Help Me Make A Good College List

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hi all, I just finished my junior year and just got back my ACT scores for the June ACT. I go to a competitive Catholic high school on Long Island that offers zero AP courses or honors courses. I take the only two "accelerated" classes I can, but that's about all they offer. It's pretty rigorous for a high school, but I don't have any AP exams other than a Bio AP test which I took without knowing a lot of the material. Here are my basic stats:</p>

<p>ACT: 32 composite (35 Reading, 32 English, 31 Math/Science)
SAT: 2070 (700 Math, 690 CR, 680 Writing)</p>

<p>I'll probably not retake the SAT and just prepare heavily for the ACT over the summer. The ACT score is the first one I took with not that much prep so I think I can do better.</p>

<p>GPA: 95.3 (unweighted, my school doesn't do weighting)
Freshman year:
History of Salvation (religion class) - 98
English I - 98
World Regional Studies - 95
Mathematics 10 (Geometry; accelerated) - 95
Spanish II (accelerated) - 94
Music - 97
I take orchestra instead of a study hall, but it doesn't count towards my average.</p>

<p>Sophomore year:
History of Salvation II - 94
English II - 95
European History - 94
Mathematics 11 (trig) - 95
Biology - 95
Spanish III - 94
Health - 96</p>

<p>Junior year grades aren't released yet (tomorrow), but they're basically in line with these grades. I might have gotten like a 93 in a religion class or chem, but nothing really that major.</p>

<p>For ECs I do string orchestra, I'm an officer of my computer's tech club, I am a Catholic catechist (I basically teach religion to 3rd/4th graders and lead a class by myself), am co-editor in chief of my school's literary magazine, and I'm in National Honor Society. I'm also going to be working under the president of a local hospital during the summer and I will probably continue that through my senior year of high school.</p>

<p>I know that my ECs aren't that great, there are a few other minor clubs that I do, but I think it's basically too late to try and improve them. Just trying to get more volunteer hours in (going to be doing at least 12 hours a week over the summer at the hospital, looking to maybe increase to 18-20 hours a week). I also have prior work experience at a preschool doing assistant administrative work and I have experience at a camp as a counselor.</p>

<p>So my college list so far basically looks like this:</p>

<p>SUNY Binghamton
SUNY Stony Brook
Northeastern University
Tufts University
University of Delaware
University of Maryland College Park
Johns Hopkins University
Brandeis University (undecided about if I want to apply here)
Villanova
University of Virginia
Bucknell
Case Western (not really sure about this either)</p>

<p>I'm also going to look at a few schools in Pennsylvania, so I'll add a few other things. I intend to major in Biomedical Engineering, and I'd like to go to a relatively big and/or urban school. I know not every school on here fits that category, but I need to apply to the SUNYs to be financially safe and I really liked Tufts, even if it is a bit smaller and more suburban. Are there any recommendations in the northeast that I should at least check out and read about, and how does my list look so far? Any help is greatly appreciated. I'm probably going to teach myself some stuff for the ACT over the summer, so I'm hoping to improve that to around a 33 or 34 after the superscore (Tufts, my #1 choice, superscores).</p>

2

<p>Have you run the net price calculators on these schools to see if your family can afford them? Convince your parents of the need to do this now rather than later. </p>

<p>With your stats right now, Tufts, JHU, UVA are reaches; Northeastern, Delaware, Maryland, Brandeis, Bucknell, and Case are high matches; Villanova and the SUNYs are matches to low matches. </p>

<p>In my opinion. I’m being conservative with your GPA in my assessment because I’m not that familiar with percentage scores at these schools.</p>

3

<p>A 95.3 is either like a mid 3.8ish or a 4.0, depending on the scale (according to collegeboard/princeton it’s a 4.0, according to other schools it varies). I know about the net price calculators and it’s kind of complicated because my parents are divorced. I can’t really afford most schools without aid, so that’s why I’m applying to the SUNYs. According to the calculators we’ve used, I’m basically going to get a lot of money to go to most schools. Also University of Maryland and Delaware are high matches?</p>

<p>Does high matches mean that they’re a good fit for me, or that they’re on the upper range of being a match? According to the stats my school posts, UD basically accepts anyone with around a 90 and above an 1850 on the SAT. They also accept well over half (175/316) of the students that apply there from my school. I’d consider University of Maryland and UD to be safety schools in everything but price, to be completely honest. Maybe I’m overestimating my own stats, but they’re higher than the mid 50% at those schools.</p>

4

<p>I think your chances are good almost everywhere on your list other than Tufts, Hopkins, and UVA. They are definitely reaches for you. I’d add Temple and/or Pitt to your list. Pitt has a slightly better academic reputation, but you might have a stronger shot at a merit scholarship at Temple (which could bring the cost down to something comparable to most in-state tuitions at public colleges). They are both public, and even out-of-state tuitions are lower than many private colleges. Pitt Medical Center is world-class, but Philadelphia is a great city for medicine and health sciences, also. Both are affordable cities for young people, also. </p>

5

<p>Agreed per above. Northeastern seems to satisfy most of what you want in a college. It has a good biomedical engineering program, is urban, and may offer some merit scholarships. You seem to have a good list of reaches, matches, and safeties with the addition of the SUNYs. However, definitely get those SAT scores up if you want to be competitive for those reach schools. Good luck!</p>

6

<p>Northeastern has a well-established grad program for biomed engineering, but the undergrad program is quite new. Also, they are currently building a brand new science and engineering complex on campus, which should provide some awesome opportunities. Being in Boston (with all its start-ups/biotech) with co-op opportunities is also a great combination. You would also possibly be eligible for merit aid. (I think you’d definitely get merit, but it gets tougher every year, so it’s hard to say.)</p>

<p>Also, universities can’t really penalize you for not taking advantage of classes that your school doesn’t offer. You just have to show that you’ve made the most of what’s available.</p>

7

<p>@shawnspencer I’m going to send my ACT instead of my SAT. Thanks for the advice guys.</p>

<p>I also guess I should mention that I took the Bio AP and got a 3 on it. I think that I’d still like to do better overall on the ACT, but I figure that will be, will be for my GPA. I’d like to keep it relatively high, but I don’t think there’s really much I can do for it at this point and I think that I’d like to just focus on making my ACT as competitive as possible. I know Tufts is basically a reach for even a lot of competitive applicants, but would a 33 or 34 make me more in line with what their average student’s stats look like?</p>

8

<p>okay, now that I’m awake and have a better understanding of the GPA, UMD and Delaware are safeties. And I too like you for Pitt. Class rank is important to pitt merit; you might squeeze 5-10K out of Pitt. </p>