is columbia ever a match?

Colleges & Universities A-Z Columbia University
1

<p>earlier this month i went with my mom to her barnard reunion. being a rising senior i visited both sides of broadway. my reaction to barnard was "ehh," to columbia, "ahh!!".</p>

<p>i'm unlikely to consider ed, but i would like input. specifically: i'm considered a legacy at both barnard & columbia college (since my mom graduated in 78, before coeducation at cc). considering the below, is my chance at columbia strong enough that i don't need to apply to barnard as well? </p>

<p>Objective:[ul]
[<em>] SAT I (breakdown): 2400
[</em>] SAT II: 800 biology e, 800 literature; tba math ii and latin
[<em>] Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0, weighted I think 4.83 but may become 5.0 with new policy
[</em>] Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 1 of 53
[<em>] AP (place score in parenthesis): us govt, macro, micro, english lit, english lang, latin lit, latin vergil, physics b. my school doesn’t have ap, so i did the work on my own. it’s not that i love paying college board- i wanted at the time to take a gap year. now i’m not sure. results tba.
[</em>] Major: almost certainly greek
[<em>] Senior Year Course Load: my school has a fixed curriculum like st. john’s college (md, nm). think all core all the time. senior year is definitely the hardest. chem, calc bc, studio art/theater (semester long), combined humanities course more or less exactly like lit hum, greek, senior thesis (credit but no class time). taking ap exams in chem, calc bc, art history, comp. gov’t.
[</em>] Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.):
athletics: all-region in track and cross, all-state in track (3200m). that's all-state for small schools- i'm being recruited in d3 but not d1.
classics: 2x natl winner of latin translation contest, oxford classical dictionary award from natl latin exam, highest honors on natl greek exam and natl mythology exam, 4x state jcl certamen champion, many other state awards
national history day: district and state champion, natl finalist (historical paper)
speech & debate: extemp toc qualifier, academic all-american, degree of premier distinction, extemp finalist at natl tournament, 2x state finalist in extemp and impromptu speaking
others: wellesley book award, natl merit semifinalist, minor essay contests, 4th regional science bowl[/ul]</p>

<p>Subjective:[ul]
[<em>] Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): jcl (state president, chapter president, 4 yrs), varsity cross (captain, 3 yrs), varsity track (3 yrs), speech & debate (captain, 4 yrs), science bowl (captain, 4 yrs), violin (7 yrs)
[</em>] Job/Work Experience: managing coffee bar at school senior yr, expect about 8 hrs/wk
[<em>] Volunteer/Community service: about 200 hrs. peer tutoring (4 yrs), direct & produce nativity play (3 yrs), translate & direct greek tragedy (in 11)
[</em>] Summer Activities: study abroad in austria after 10, tasp after 11
[<em>] Essays: unwritten as yet. will almost certainly be about my bizarre school (columbia-esque curriculum, hyperconservative faculty and students) and why i decided to stay there despite occasional hostility.
[</em>] Teacher Recommendation: one will be from from teacher who had me twice in 2-period combined courses and will also teach me chem this year. i don’t read my letters but we have a great relationship. other will be from my greek teacher meant mainly to vouch for my skill, which my transcript doesn’t represent (i did independent study which my school didn’t recognize)
[<em>] Counselor Rec: she thinks i walk on water
[</em>] Additional Rec: they have enough things to read already. i’m planning to send an excerpt from my translation of the play mentioned above (euripides’ bacchai) and an abstract of my natl history day paper.</p>

<p>[/ul]Other[ul]
[<em>] State (if domestic applicant): arizona
[</em>] Country (if international applicant):
[<em>] School Type: very small charter with fixed liberal arts curriculum not much different from columbia core. interesting place but very conservative. most faculty and students are either calvinists or very strict catholics & the atmosphere is a fairly strange one. it was the right place for me though. most students go to religious schools or our state schools, which are decent.
[</em>] Ethnicity: i mark white and other. wasp but my first language is spanish.
[<em>] Gender: female
[</em>] Income Bracket: well off. my parents teach at a state school but not in lucrative fields.
[li] Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): tasp (next week!!), greek, legacy</p>[/li]
<p>[/ul]Reflection[ul]
[<em>] Strengths: serious humanist, underpopulated major, interesting kind of life story
[</em>] Weaknesses: my ec’s could be substantially better[/ul]</p>

2

<p>You’ve got a fantastic chance, but of course no top-10 school is ever a match.</p>

3

<p>I think you should just apply ed and you’ll know whether or not you have to apply to barnard. If barnard, is the next best thing to columbia then certainly apply to barnard, if you have other colleges that you would rather go to between columbia and barnard you don’t really need to apply to barnard, with a profile like yours you’ll definitely get into one of those. You’ll likely get into columbia also.</p>

4

<p>You’re kidding right? If you don’t get in, there’s no chance for the rest of us…But you never know with the Ivies. They like to mess people.</p>

5

<p>ed is really out of consideration for me. i don’t have the money to commit immediately & i’m also not a million percent sure. </p>

<p>this is ridiculous, but part of why i’m reluctant to apply to bc is that the application has 5 essays. i would be fine with that did i not have 8 other applications to tend. am i just being lazy? should i bother applying to barnard? i do like it but it’s not #2 to columbia’s #1, it’s like #6 to columbia’s #2 (albeit an ultra close #2).</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>what do you mean by match? i’m not using the term in a completely cut & dry sense, but i would qualify it as meaning better than 2/3 chance of admission.</p>

6

<p>One thing you’ll realize about the essays is that many of them are basically the same. Of course, there will be differentiation when they ask you questions about their own school, their programs, their location etc. but the personal essay tends to be the same across the board.</p>

<p>Apply to Columbia and the core will serve you well.</p>

7

<p>nothing is ever a match–but judging from TASP, you’re at least a good essayist (I was a TASP reject-haha) which definitely helps. All I can say is good luck!</p>

8

<p>my take is that…with your profile you don’t need to apply ED if you aren’t absolutely sure… you will definitely end up at some top 10 school…no question about it but I think you would serve yourself well by laying out all the schools and considering if you got accepted to all of them which you will go to and then apply to that one ED. By getting the process over with early, you’d have ~6-8 months to just relax…with all those activities it seems like you need it.</p>

9

<p>wow, I almost never say this to people, but your app is strong in every way. Excellent test scores, excellent EC’s (actually, almost identical to mine), excellent summer activites, solid grades, I’m sure your essays will be great. I think you stand a really good chance at Columbia. What other schools are you applying to?</p>

10

<p>ed partisans: not going to ed anywhere even if god came down and told me i would get a full ride to the school. i change my mind too often. if columbia had scea i would do it, but alas.</p>

<p>sevitagen: because of my high school curriculum my attitude is sort of “core or bust.” in other words i am a shameless ho for the intellectual unity a core curriculum is sufficient but not necessary to generate. other top choices include chicago, yale for directed studies, stanford for sle, swarthmore. unfortunately core and top-notch classics programs seem to be like oil & water so there are some more, more incongruous-er ones after that. </p>

<h1>1 beating columbia by a nose right now is newnham college cambridge. i know, apparently complete opposites. but in classics everyone has the first 2 years’ curriculum in common, which is what i want. the coreness of the core is what attracts me, not necessarily its content. does that make sense?</h1>

11

<p>well, I mean, it’s great that you value something relevant to curriculum (I’m a prestige whore, so I’m much worse), but I’m sure even in a college where there isn’t a core curriculum, chances are that you are going to have to take much the same classes as other’s in the same major for a classics concentration (Latin is my favorite subject, actually). I don’t know a lot about the program at Cambridge, but they do publish the latin books that our class used, so I’m assuming they have a pretty solid program. </p>

<p>I think you have an excellent shot at yale, cambridge, uchicago, and swarthmore, even without the added bonus of legacy status. I mean, I do LD, and being a national qualifier for extemp is impressive, as is your involvement in JCL.</p>

12

<p>I can’t picture a scenario of you not getting in…and believe me I’m trying. I wouldn’t ED it. No need.</p>

<p>I’d give Yale a stronger consideration. It’s probably the only undergrad program I would consider above Columbia for me. Everyone I’ve talked to from there considers it the absolute greatest experience.</p>

13

<p>sevitagen: i actually didn’t qualify to nationals in extemp. in fact i didn’t even go to quals as i had already qualified for national history day (much harder as you need to be 1 or 2 in the state) which was at the same time :frowning: by “finalist at natl tournament” i mean that i finalled at “national tournaments” in the sense of “tournaments with toc bids.” which is probably self-explanatory given that i list “extemp toc qualifier.” oops. </p>

<p>it looks like you’re 2010, so here’s my classical sales pitch: it’s never too late to learn a new language. greek is one of the most popular to self-teach, and chances are your latin teacher already knows some. try an independent study this year & i guarantee you’ll enjoy it.</p>

<p>undisclosed: thanks! yale is my scea. it had a cage fight with stanford for that status and old leland marked away with several broken bones. i heart it and its directed studies (directed suicide, etc). my only misgiving is its unfortunate location. now if yale was in the upper west side <em>then</em> i would consider ed.</p>

14

<p>Why haven’t you considered St. Johns? You mentioned it as similar to your school’s core, and you seem to want to follow in the path (hence your interest in Columbia)</p>

15

<p>i have to be in a city. i’m in sante fe right now (and visiting tomorrow) and the quietness is driving me crazy. same thing about princeton and the claremont colleges, which aren’t core-y but have excellent classics programs-- i absolutely cannot handle the eerie suburban calm.</p>

16

<p>Philoglossia</p>

<p>Just curious how you consider yourself a legacy at Columbia College? Even if your mother graduated in 1978 prior to co-education at CC in 1983, I have never seen students such as yourself consider “legacy status” at Columbia College. The admissions office does not officially state this is the case in any material I have reviewed. I have also interviewed many students for admission to CC and have known their mom’s to have attended Barnard prior to 1983. Nowhere have I seen the admission office consider these students to be legacy for CC. Just wondering where this information is stated?</p>

<p>Thanks</p>

17

<p>yea i forgot to mention that in my first post…you aren’t a legacy…but i dont think you need to be with your scores…on the application they ask you if you had any family that attended columbia …they don’t ask about barnard at all…the fact that it was before 1983 is irrelevant.</p>

18

<p>I’m curious–how is it that you are first generation college, yet your parents are teachers?</p>

19

<p>“I’m curious–how is it that you are first generation college, yet your parents are teachers?”</p>

<p>That’s not what she said: that would be contradictory to her claims of legacy.
She put “URM, first-generation college, etc.” in parenthesis to indicate what “Other” meant in her list of accomplishments.</p>

20

<p>the template is copied from a decision thread. i am neither a urm nor (obviously) a first-generation student. those are examples of hooks.</p>

<p>legacy issue: i visited columbia this june and specifically asked an admissions officer if i would be considered a legacy. i told him that my mother had attended barnard 1974-1978. he responded that there would be an extra note made on my card exactly as though she had attended columbia college. the officer then went on to say that this “consideration” was given to children of bc graduates only if their mothers matriculated before 1983. otherwise it is restricted to children of columbia college alumni.</p>

<p>for children of barnard post-1983 matriculants and columbia professional school alumni, they note the connection when they read your file, but they don’t extend the mysterious consideration which they do to pre-coed bc legacies and all cc legacies.</p>