Is this a realistic college list?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

I’m beginning essays and applications, and I’m wondering if my list is realistic. Here are my stats:

Testing and grades
*GPA: 3.9
*ACT: 36
*AP: Art History (5), U.S. History (4), Environmental Science (5), English Language and Composition (5), Calculus AB (4), Psychology (5), will take AP Stats senior year
*Based on past scores from my state, I’m likely to be a national merit scholar, but it’s hard to tell with the new test and selection index scale.

Extracurriculars
Varsity tennis, Co-Student Council President, Yearbook, Library Teen Advisory Council member, Poverty Awareness Initiative (students raise donations, sleep outside in boxes) organizer for a year, Diversity Day (day of panels on topics within diversity) head organizer for 2 years, theater (acting and crew), co-founded a school literary magazine

College Classes
Took Calculus and Analytic Geometry II at an online college (got B-, which is in GPA), will take 2 more classes this fall

Summer Activities
*Wilderness Leadership Camp
*Working on organic vegetable farm
*Leader in Training camp (camp counselor training)

And here’s my current list:

*Carleton
*University of Wisconsin - Madison
*Williams
*Yale
*Vassar
*Bowdoin
*Wesleyan
*Columbia
*Brown
*Colby
*Pomona
*Bates

Am I being too ambitious? I’m fairly sure that I’ll get accepted to Madison, but how likely is it that I’ll get into the other schools?

If I’m aiming too high, does anyone have suggestions of LACs that would be good safeties for me?

Thanks so much! (:

2

I would say Carleton, Williams (?), Vassar, Bowdoin, and Wesleyan are all matches for you. I would be surprised if you didn’t get in to almost all of them. I think Bates, Colby, and UW could all be considered safeties, and the rest are reaches, but definitely not out of the picture. Congrats on your ACT! Middlebury is also a good, LAC similar to the ones on your list. You could also consider Macalaster and Claremont McKenna as more safety type schools. Good luck!

3

*Carleton – Match
*University of Wisconsin - Madison – Safety
*Williams – Reach
*Yale – Reach
*Vassar - Low Match
*Bowdoin - Low Match
*Wesleyan – Low Match/Safety
*Columbia – Reach
*Brown – Reach
*Colby – Low Match/Safety
*Pomona – Reach
*Bates – Low Match/Safety

What are you interested in studying? That will further determine whether these colleges are in your caliber.

4

Is your GPA weighted or unweighted?

Also, be you have shown interest at the colleges that care; you can tell by Googling the Common Data Set for each school.

5

You have the numbers to get into every one of your schools but your ECs are a little lacking. I’d say you’ll probably get into your safety, Vassar, Colby, Bates, Carleton, Wesleyan, Bowdoin and possibly one Ivy (Williams and Pomona are too unpredictable).

@keeponswimmin How is Claremont McKenna a safety school?! With an acceptance rate of 9.4%, I’d say it would be a low reach even for this applicant (unless it is very self-selecting).

Hamilton is a similar college that would be a safer college for you.

Chance back?

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1903498-separate-my-college-list-into-low-medium-high-reach-match-or-safety-i-will-chance-back.html

6

Also, applying early to one of your schools would increase your chances. Are you considering one in specific?

7

@keeponswimmin thanks for the congratulations :slight_smile:
@Neurological I’m undecided at the moment, but leaning towards English, Psychology, or History
@intparent My GPA listed is UW.
@ap012199 Where would you say I most need to improve my ECs (and is there anything I can do at this point)? I don’t like any of the schools more than the others enough to apply ED, but I might single choice early action at Yale.

Thank you all for the feedback!

8

I would say try to do an NTA (Non-teenager activity) over the summer involving one of your career interests; this will impress adcoms (since it’s usually an adult activity). If you like English, maybe try writing a short story and entering a competition or something of that sort.

9

Great essays will also make up for lack of ECs

10

LOL at Claremont McKenna as a safety. Also at Wesleyan as a “low match safety” while on the same list Carleton is a match… Good stuff.

But more on topic, great stats! Good work. I would recommend it wouldn’t hurt to get a second clear safety besides UW because none of the rest are true safeties. That said, you are very likely to get into many of these. In ranked order of difficulty for admission it probably goes like this (hardest to least hard):

*Yale
*Brown/Columbia
*Pomona
*Williams
*Bowdoin
*Wesleyan
*Carleton/Vassar/Bates
*Colby
*University of Wisconsin - Madison

Good luck.

11

@ap012199 I know they have a low acceptance rate, but also the same average ACT as most safety schools for this person. I don’t think they would have any problem getting in, based on people I know that have.

12

Wes & Carleton have almost identical acceptance rates, and Wes is test optional. So I would say Carleton is slightly harder to get into than Wes. Other than that, I agree. CMC would be pretty close to Pomona & Williams in “reachiness”.

13

Any school with an acceptance rate below 15% should not be a safety.

14

@intparent for the Class of 2020, Wesleyan had an admit rate of 17.5% (more like 14% for RD) from 12,030 applicants. Carelton had an admit rate of 22% from 6,500 applicants. Being test optional would only help the OP’s admission prospect if their scores were below average but with a perfect ACT score the OP is going to want to report and it will only help with both schools. I only ranked Wesleyan as slightly harder to get into than Carleton so no need to quibble, but it’s hard to see it being listed as easier given the above.

15

Both Wesleyan and Carleton are not as easy to get into as you might think. You need at least another safety preferably one with rolling admissions. i would suggest possibly Michigan as a match and Pitt as a safety.

16

@bookmama22 do you know how the OOS financial aid is at Michigan and Pitt?

17

What @citivas and @bookmama22 said. Any school with holistic admissions and a rate below 30% might be a match for some, including the OP, but I wouldn’t call it a safety. And much depends on location. Wesleyan seems particularly difficult for kids from the northeast. I wouldn’t call Bowdoin anybody’s “low match” either.

@citivas’ ranking is in the ballpark, though I wouldn’t bother to distinguish between some of those and might move Bates under Carleton/Vassar, closer to Colby.