<p>I am a Japanese student in my senior year
I have spent my elementary and middle school years in the American system, but ended up going to a Japanese high school, which I regret right now.</p>
<p>Since last December, I have wanted to apply to colleges outside Japan, and decided to apply to Canadian Universities. But as I did more and more research, I became more interested in American colleges, and decided to shift more towards American colleges.
I took the SAT in October and got a 1990(CR590, Math750, Writing650) and on the TOEFL, 112. I will be taking my subject tests(Math2C and Physics) in December and maybe January
Most likely, I will get a near full score for both of them.</p>
<p>I know I'm on a tight schedule, and that my SAT scores arent so high, but do you think I would have any chance in the big names?Maybe the Ivies or Stanford or even MIT?
Should I apply to Canadian colleges instead, or even carry on with my life in Japan?</p>
<p>Any advice would be helpful
and thank you in advance</p>
<p>I'm not positive of the technicalities regarding this, but you could try asking your high school's academic counselor about international transferring. If they do look at you SAT, you'll probably want to raise it to at least 2150 for the Ivies/Stanford/MIT crowd. I'm not sure if you guys have GPA or what, but if you'd probably want an equivalent of 4.0, which is more or less straight A's. >_<</p>
<p>Nonetheless, the Ivies/Stanford/MIT crowd are private universities rather than public universities, and I think this means you have just as good a shot at them as domestic Americans. So that's good news. :)</p>
<p>Again, definitely see your high school academic counselor for the specifics.</p>
<p>The greatest problem I'm facing right now is that my guidance counsellor doesn't really understand what I'm doing, and above anything, he doesn't understand much English.
I applied early to one college, but my homeroom teacher(IMHO quite fluent in English) ended up doing the guidance counsellor section. And to make things worse, I'm the first student in my school's history to apply to an American institution. </p>
<p>To clear things up a little further,
Most Japanese schools grade their students on a scale of 1 to5.
My gpa on the scale is at 4.34, and in the Japanese system, anything above a 4.3 is considered A, and grades surpassing 4.7 is A(with a circle around it)
It's considered almost impossible to get anything above 4.7, and 4.3 is considered pretty high. However, the school decided not to calculate GPA, as they felt it was irrelevant.
My school also doesn't give out class ranks. i don't have this condirmed, but i have heard that around 10% of a class is ranked A.</p>
<p>Can you guys list specific names of colleges that I should apply to?</p>
<p>Hi
I was looking at the international students thread to find students kind of like me.
We’re pretty much in the same boat. (Regular japanese school, first in the history of the school to take SATs, guidance counselor who had never heard of the common app :P)</p>
<p>About looking about Japanese universities too, i have decided not to take any entrance exams. Have you taken any of those “moshi” or practice tests? If so, is there any chance of you getting into a university of your choice? I know a lot of people who used their ability of fluent English to get into prestigious schools, especially where they put a lot of weight on the English section. Also, are you planning on taking the “center” test?</p>
<p>I understand about the GPA you were talking about. I asked my teacher to write that most of my classes are like the equivalent of an AP in America. </p>
<p>I don’t know what kind of school you’re looking for. What do you want to study? Big or small school? Do you want to attend a liberal arts school?</p>
<p>I found this really interesting because my family is Japanese but I’ve spent most of my life living in the United States - but I’m applying to schools in Japan and my family is pushing towards universities in Japan. I agree with what yawn said earlier about SAT score - Ivies you need at least a 2100 if not higher, on ACT that would a 32+. Being an international student will probably help your chances than if you had stayed in the United States. Because you’ll have more requirements it’s best that you send your application earlier - visa stuff may take a while to get through. Good luck! You also need to take SAT IIs or subject tests for Ivies. Yale requires 2. Hopefully, you’ve already taken them.</p>