I'm Getting Ahead Of Myself, but still.

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>I'm beggining Junior Year, so maybe its too early to be asking what are my chances, but this is just to get a vague idea at where I can aim for.(?)</p>

<p>===Begin Stats=========================================
Freshman GPA: 3.4 (to be honest, I didn't take classes seriously.)
Sophomore GPA: 3.6(realized the mistake of Freshman year and tried harder, but got an A-, and 2 B+)</p>

<p>Class Rank: As far as I know, our school does not rank students, they say they don't because it is a magnet school and the students are all competitive. But I think I can be somewhere in the top 20% (300 students in my class)</p>

<p>Honors: All Non AP/IB courses are honors(for everyone.)
----APs-------------
I've taken no APs so far, and Will Probably not take one this year, because I do not qualify for the following AP classes available to juniors:
AP Chemistry(B+ in chem)
AP Calculus AB, BC(i'm in a lower level math class, will be taking it next year)
AP Microeconomics(need completion of the math class I am in now, to qualify)</p>

<p>I am currently taking IB English,
I did not try for IB Spanish(un-interested)(spanish was also the other class i had a B+ in)
I did not try for IB History(would require an extra class next year for history, and I need that time to take AP classes)</p>

<p>I hope to take AP Calculus AB, AP Chem/Physics(not sure.), and Computer Science</p>

<p>My school only offers a few AP classes:
AP Chemistry
AP Physics
AP Biology
AP Calculus AB, BC
AP Computer Science
AP Music Theory
AP Microeconomics
AP Macroeconomics</p>

<p>----SATs-------------
I haven't taken any SATs yet but I will be taking one in october, I hope for 2100+ but thats unsure, it may end up slightly below 2100, I would consider taking it again afterwards if I think I can reach 2200, not sure if it would matter.</p>

<p>SATIIs I will take Math IIC, and Physics near the end of the school year, and probably World History(not sure.) For now, lets assume 700+ for each.</p>

<p>----ECs-------------
1)200+ Community Service at Summer Recreation</p>

<p>2)Web Club: (Helped to redisign our school's website, and the county's special services district website <a href="http://www.bergen.org%5B/url%5D"&gt;www.bergen.org&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/p>

<p>3)Model UN: I Plan to be a member for 3 years, starting from Sophomore year, competing at 3 events per year, Lets be optomistic and say I will recieve atleast honorable mention at:</p>

<p>WAMUNC(George Washington University) x2(got 1 already, one next year)
BOSMUN(MIT and Boston Univeristy)x1
Princeton Model UN</p>

<p>The club may change what conferences it attends, but we typically attend three a year.(w00t we won BOSMUN and PMUN last year)</p>

<p>4)Choir for three years, I know its not much, but i'm unsure whether I should try for county/regional/allstate, for now lets say no. I have tried for Chamber Choir(our higher-ranking choir(?)) I am awaiting a reply.</p>

<p>Fresh Angles, a school-run magazine, where I worked as the technical staff in charge of their website <a href="http://www.freshangles.com%5B/url%5D"&gt;www.freshangles.com&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>----Other-------------
My school offers a course where you enroll in Cisco Networking Academy online courses that prepare students for Industry Certification Exams, I have already completed the courses for CCNA 1 and 2, Panduit Voice and Data Cabling, IT Essentials 1 and 2, and will be finishing remaining 2 CCNA courses this year, and beggining some Microsoft Certifications. Although taking the courses does not mean you will pass the exam, I also hope to self-study(with my uncle) for the real CCNA exam.
More info for CCNA at:
<a href="http://www.cisco.com/web/learning/le3/le2/le0/le9/learning_certification_type_home.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.cisco.com/web/learning/le3/le2/le0/le9/learning_certification_type_home.html&lt;/a>
More info on Cisco Networking Academy at:
<a href="http://cisco.netacad.net%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://cisco.netacad.net&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I have learned Visual Basic, and Java from classes in school, and self-learning PHP right now. I am somewhat dissappointed I haven't picked up C++ yet but will probably take a class this year.
===End Stats=========================================
I am not too sure on how much value Cisco has, but I do hope to take up a major in Computer Science/Networking, or computer related field.</p>

<p>Also, just for fun, I'll ask, is being "staff" at an online community worth mentioning? I did put much time into it(having joined in 6th grade, become staff in 9th) Essentially began as a chat-room operator, became forum-moderator, and later IRCoperator(in charge of the IRC network). Essentially you can call it a fan-site, but its also a gaming community, and majority of members have no interest in the game/anime, but rather just the people.(rofl, I can't believe I asked, but I figured it can't hurt, you guys often mention looking for a "passion" maybe this can help)</p>

<p>That said, do I have any chance at Dartmouth, Cornell, Brown, Johns Hopkins
I haven't dug too deep into the list of colleges so any other suggested colleges are welcome =]</p>

2

<p>get your GPA up. you can see from my post, that gpa is killing meee and you have time to do so well. </p>

<p>i would honestly say take whatever ap you can. if you cant take any this year formally, you may want to look into studying for the test yourself- only if you are self motivated.</p>

3

<p>yes, I'll try to get a 4.0 this year, might help.. but that depends on some stuff(heh.)</p>

<p>Since Chemistry may be difficult for me to self-study, and Computer Science would be available to me this year, except they only allow Seniors, I just got the idea earlier today, about self-studying that(maybe with help from my uncle! =]) If that is the case, I may not take AP Comp Sci Senior year, and can take both Chem and Physics</p>

<p>Oh, I forgot to mention in the first post..</p>

<p>The school requires that we intern somewhere during senior year. Infact, Seniors don't go to school on wednesdays, and must intern on that day. I hope to grab a position somewhere in the IT field.</p>

<p>And... I haven't done much during my summers(except summer rec) next summer I hope to go to Columbia Summer Program.</p>

4

<p>seriously you are just starting your junior year so you can do well. :) about self study, classes like ap english and psychology and possibly stat are easy enough to self-study. that way if u dont have that much hw u can do like a few pages of reading for those classes. also ask the teachers that currently teach the ap courses to help you out, you can do it! :)</p>

5

<p>AP english and stat? hmm, Stat seems hard, but I'll definetly look into it
<em>lightbulb goes off</em> hmm.. is AP english worth it if I'm taking IB english?</p>

6

<p>ive never taken stat so i have no clue. ap english is def doable- especially language and comp. i am not familiar w/ IB english so i'm not sure :)</p>

7

<p>Your GPA is a little low, but junior year's what really matters most, anyway. Your ECs are good, though not fabulous (ie, you haven't discovered the cure for AIDs while making All-State one oboe and spending your summer working with nuns in Guatemala)... It's really going to depend on your test scores (above 2100 at least, greater than 700, preferably 740, on two SAT IIs, 4s or 5s on APs) and your essay. Your have a decent shot at JHU, though the ivies will be more of a reach. Pop on over to the Dartmouth forum -- you can see some of the ED seniors' stats.</p>

<p>As for classes, just take the hardest ones you can without killing yourself. And AP stat is a blowoff class. I'm seriously losing brain cells sitting in that class.</p>

<p>And WAMUNC is the second best MUN conference ever. What committee were you on last year? Country?</p>

8

<p>rofl, i'm replying about WAMUNC first? heh.
Yeah, I was in OAS as Ecuador. My first conference, and got honorable mention! felt good, since other first-time friends said they didnt expect to get anything in their first. Unfortunately we didnt win, but we won the other two that year!(ehh i didnt go to the other two, no room for inexperienced person)</p>

<p>AP stat is blowoff class? hmm, so I should self-study it? I'll see.
4s or 5s on APs, doesnt look like that would matter too much, since I won't be taking any this year(unless i choose to study Stat or something myself) and after this year the colleges wont receive the score before i apply(?)</p>

<p>Hmm, Industry Certs don't mean too much?
I've been considering the ivies as somewhat of a reach, and assuming there isn't much to senior year except the course-load, I guess only way to improve my chances to those would be GPA and AP-classes?
ahh! and I have to take the SATIIs too!</p>

<p>Right now, I think I'll have to priorotize the following
1) Study until October for the SAT(hopefully i'll do well!!)
2) Build up ECs(?)
3) Self-Study <em>something</em></p>

<p>...gah, time to go to sleep. I'll check back tommorow.</p>

9

<p>Bump, and let me ask another question</p>

<p>since I <em>want</em> to try to self-study something, and I have one year experience in Java, should I try AP CompSci?</p>

10

<p>just look through a review book, and talk to ppl who have taken the class/test- thats prob ur best view of whether or not it is duable. i have no experience w/ compsci :( Sry.</p>

11

<p>I was on SOCHUM...I'm always on SOCHUM. Mexico. It was my sixth one, but my first one I didn't expect to win anything either and ended up third place. You aren't from Dalton, are you?</p>

<p>And do IS stat. My previous math classes have got me through 90 percent of the book already.</p>

12

<p>IS Stat? whats that? typo? didya mean AP/IB(i dont think IB does have stat..)</p>

<p>Umm, nope I'm not from Dalton(there was only one person in my committee from Dalton, I think) I'm from Bergen County Academies.</p>

<p>Umm, about JHU, when you said I have a shot.. a "reach"? or more of a match? O_o</p>

<p>I've been considering Ivies as a "reach" but I would atleast like to get JHU</p>

13

<p>IS=independent study</p>

<p>That's good you're not from Dalton (not that I have anything against the school in general)....they've turned into our archrivals. They beat us a JHUMUNC, and we took them down at WAMUNC. Iswear to god Dalton kid in my committee walked in with three 4inch binders of reseach -- in a duffel bag.</p>

<p>And JHU is less of a reach than the ivies, but it's still not a safe match. Raise your grades and you'll have a great shot getting in.</p>

14

<p>Will Do. (bout JHU and maybe Independant Study)</p>

<p>Dalton as archrivals? funny, our school says the same O<em>O
(ironically i sorta wanted to get to know the girl from Dalton..even though she's a senior(ironically applying to JHU O</em>O))</p>

<p>ya know? i'm gonna go ask my parents right now if they can take me to library to see if they have some Stat books.. so I can skim over it get an idea of its difficulty. any suggested books?</p>

15

<p>Yeah, they became our archrivals when they broke our 3 year, 12 conference winning streak. We don't really have any rivals around here (the local tornaments have recently started giving us crappy countries in an attempt to make us lose), and Dalton's the only one that's ever given us any trouble. Dalton, however, will tell you that their rival's Horace Mann, though they certainly weren't too happy to see us beat them. They tend to put one great kid and one bad kid on each committee, whereas we pick our own committees, so we tend to cluster in groups we know we work well in.</p>

<p>Some of the Dalton kids are nice -- I had one on my committee at JHUMUNC that was shockingly un-pretentious -- but some of them are just completely full of themselves. Ironically, I started preparing for WAMUNC the morning we left (I had a 25 page research paper due, to the MUN advisor/my APUSH teacher, the day before) and still beat the Dalton kid with three binders. MUN is really about BSing, not about researching.</p>

16

<p>ehh, however much i like MUN, I can't argue about it too much, remembering my first experience there, the 2 ppl getting higher awards also BSd(can't say I didnt...) but 1st place, the Dalton girl, seemed different. </p>

<p>...oops off topic xD(being a moderator on some forums... i'm sorta wondering if i should have posted this one O_O)</p>

17

<p>hmm, how would my chances be at Boston College, Boston University, UCLA, UCB, Caltech, or Duke?</p>