I know i am thinking a bit early but i want to get into an Ivy League or a prestigious college...

College Search & Selection
1

<p>Hello everyone,</p>

<p>I have just come into to 8th grade, (4 days gone by) and well, i already started to think about which college i would be going to...</p>

<p>I desperately want to go to an Ivy League school or a prestigious school (i.e. Stanford, MIT etc..)</p>

<p>I would like to know my chances for acceptance...</p>

<p>NOTE - I understand it is early... But just want to know on the areas i need to improve on...</p>

<p>I will be talking about my 7th grade performance and extra-curricular activities...</p>

<ul>
<li>Grades - All 'A' except for Art 'B' (will drop that out next year)</li>
<li>Taken an online MIT course from edx.org and received a certificate...</li>
<li>Pursuing another MIT course on programming with Python...</li>
<li>Karate Black Belt holder...</li>
<li>EDITED PART: Pursuing Harvard CS50 course - Introduction to Computer Science...</li>
<li>Earned Gold and Silver medals in Karate championship...</li>
<li>Volunteer in (Old) Book Sale for Charity...</li>
<li>Helps a school for deaf children (via interacting and fundraising)</li>
<li>Treasurer of the Student Council (I could only be a Treasurer or a Design exec. in 7th grade. 8th grade onwards, we will have president etc... Will opt for that this year...)</li>
<li>Volunteered for Festivals (3 festivals (9 hours each))</li>
<li>Play the Clarinet...</li>
<li>Going for Tennis competition (out of town)(this year)...</li>
<li>Amnesty International (In School)...</li>
<li>Completed Certification Program on Object - Oriented Programming with C++ - By NIIT (National Institutes of Information Technology)</li>
</ul>

<p>Calculated GPA (Not accurate) - 3.97 (I doubt they are correct)...</p>

<p>This year, i hope to get straight 'A''s, even in art, and will do a lot of extra-curricular activities in order to balance both the weights.</p>

<p>Please tell me about how i can improve to reach the level...</p>

<p>GRADUATION - 2019</p>

<p>Thanks a lot!</p>

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2

<p>Yes don’t hinge your future on getting into these schools.
There are lots of great colleges out there.
In the next couple of years find out what your interests are, try to be the best student you can be, but also find time for activities you enjoy.</p>

3

<p>In all seriousness OP…you are way to young to even start thinking about these things. Just do well in school and enjoy life…seriously. most kids that end up going to the schools you are thinking of didn’t plan things. My daughter went to one od those elite schools and now is in medschool…she had never heard of those schools till summer before her senior year of HS. She simply did the woek and did the ec s that she liked. Don’t try to fit your life for a set of schools…it won’t work.</p>

4

<p>8th grade isn’t early at all. Get straight A’s and do well on the SAT, that’s the two most important things. Focus on your education above all.</p>

5

<p>The only thing a school’s fame will get you is a bunch of know-nothing-know-it-alls who think they can speak with authority about that school.</p>

6

<p>Of course that is the standard answer… but no rising 8th grader should be making chances threads. Good lord, it is sad if kids need to worry about these things at age 13! be a kid and do well in school. That’s it.</p>

7

<p>Just don’t take art in high school :P</p>

8

<p>@Tier1 - I am going to take a bit different approach to your question than the usual, although I generally agree that setting as your goal “I have to go to Harvard” or in your case a set of schools of similar “prestige” might not be the best way to look at the world. But it is your life and if that is what your goal is then part of the point of this forum is to provide advice in that direction, sometimes after pointing out our opinion about such goals. So I will spare you that lecture. Besides, even if I don’t agree with why you are setting certain achievement goals for the next 4-5 years, I would have to admit there are far worse things you could be doing. I would only emphasize the message underlying that contained from @mommdc and @GA2012MOM, which is to balance your life and include a lot of personal enjoyment and growth, rather than to be so focused on “checking boxes” to get into a certain type of school you look back with regret at normal teenager stuff you didn’t do. So that said…</p>

<p>I think you probably know a lot of what you will need. Top tier schools are looking for the best students, as a starting point. Ones that have the highest achievements in the classroom against the toughest schedules, and also the ones that show genuine intellectual curiosity. This is something you control, to a very large degree. You don’t need straight A’s, but you do need a very high GPA with a lot of AP or similar courses.</p>

<p>Perhaps in 5 years things will have shifted some, but as things stand now you will need to do well on the standardized tests, such as scoring in the 97th percentile or above. You have some control over this by practicing and preparing.</p>

<p>Focus on activities you really enjoy, which in your case appears to include Karate and programming at least. Show leadership by initiative. You don’t need 10 different activities, but you need a handful where you can talk about real effort and accomplishment, and especially why you like it so much. Certainly try at least a couple of new things in high school, though.</p>

<p>In the process of all this, you will no doubt get to know a few teachers better than others. These are the ones that will be writing your recommendations. Talk to them early on about your goals and let them help you get there.</p>

<p>That’s about it, for the basics. It isn’t magic, but it takes inherent talent plus discipline and hard work for most people. Honestly, if you have what it takes and then just “do the right thing” as most people understand that to mean, you will give yourself a good shot at a school you really want.</p>

9

<p>You ARE too young to obsess on prestige and brand names. </p>

<p>You are not too young to explore the world and discover your interests. Do your best in school. Talk to teachers in subjects that interest you. Talk to teachers in classes you are struggling - get help, ask questions, make appointments to see them.</p>

<p>During summers, do something interesting to you. Camp is good. When you’re older, a job is great (as a parent I love it when my child brings in income rather than choosing me money). Use that time to explore your interests.</p>

<p>The thing about colleges - they have to fit you, not the other way around. Put yourself in charge. When my daughter started interviewing for internships and some colleges, I told her, her goal was to find out if they were suitable for her. She asked questions to find out what they could do for her as much as they asked questions. </p>

<p>You may find in five years, none of the Ivies offer you what you want. What if you want to go to a small liberal arts college of less than 2000 students? What if you want to live in southwest US? What if you want to attend a military academy? Remember, the Ivy League really is just a sports league of eight teams. </p>

<p>Focus on bring the best student you can. But don’t do out for the schools. Do it for yourself.</p>

10

<p>@GA2012MOM‌ - She isn’t doing a chances thread. She is asking for advice on how to plan her high school career in order to achieve a goal. Now we can debate elsewhere if that is a good approach for an 8th grader or not, but it certainly doesn’t seem to me to be anything but something that would be considered mature and admirable if done by an adult. She is asking for advice from people that have more experience than her. I can’t see knocking her for that.</p>

11

<p>To piggy back on fallenchemist, you have to show what your passions are. Seems like you are just “checking the box” for ECs. What is it you really care about and want to pursue in your spare time that has nothing to do with school? I know a young man who was admitted to Harvard this fall, but who dropped out of high school and ended up getting a diploma from an alternative school. How did he do it? He was smart (a given), but was bored with traditional schools. He was an avid sailor, and is going to be sailing on the US Olympic Sailing Team. Think of the question: “How are you going to change the world?” The admissions committee members don’t care for the canned answers, but want to look for originality and earnestness. </p>

12

<p>Fallenchemist…her op said “I would like to know what my chances are for acceptance?” I think it is great she is thinking ahead, but she doesn’t need to plan and obsess in 8th grade</p>

13

<p>I think it’s good that you’re planning for the future, it sounds like you want to do really well so you can have a shot at top schools. That’s preferable to someone just skating along in high school and then be dismayed to find out that their cumulative gpa from freshman year of high school on is not high enough even if they got great SAT scores.</p>

<p>Also if you want this from your own initiative instead of your parents having certain expectations, you are more likely to succeed.</p>

14

<p>@GA2012MOM - It doesn’t matter what she said in that case, since it is clear that in that context she didn’t mean it as a chances thread as we know them. No one could argue that was a “chance me for Ivies” post. Sometimes newbies don’t know our lingo, and we have to guide them.</p>

<p>You are right she doesn’t need to obsess. But everyone needs to plan, especially when your goals are substantial and difficult.</p>

15

<p>OP, I hate to burst your bubble, but pretty much nothing that you listed will be on an application. No one cares about what you did when you were in middle school. In fact, most applications don’t even allow you to put down anything you did before 9th grade. What I will say is, you should not be desperate to go to a prestigious school. That is a very shallow goal to have seeing that prestigious schools are all extremely different from one another. Stanford is VERY different from Dartmouth. Harvard and Yale are miles away from each other when it comes to the learning experience and campus life. </p>

<p>Aspire to have good grades. Be curious. Investigate. Imagine. Innovate. Don’t worry about the SAT. Ideally, you shouldn’t even be on CC because they don’t have a middle school life subsection as far as I know, but if you will be here, avoid the college threads. Hang out in High School Life. Don’t be a typical student. Do something original. Find a way to stand out in a positive way. And chill out. </p>

16

<p>I was a driven student in high school. I freaked out if I didn’t get an A+ in a class! I also played classical piano and practiced anywhere from two to five hours a day.</p>

<p>And you know what? I wish I had relaxed and had more fun! If I had it to do over again, I would have settled for a few A-'s and practiced no more than two hours a day. I didn’t realize at the time that as an adult, I wouldn’t have all of my friends so accessible and ready to go out!</p>

<p>Anyway, it’s admirable that you’re planning so young, but be sure to have some fun along the way.</p>

17

<p>OP, I’m going to recommend the book “How To Be a High School Superstar.” Basically the author’s argument is that really selective colleges don’t look for kids who have met a defined list of criteria – they look for kids who have followed their own path and are genuinely interested in learning for its own sake. Such students tend to come across as more mature, interesting and confident than students who have spent their adolescence jumping through every hoop that was put in front of them. </p>

<p>I’m giving you this advice not only because you want to get into an Ivy, but because, as the others said, it’s really a waste of 4 years if that’s your only goal the whole time. And then if you don’t get in, you become one of the students who come here to CC in April of their senior year saying “I was only accepted to my safeties – why did I work so hard for 4 years??” If you think there’s a chance you’d feel that way, you need to start paying attention to whether you’re doing all these ECs because you want to or because you think you need to.</p>

18

<p>The things that caught my attention were the programming things you have done:</p>

<ul>
<li>Taken an online MIT course from edx.org and received a certificate…</li>
<li>Pursuing another MIT course on programming with Python…</li>
<li>EDITED PART: Pursuing Harvard CS50 course - Introduction to Computer Science…</li>
<li>Completed Certification Program on Object - Oriented Programming with C++ - By NIIT (National Institutes of Information Technology)</li>
</ul>

<p>These give you a good start toward computer science, if that is your interest. If you know Java, you might consider self-studying and taking the AP Computer Science test this coming May. My S17 took it in 8th grade, and was one of only 22 7th/8th grade students to score a 5 that year. Note that what year you take an AP test is not all that relevant, but it did give him a leg up to do CS research at a university this past summer in a program that mainly takes 11th and 12th graders. </p>

<p>Another thing you could look into is USACO. There are lots of interesting practice problems you can do. Project Euler also gives you a series of fun programming challenges. For both of these, you can choose which language you want to program in and use different languages as you progress.</p>

<p>Note that if your interest is truly computer science (and it might not be–maybe you will be more interested in using CS in biology, astrophysics, or whatever), the Ivys are not necessarily the top schools. (And certainly not the Ivys as a group.) When you get to the point of looking at colleges, you may want to consider not just MIT and Stanford, but also Caltech, Harvey Mudd, and some highly-ranked public schools, such as several in the Univ of California system.</p>

<p>The High School Superstar book is a good one, and if your main interest is CS, there are a lot of CS-related activities you may run across that would allow you to stand out from the crowd.</p>

<p>As others have said, it’s great that you are doing volunteering, sports, and music. Those specific activities will fall off your resume when you are in high school, but you are on a good path.</p>

<p>Finally, what math course are you taking in 8th grade? Does it put you on a path to take at least AP Calc BC by senior year or whatever is the highest math class available at the high school you will attend?</p>

19

<p>Are you international?</p>

20

<p>Yes I am international… I will take the AP comp science… But that will be in grade 9 since I am learning Java at the moment…</p>