How are these colleges?

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hey everyone, I've posted a few threads on CC before and everyone has been extremely helpful. I was hoping that people could help me choose realistic choices to apply to now that I know what I want to do, my scores, etc.</p>

<p>Location: Long Island, New York
Scores: 2100 on SAT I, SAT II I'm taking November 2nd. (710 CR, 680 M, 710 W)
Classes: 4 Honors, 6 AP, plan to self study AP Microeconomics and AP Physics C this year.
EC: Vice President of French club, Treasurer of National Art Honor Society, Art service club, key club, volunteer at local hospital, and judicial intern at Nassau county supreme courts.
Rank: 80/536 (My mom was very sick in 9th grade and I was extremely stressed and my low grades come from this year, past 9th grade I've held a 95-101.5 average)
GPA: 94ish
Ethnicity: Caucasian of European descent.
(If there is anymore information needed please ask.)</p>

<p>I'm interested in the following schools and plan to apply:
Bowdoin
Colby
Bates
Boston University
Wesleyan University
Trinity University
Brooklyn College
City College of New York
College of the Holy Cross
Fordham University
Macalester</p>

<p>I'm interested in the following schools, but am not sure about applying:
Tufts University
Brown University
Haverford
Middlebury
Hamilton</p>

<p>I'm also interested in other suggestions if there are any.</p>

<p>I'm interested in a wide array of subjects, I really want to study history and economics, but have a deep love for languages and plan to become proficient or fluent in German, French, Latin, and Greek.</p>

<p>I'm not sure how realistic these schools are, I realize some are obvious reaches, but should I still apply? I'm really not sure. Historically my school has sent many kids to great schools, one went to Harvard last year, and many other get into great schools. However, these great schools are not very popular schools in my high school. I'm not sure if that helps at all. Thank you in advance for your help.</p>

2

<p>I hate to bump myself, but if someone could respond it would be wonderful. I’m not sure I was totally clear with my question which could be the issue. I’m curious if these are reasonable schools to be applying to based on my credentials. I’m applying with the intent of entering a PhD program or law school later in life, so I would also like to know if these schools are respected by graduate schools.</p>

3

<p>Have you run the net price calculator on each school’s web site and shown the results to your parents? Can that afford to contribute the enough so that you can make up the rest with at most direct loan and/or a reasonable amount of work earnings?</p>

<p>If you want to go to a PhD program in economics, you may want to check the course catalogs for strong math and statistics offerings, intermediate microeconomics and econometrics courses that list math prerequisites higher than frosh calculus, and advanced mathematical economics courses.</p>

4

<p>I haven’t run the net price calculator yet, but I can get right on that. I’m more interested in pursuing a PhD in history, not economics. I’m just interested in studying economics. I was more asking whether or not these colleges are reasonable in terms of selectivity as in that I have a nice safety with some other colleges that are within grasp of admission. Also that these schools have strong departments in my area of interest. I was going to worry about FA and affording them after the fact because from college board statistics these colleges have some of the best average 1st year financial aid packages. If I was unable to afford them, I would have brooklyn as my financial safety.</p>

5

<p>If you love languages, why are you unsure about Middlebury? Likely one of the best LAC for it. Should be your new #1.</p>

6

<p>I see brown is a school you are maybe interested in but not sure you will apply and my suggestion is don’t waste the time, effort and money to apply because it is not worth it for you. I say that because I don’t think you have a very good chance of getting in. No this isn’t because you are not smart but instead it is because schools like brown sometimes can’t even accept people with perfect test scores and perfect grades. If you decided though that brown if you got into it would be your number one school then by all means apply because you will never know for sure if you will get in till you apply.</p>

7

<p>Do you think I would have a decent chance at being accepted? From what I’ve read it seems so prestigious, even above Bowdoin. I never really thought I had a great shot at Bowdoin, but my aunt’s friend talked to highly of it that it seemed worth it. If you think it’s within reach and it has a strong history department then I’ll happily add it to my list.</p>

8

<p>That’s really why I’m undecided about Brown, I had it listed based on what my guidance counselor had recommended and because my cousin had gone there.</p>

<p>@Ucbalmnus I ran a quick calculator for Wesleyan just as an example and I was told that the 14,000 net price would be affordable to my family by my mother.</p>

9

<p>

</p>

<p>Doing the net price calculator before application can save you the time and money spent on applying to a school with no chance of being affordable. Note that you should do the net price calculator on each school beforehand, since each school can differ in its financial aid calculations.</p>

<p>If few or no schools are affordable on need-based aid, you need to remake your application list aiming for large enough merit scholarships.</p>

10

<p>Is there a way to tell if you’re going to get merit aid at all? For example, I think that I’m a pretty decent candidate for College of the Holy Cross. Would I possibly get merit aid there? Also, I understand finances are a big part, but are these schools reachable for me?</p>

11

<p>Unless the school has an automatic for stats merit scholarship (e.g. <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-20.html#post16451378[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-20.html#post16451378&lt;/a&gt; ), there is no way to tell for sure whether you will get it.</p>

12

<p>For Middlebury, your stats are right around the 50th percentile. With an acceptance rate below 20%, you’re a reach. If you can highlight your love of languages, that might push you up, but it’s not going to be “realistic”. But why should that stop you from applying? How do you think that 50th percentile came to be defined? Because they admit people just like you! If you learn as much about the school as you can, and try hard to stand out in the application…stranger things have happened.</p>

13

<p>As much as I love the idea of going to Middlebury, but it might not be affordable. I ran the net price on Middlebury and I was told the net price was 33k. Wesleyan and Bowdoin would be much more affordable only having a net price of 14k and 10k respectively.</p>

<p>That being said, do you think it would still be wise to apply to Bowdoin and Wesleyan? I feel like they’re about the same selectivity, with Bowdoin being the more difficult one to be admitted to. Also, do you know if Wesleyan and Bowdoin are strong in the fields of History and Economics?</p>

14

<p>Do you have a budget cap for applications? What’s the max number you can apply to?</p>

15

<p>My parents said that they would like to keep it at or around 10. Macalester, Fordham, and Colby are all free applications though.</p>

16

<p>Well with 10, you can put a few “matches” in there that aren’t necessarily “likelies”. Do you want all of your matches to be “low matches”, that is, more toward the “likely” end? That makes a difference.</p>

17

<p>My main goal is to create a nicely varied list where I have a shot at each of them. I know I everyone has a chance, but clearly the odds of me being accepted at Harvard would be very low. I want to eliminate things such as that. I’m aware that because of the quality of Bowdoin, Wesleyan, Middlebury, etc. applicants the odds that I get accepted are going to be lower, but I wouldn’t mind applying to fantastic schools under the impression that I’m the type of student that has a chance, but they can’t take everyone. I hope that kind of makes sense, sorry if I made that a bit confusing.</p>

18

<p>So you don’t want any high reaches. That’s ok. Other than that, your choices are going to end up being typical, though maybe a bit more conservative. There’s a risk/reward to it, right, you can’t battle the odds and win the acceptance to the match schools without applying, so it’s probably not smart to have this scenario:</p>

<p>Reach (high): 0
Reach: 1
Match: 2
Match (low): 3
Likely: 3
Safety: 1</p>

<p>You have solid stats, so you can afford to be more aggressive:</p>

<p>Reach (high): 0
Reach: 2
Match: 3
Match (low): 3
Likely: 1
Safety: 1</p>

<p>There’s a fine line between adjacent categories so it’s a lot of guesswork. What categories do you see your 10 applications falling into?</p>

19

<p>I really like the way you outlined them:
Reach (high): 0
Reach: 2
Match: 3
Match (low): 3
Likely: 1
Safety: 1</p>

<p>I feel like that’s going to maximize my chance at attending a school that I’m happy with and I feel challenged at. Like you said though there’s a fine line between schools so I’m really unsure where I should rank colleges relative to my stats. I think my two reaches are going to be Wesleyan and Bowdoin, but when it comes to the others I really don’t know where the others would be placed. Does Brooklyn rank as a safety for me? Where would boston university be, my reading and writing sat scores are above the 75th percent ile, but my math fails to be at that level.</p>

<p>Also, not to introduce another question, but do you feel like there are any colleges that I might be missing that would be good for me? I really don’t care about prestige, I just want a strong academic education where I can learn as much as possible and hopefully attend a top tier graduate school.</p>

20

<p>

</p>

<p>“Free” applications can still cost money for sending SAT or ACT scores, and time spent writing essays as well as pestering your high school for transcripts if needed at application time and pestering your teachers and counselor for recommendations if needed.</p>