Help on college list!!!?

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hello, I'm a rising senior from SoCal and applying to college next fall. I have written up a college list and am hoping to get some opinions/suggestions!</p>

<p>Here are my stats:</p>

<p>Scores/etc.
*SAT: 2290 (690 CR, 800 M, 800 W 11 E) not a native English speaker, so yeah =\
*SAT II: Math II (800), taking Chem and Physics in October (anticipating >750)
*GPA: 4.0/4.0 unweighted
*Rank: school doesn't rank
*APs: Chinese (5), Human Geography (5), Statistics (5), took Chemistry, Calc BC, Comp Sci A, Physics C M, and Lang last month (anticipating all 5's except for Physics =___=), taking Bio, Physics C E&M, and Spanish next year
*Senior Courses: Band, Rhetorical/Creative Writing (super challenge for me), AP Bio, AP Spanish, Multivariable Calc, Civics/Econ Honors</p>

<p>Academics
*AIME Qualifier - scored a 5 on this year's AIME I + other random math competitions
*High School Math Contest in Modeling - Meritorious
*International Space Settlement Design Competition - 2010 winner, 2009 finalist, 2011??
*NASA INSPIRE participant (went to the Summer Program last summer)
*Research assistant at my dad's clinic (did some data analysis with Down Syndrome)
*Got a research internship at a university this summer (professor said she would get me published! super excited x]!!)</p>

<p>Extracurriculars
*Badminton - junior national level player, training year-round but particularly more in summers, won a few tournaments before.
*Assistant coach at my city's recreational badminton class
*Coach my school's Math Counts team (my school is 7-12)
*Starting the first math club at school next year! =D
*Piano - Certificate of Merit Advanced Panel
*Varsity Soccer
*Marching/Symphonic Band - French horn (may be section leader next year)
*National Honor Society
*Spanish Club Historian
*Honor Guard, Student Ambassador</p>

<p>Other stuff:
*School: Public, reputable but poor because there's only ~1000 students, most students go to UCLA, UCB, USC, and etc. with ~8 out of ~170 to Ivies every year
*Ethnicity: Asian
*Gender: Female
*Income Bracket: ~$60k</p>

<p>I'm planning to major in an engineering field (not sure yet, but leaning towards electrical or computer) and minor/double major in math or management. I also want to study abroad in college! (I really want to go to UK and Japan!)</p>

<p>And these are my college choices. </p>

<p>MIT
Stanford
Princeton
Caltech</p>

<p>Carnegie Mellon
Cornell
Northwestern
UC Berkeley
UCLA
UCSD
U of Michigan</p>

<p>I think I will apply either MIT or Stanford EA, because from online searches, these two schools are, like, PERFECT. They have everything I want in my college experience. (Great engineering, decent humanities, close to urban areas (well stanford not so much), organized badminton clubs, diversity, oh, i can go on and on) I will visit both of them in September to really feel the difference between the two schools.</p>

<p>I don't really know how to classify these choices into reaches, matches, and safeties. So help/chancing on these would be greatly appreciated. It seems like none of these schools would be safeties for me, so any suggestions on safety schools? Or any schools I should take out? Also, if there's other great engineering schools (but still with decent humanities/business departments) that I've missed out, please recommend some for me too!</p>

<p>Thanks a billion!!!</p>

2

<p>For UCs, compare your stats to the profiles here:
[University</a> of California - Freshman admission profiles](<a href=“http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/freshman/profiles/index.html]University”>http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/freshman/profiles/index.html)
and the stats here:
[University</a> of California: StatFinder](<a href=“http://statfinder.ucop.edu%5DUniversity”>http://statfinder.ucop.edu)
to find reach/match/safety for admissions purposes.</p>

<p>Look into the Blue and Gold Opportunity plan:
[University</a> of California - Blue + Gold Opportunity Plan](<a href=“http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/paying-for-uc/financial-aid/grants/blue-gold/index.html]University”>http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/admissions/paying-for-uc/financial-aid/grants/blue-gold/index.html)</p>

<p>Cal Poly SLO looks pretty safe also with those stats.</p>

3

<p>RPI would appreciate you. They definitely appreciate women with your stats and interests. You could add them as a safety school.</p>

4

<p>There are no safeties on your list.</p>

5

<p>Michigan is over 50K/year and will not meet your need for OOS student.
You stated your family’s income is around $60,000/year?</p>

6

<p>oh i didn’t look into FA too much for Michigan yet, but it seems like they don’t give much to out of student students huh? Maybe I’ll take it out then. I’ll also add RPI</p>

<p>So now it looks like:</p>

<p>Reach:
MIT
Stanford
Princeton
Caltech
Northwestern</p>

<p>Match:
Carnegie Mellon
Cornell
UCB
UCLA</p>

<p>Safety:
UCSD??? (or should it be a match instead)
RPI (but only 28% girls ehhhhhh…)</p>

<p>I’m also qualified for the UC program in which California students with high enough SAT & GPA are guaranteed admission to a UC with space. I guess that could be my ultimate safety.</p>

<p>any thoughts? do i need to cut the list down? 10~12 seems pretty standard given the fierce competition in recent years.</p>

7

<p>Seems hard to believe that with a 4.0 unweighted average you aren’t going to be ELC which ought to guarantee you admission to UC Davis. They have a pretty good engineering program. You shouldn’t need to look much further for a safety.</p>

8

<p>RPI = you would never have any trouble finding a date! ;)</p>

9

<p>I aggree with the suggestion of RPI. It’s not really a safety school though. Look at the standardized test scores compared to say UCLA: </p>

<p>RPI 25th - 75th percentile, SAT = 1860 - 2135, ACT = 26-30 </p>

<p>UCLA 25th - 75th percentile, SAT = 1750 - 2130, ACT = 25-31 </p>

<p>Also the RPI acceptance rate has dropped from 78% seven years ago to 38% now and you can safely expect it to drop to the mid thirties for your admit cycle. </p>

<p>I’d call RPI a solid match along with places like Michigan and UCLA.</p>

10

<p>Smith College has a very good engineering program (with a somewhat less tech-y focus–that is, it’s a liberal arts college) and a very strong junior year abroad program. My D is there, majoring in physics; she wanted to go to Japan for her junior year but found that she couldn’t get in all her courses for her major and minor (this is a problem you would probably have anywhere you go, if you double major with engineering). Instead, she is working with her physics prof to do her senior project translating Japanese physics papers, and then go to Japan to work in a lab where her prof has contacts, for a gap year between college and grad school. I mention all this to point out the advantages of a smaller school with faculty members who work closely with undergrad students; some students who share their undergraduate school with graduate students find that the grad students get the lion’s share of their professors’ attention and research.</p>

<p>Smith would not be a safety school, but a good match.</p>

11

<p>One of the UCs would be a safety, but not necessarily UCSD and certainly not UCLA or UCB.</p>

12

<p>hmmm i will ask my counselor about ELC then. seems like a good option for safety.</p>

<p>@SLUMOM: LOL, true but I would still rather have a somewhat even distribution. but RPI does look like a great school. =P</p>

<p>@marysidney: I’ve always been uncomfortable with the idea of a women-only school, and hopefully you can clear my doubts =] I’ve heard both good and bad things about single-sex school, with good things being a tight-knit community, easier to concentrate on academics, and etc. and bad things being deprived because there’s no guys. Wondering what’s your stand and your D’s view on this? Also, how would you compare studying science/engineering in a LAC then in a tech-heavy school like RPI/MIT/etc?</p>

<p>do you guys think my other choices are OK? or a bit unrealistic =P</p>

<p>Reach: MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Princeton, Northwestern
Match: UCB, UCLA, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell
Safety: UCSD, whichever UC I get from ELC, RPI</p>

13

<p>MIT all the way!!! It’s the top engineering school, and I think it’s your fit. I have a friend who attended MIT, and she said it was the best experience ever. BTW, amazing scores!! I think every school will apply!! (:</p>

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<p>Momo899: you’re right, a women’s college is not for everyone. There is a stickied discussion on the Smith forum about “why women’s colleges?” which might help you with your concerns. The short version: guys are around when you want them, and not when they’re in your way. </p>

<p>Smith is the only women’s college with an engineering program, and they take great pride in it, but my impression is that is not as hardcore technically as, say, RPI might be, because Smith is an LAC and wants you to be able to take courses outside your specialty, or to double major. I’m not an engineer myself, so I can’t speak to the differences in program specifically, but the question for you is, what is your goal? A BE? An ME? An ME and MBA? A PhD? What do most people in the programs you are looking at end up doing, and is that what you want? Many engineers get their BE and go straight to work as an engineer, and stay there; they tend to value a really focussed technical preparation. Some engineers want to move into management, and for them a broader preparation might be better. </p>

<p>My daughter likes not having to deal with masculine ego, as she did in high school–there still are guys who assume that women are not/should not be good in science (or maybe just not as good as they are), and she found that tedious. I went to Smith myself, a quarter-century ago! and found that even in the humanities not having to worry about what the cute guy might think made classes less fraught with self-consciousness and subtext. But some people can’t conceive of college life without the element of boy/girl flirtation or whatever. It’s important to think about what makes you happy. </p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

15

<p>Hahahaha if you’re taking multivariable calc (isn’t that the stuff Russel Crowe was teaching when he played John Forbes Nash in A Beautiful Mind?), I’m pretty sure you’re going to get into most of those schools- you may not get into Princeton, MIT, Stanford, and Caltech, but you have a good chance at getting into one of them. The only school I know really know about out of your list is Princeton, and you had better be really good with that math and science stuff if that’s what you want to do once you get there- a lot of really smart people find themselves struggling in those types of concentrations there and probably the same in other top-tier schools.</p>

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<p>MIT is actually my top choice, and I’m strongly considering applying EA. but FA is always a problem, and as much as I like MIT, I don’t want to commit without knowing about the dreadful $$$$. I don’t know if I can stand the weather though =P Living in Taiwan first half of my life and in SoCal the second half, I can’t really stand any temperatures below 70F (or maybe I’m just weird. I’m still wearing sweaters to school and it’s freak’n June ^__^) And Stanford would be my second choice because it has a much nicer weather and is in NorCal, which is badminton powerhouse in US, so that means I get to play a lot XD! and it’s closer to home too. lol, if they can move MIT to NorCal, that would be the perfect school =P</p>

<p>Multivariable Calculus is actually the math class after AP Calc BC, which I believe many advanced math students take. I don’t think I’ll get into any of my choices simply because I’m in Multivariable Calc next year O_O It’s not very common, but not unusually rare either</p>

<p>I want to eventually get into the management side of engineering. That’s why I want to double major in management and engineering (not sure which yet).</p>

<p>anyone else? =D</p>

17

<p>Study hard to get 800s on Physics and Chemistry.
800-800-800 on Math II-Physics-Chemistry will be really good.</p>

<p>Vanderbilt and Rice have very good merit scholarships and I believe Yale wants to build up their STEM programs.</p>

<p>You are a STEM oriented female. I think you have good chances at those top colleges.</p>

18

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</p>

<p>Engineering graduates often do management.</p>

<p>Business graduates tend to have a very hard time doing engineering.</p>

<p>Multivariable calculus is nominally a university sophomore level course, although MIT compresses what is normally a year of freshman calculus into one semester (course 18.01 and its variants) so that students take multivariable calculus second semester of freshman year (course 18.02 and its variants) at the latest (both courses are required for graduation for all majors – MIT humanities majors take a much more well rounded liberal arts education including math and science than humanities majors at most other schools).</p>