<p>I'm a Senior at a large, very well respected public high school in the Chicago area (Evanston). I only have about a 4.0 weighted GPA which puts me only in the top 20%. I have a 35 ACT and 5s on the three AP tests I took last year (APUSH, Environmental and AB Calc). I've always taken honors classes and 3 APs my Junior year, 4 this year. I've worked each summer, and played two sports. I've seen my siblings go through it, but they were the best of the best in grades, test scores, everything, so I don't really have a good idea of what I can expect as a student with my profile. I'm applying to:</p>
<p>Middlebury-ED (Brothers a current student)
Colorado College-EA
Colby
Bates
Bowdoin
Occidental
Claremont McKenna
Grinnell (Mom's alma mater)
Macalester</p>
<p>Any clubs/leadership activities/awards? Otherwise, I'd say you'd have a good chance to get in at any one of those colleges. Colleges don't always care about rank anyway (at my school, a 4.0 weighted is top 3%-it's not really fair to judge only based on that). Especially since a lot of your colleges are LAC's, you want to make sure your recommendations and essays are particularly strong (i know Claremont Mckenna holds leadership in especially high esteem). The rest, I'm not too sure about specifically.</p>
<p>I will have some pretty good recs and I've had fantastic interviews at the schools that I've interviewded at so far(They always sseem to go about 20 minutes past what the person seems to think it will take, and it seems as if both parties have thouroughly enjoyed talking to each other). I've been a captain of my volleyball team, and at work I have the lives of anywhere from 30 kids to more than 50 adults in my hands at any given time (I'm a sailing instructor).</p>
<p>i think you have a great shot at midd, especially given your stats. your grades are a little weak, but your APs and your ACTs make up for that. interviews don't always have a lot of weight. in my experience, they can harm, but they can rarely help, even if their exceptional. think of them as less important recommendation letters, used only if your teachers are general and unhelpful in their comments. </p>
<p>anyway, i think you have a good shot at getting into middlebury. but, as always, don't count any chickens, you know...good luck!</p>
<p>I think you will be very strong at Occidental. Claremont is very competitive, much harder to predict. Colby, Bowdoin should be matches but who knows? You are wise to have given yourself so many good choices. Some of them should come through (assuming ED doesn't). Don't worry, just put your best application together.</p>