Hi everyone, thank you for taking the time to read this!
As March Madness draws near (and I’m not referring to basketball), I would like to know my chances at my reach schools. I have already been accepting to a few of my matches/safeties like SDSU, UC Irvine (CHP), and Cal Poly SLO, and for this I am very very grateful.
Could you please tell me my chances at:
UC Berkeley
UCLA
Stanford
Cornell
Penn
Carnegie Mellon
Of those on this list, I am mostly interested in Cal, UCLA, Stanford, and Penn. I wasn’t really into Penn until recently, but I’ve really come to like the environment and offerings there, and I would love to attend. Anyway, please offer me your input.
My 9-12 GPA is 4.42 weighted/3.81 unweighted. My 10-11 is 4.57 weighted/3.80 unweighted. My ACT composite is 35 with a 10 essay, and I have a 1560 SAT. I have SAT II scores of 720 (Chem) and 770 (Math II). I will have taken 17 APs by the end of HS, 11 of which were completed by the end of junior year. So far I have taken 9 AP tests, with all 5s and 4s except for one 3. I am a National AP Scholar and a National Merit Finalist. As for ECs, they are quite diverse. I don’t want to give too much away, but I am really into music, and I did an internship in the field of my intended major. Intended major is bio/biochem btw.
Thank you all…I am hoping to get into at least 2-3 of my reaches.
I think you’ll get into at least one of your reaches! Everything seems solid and I wish you could say more about your ECs but I understand. Also, how does your GPA rank compared to others in your school?
I think you’ll get into Cal and UCLA; I’m surprised you didn’t get Regents/early admission for either of them. Out of the remaining schools, I think you may gain admission to one.
Chance back? Lol… I feel the March Madness coming on.
Sorry, I don’t see any of those schools coming out with the NCAA Championship this year. I doubt Penn will even make it out of the Ivy League. UCLA’s got a chance, especially with Lonzo Ball leading the way. However, I don’t see them topping other well-rounded teams such as UNC and Villanova.
Chance my basketball programs back (Michigan and Northwestern)? I know they’re reaches (may not even get into the tournament) but I’d like a realistic perspective of their title aspirations.
Apparently, you have damaged your (UW) GPA with taking too many APs. And that may hurt you at the end … for schools such as UCLA/UCB where GPA is the primary factor in the admission.
You may actually have a better chance with other more competitive schools (i.e, Penn, Cornell, CM and may be even Stanford!) where rigor and score play a bigger role.
^ they do but not as much as GPA. Still your UC GPA (which you did not mention but I assume to be better with that many APs ?) may help you and make up for the lower UW GPA!
I think you have a really strong shot at UCLA and CMU. I talked with an admissions officer from UCLA a few months back, and from what I gathered I feel that you have a really good shot. (no guarantees though).
Berkeley L&S should be okay for you as well if you have more leadership or awards (NMF is a good start).
For the other schools it really starts to become much less about the stats (they assume you are good with that) and more about your ECs, background, competition performance, research experience, leadership positions, etc. So if you aren’t terribly strong in that regard (you haven’t given us too much detail in this regard), I think those would be likely reject unless you have something more impressive up your sleeve (don’t be pressured to share though).
Your scores and course rigor are awesome! I can’t tell much without ECs. Since I’m going under the assumption that you haven’t won any national awards and (forgive me if I seem harsh) just doing music and having one internship might not be enough, I would say:
i thought UCLA and Cal cared a lot about rigor, though? and my ACT and SAT won’t help?