rather go to over rpi (cornell,mit, CMU)</p>

<p>That is my first suggestion. </p>

<p>My second is only if you can do this. Which you may not be able to depending on finances and stuff like that. </p>

<p>Visit the schools! See where you like and apply there!</p>

3

<p>Ya I will probably have visited most of the schools by the end of summer except for gtech cause its too far. </p>

4

<p>Bump </p>

5

<p>Please…??? </p>

6

<p>Without a hook, and with your current unweighted GPA and test scores, I think your reaches are out of reach. A 2000 SAT isn’t going to bring you in reach, IMHO.</p>

<p>Also, have you run net price calculators for all these schools? Be sure you do that – even if your parents say they can pay for any school, the actual sticker price can be a huge shock and make your list meaningless. So if you have researched these schools (reading about them in Fiske, reviewing their websites, reading up on them in the individual CC forums out here, looking them up on C-O-L-L-E-G-E P-R-O-W-L-E-R), then work with your parents to run the calculators. That could help you eliminate some from your list. The calculators are less accurate if your parents are divorced, have a small business, or own rental real estate.</p>