Help Me Cut My College List

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Desired Major:
Chemical Engineering</p>

<p>GPA:
Cumulative UW: 3.2
Cumulative W: 3.5</p>

<p>Freshman:
UW: 2.86 (2.7 Core Class UW GPA)
W:3.12
C in Honors Biology and Honors Geometry
I took 2 honors classes total (Bio and Geom)</p>

<p>Sophomore:
UW: 3.06 (2.7 Core Class UW GPA)
W: 3.21
C in PST and Spanish 2
Took 1 honors (Chemistry) and got a B & one advanced (not as high as honors but above average, no weighting awarded) class (PST)</p>

<p>Junior (So Far):
UW: 3.73 (3.5 Core Class UW GPA)
W: 4.0+
Am taking 1 AP (Chem), 1 honors class (English) and 1 advanced class (Pre-Calc)</p>

<p>Senior Classes:
AP Stat, AP Environmental, AP Lit, AP US Pol & Gov, Honors Calc and Honors Physics.</p>

<p>I had a really rough freshman and sophomore year, then did very well junior year, please take this into consideration.</p>

<p>SAT's:
Shooting for a 2100+ and I am almost certain I can hit 2000+ with:
750 Math
620 CR
630 W (10-12 essay)
I took the march SAT, will know how I did by next thursday.</p>

<p>I have good EC's including:
-Habitat for humanity - 3 years - I was the leader of the flooring team one year and we laid the entire floor of a house in 2 days.
-Music - 6 years - I play guitar and bass.
-Model UN - I should have around 5-7 committees by the time I graduate. I have participated in 3 so far and won 3 awards.
-MADMen - 1 year - I helped a freshman who was struggling with social and academic issues.
-I am applying for the drexel summer materials camp.
-I am getting a job this summer.</p>

<p>List:
Boston University
Clemson University
University of Connecticut
University of Delaware
Drexel University
University of Florida
*Georgia Tech
*University of Illinoin - Urbana-Champaign
*University of Maryland - College Park
North Carolina State University
Ohio State University
University of Pittsburgh
*Purdue University
Rowan University
Rutgers - New Brunswick
Syracuse University
Villanova University
*Virginia Tech
*University of Wisconsin - Madison</p>

<ul>
<li>= top choices</li>
</ul>

<p>Sorry this is so long, can you please tell me which I should remove and give any suggestions you may have.</p>

<p>**I am an NJ resident and my family can afford up to 55k a year, though less is DEFINITELY preferable.</p>

2

<p>Can someone please help me cut my list down.</p>

3

<p>I’ll help you out haha:</p>

<p>add: University Of Minnesota - Twin Cities</p>

<p>Keep: University Of Wisconsin - Madison, Georgia Tech, Rutgers, Illinois, Rowan, Florida, Maryland, NC State, Ohio State, Purdue and Virginia Tech</p>

<p>How many schools do you want on your final list?</p>

<p>PS: If you do decide to keep Clemson on your list, let me know! I’m a civil engineering student there and love it.</p>

4

<p>I would like to get it down to 12, 15 tops. are there any schools that I should eliminate right off the bat?</p>

5

<p>Can anyone help me with this? Which are the best engineering schools I could get into, and are there any on that list that I should get rid of?</p>

6

<p>PS: Illinois and Georgia Tech are probably a huge reach for you, those are tough schools to get into for engineering</p>

<p>To answer your earlier question, I went to a top 5 public school (very competitive, we send kids - note plural - to Harvard, Brown, Duke, Yale every year) in Massachusetts so take my stats with a huge grain of salt. I had a 3.06 unweighted GPA, 3.85 weighted, was ranked in the 50th percentile and scored a 34 on my ACT (2010 on the SAT).</p>

<p>Typically to get into Clemson engineering, you will need about a 600 on SAT critical reading, 660 on SAT math or a 29 on the ACT and be ranked in the top 20% of your high school.</p>

7

<p>List:
Boston University- Cut
Clemson University- Cut
University of Connecticut- Cut
University of Delaware- Cut
Drexel University
University of Florida- Cut
*Georgia Tech- Cut (too reachy and you already have enough reaches)
*University of Illinoin - Urbana-Champaign
*University of Maryland - College Park
North Carolina State University
Ohio State University
University of Pittsburgh
*Purdue University
Rowan University
Rutgers - New Brunswick
Syracuse University
Villanova University- Cut
*Virginia Tech
*University of Wisconsin - Madison</p>

<p>I’d apply to these 12 schools.</p>

8

<p>@Jshain - Why cut florida? It is decent in engineering, and I know I have a lot of reaches. The problem is my chances are contingent on how the adcoms look at my GPA. if they look at it holistically they will see that I am not the same student that I was during 9th and 10th grade and may cut me some slack. If they look at it as more of an overall type of thing they will see a 3.2 and reject me. Thanks for your input.</p>

9

<p>@pierre - I go to the #1 public in south jersey and it is top 100 in the us. It is kind of like a magnet school(kinda). My school sends a lot of kids to ivies as well. Last year there was about 7 people going to cornell, 1 to harvard and 2 to yale, with a few other ivies thrown in. Our stats are comparable, but it is good to have a reference point. Thanks for your input.</p>

10

<p>It didn’t have anything to do with your stats. You have a great upward trend. It was more about getting your list down to a number that you were more comfortable with. </p>

<p>Of all the schools that are not currently one of your “top choices”, I would take a serious look at NC State. Good engineering school at a fairly affordable price for OOS students.</p>

11

<p>Yeah, I just found out how good of an engineering school it was today. I’ll definitely consider it, but if it comes down to Purdue at 36k or NCSU at 28k I think I would go with Purdue. Can you chance me on my top choice schools?</p>

12

<p>Do they offer AP Calc AB and BC at your school? If they do and you didn’t at least take AB Calc, I think that will hurt your chances at the top schools on your list since the engineering applicant pools are extremely competitive at top schools. If you cannot graduate in 4 years at Purdue, which is a definite possibility at that school, then the $8K differential doesn’t really matter much.</p>

13

<p>They do, but I have been told I am not allowed to take it because I only took adv. pre-calc, not honors. Thats why I am taking AP stat. </p>

<p>Can you chance me for my top choices and NC State?</p>

14

<p>You really need to have test scores in hand, otherwise it is speculation on top of speculation. Okay, assuming you score a 2075 on the SAT I :</p>

<p>Boston University low reach
Clemson University match
University of Connecticut high match
University of Delaware high match
Drexel University safety
University of Florida high match
*Georgia Tech high reach
*University of Illinoi(s) - Urbana-Champaign high reach
*University of Maryland - College Park high match
North Carolina State University match
Ohio State University high match
University of Pittsburgh high match
*Purdue University low reach
Rowan University match/safety?
Rutgers - New Brunswick match
Syracuse University high match
Villanova University high match
*Virginia Tech low reach
*University of Wisconsin - Madison low reach</p>

15

<p>That seems pretty accurate to me, thank you. I do think that it is harder to get into GaTech than UIUC and harder to get into Purdue than VTech. I don’t exactly know though. My school also has a partnership with drexel so it is hopefully even easier to get into, though it is REALLY expensive. Unless I get some merit aid I can’t justify $55k a year to go there. Thanks for your time. One more quick question though: </p>

<p>Do you think a college would rather take a student who had a 3.4 from freshman to senior year (UW) or someone like me (2.9, 3.0, 3.75ish) assuming they take the same classes, do the same activities and have the same test scores? </p>

<p>I just want an idea of where I stand because I know I would be regarded higher than a 3.2 UW cumulative, but I am not sure how positively it is seen.</p>

<p>I’ll have SAT scores in 5 days… so nervous…</p>

16

<p>Holistic review doesn’t mean they ignore your real GPA. Especially at state schools which generally have number driven admissions.</p>

17

<p>I think an upward trend is looked at more favorably than a consistently middle of the road performance. Obviously, getting a 2100 on the SAT I will improve your chances compared to getting a 2000. Hopefully, you are also going to take a stab at the ACT as well. I would also strongly encourage you to take an SAT review course or many practice tests on your own. My S (UC Berkeley MechE '15) raised his SAT test score over 200 points when he took an SAT review course. </p>

<p>Your lack of course rigor in math will not help your cause for ChemE, but it will not be the end of the world if you end up at a school like Rutgers, either. Just do well at whatever school you get accepted to and good luck.</p>

18

<p>It’s not that I lack it totally, I will have taken 2 honors, one AP and 2 adv courses. I will try my hardest where ever I go. Thank you very much.</p>

19

<p>Add University of Minnesota - Twin Cities for its highly respected chemical engineering program.</p>

<p>Put in University of Alabama - Huntsville as a safety since your stats give you an automatic scholarship as described [url=&lt;a href=“http://www.uah.edu/images/admissions/Financial%20Aid/Documents/scholarship.pdf]here[/url”&gt;http://www.uah.edu/images/admissions/Financial%20Aid/Documents/scholarship.pdf]here[/url</a>]. The main University of Alabama campus in Tuscaloosa may be similar if they accept your weighted GPA and it is 3.5 or higher, as described [url=&lt;a href=“http://eng.ua.edu/undergraduate/scholarships/]here[/url”&gt;Scholarships – College of Engineering | The University of Alabama]here[/url</a>].</p>

20

<p>I already added UMinnesota, I don’t like the idea of going to the lesser of the alabama campuses, but I guess it is something to consider.</p>