Hi all, thanks in advance for your advice. Any help is greatly appreciated!
Rigorous well-known college prep school in NC
White Female
ACT: 33 Composite 33 Math/Reading 32 English/Science
GPA: School doesn’t calculate, (A range)
Junior year course load: ADV Economics (micro and macro), ADV Biology, ADV literature, Precalc, Spanish
Senior year course load: ADV Calc AB, ADV USH, ADV English Classes, ADV Spanish Classes, Physics Mechanics
Grades: A+ in Econ and Math junior year, As in Spanish English and Bio
Extracurriculars:
2-year captain Varsity Girls golf team
Public Forum Debate team
Debate Novice Trainer
National Honor Society
School Newspaper sportswriter
4 years of service work (Beta and Key clubs)
Academic Outreach Club President (senior year)- organized school outreach to local boys and girls clubs
Summer job 11th grade working in a golf course pro shop
Recommendations:
Plan to have my Bio and Econ teacher write recs should be strong
College counselor- small school, college counselor has a good relationship with W and L admissions team, knows me well
W&L is quite competitive (18% overall admit rate for c/o 2023), but Johnson is a different level. It’s supposed to be close to the top 10% of the student population (10% of the committed–not admitted–student population). It’s really hard to “chance” these kinds of things. You have some fairly impressive stats, but your test scores are right around the average for the school. You’d probably need to bump it up to be competitive for Johnson (even though… I get it, you’re already in the 90+ percentile). Be confident, work hard on those essays, and go for it; nonetheless, understand that higher education is ridiculously competitive and that your chances (like everyone else) aren’t great. I had similar stats (34 ACT, 36 E, 34 R, 32 M, 32 S; 9 DE courses with about 1/2 of the remaining courses were Honors; Mock Trial, Debate team; etc. etc.) and didn’t get Johnson and was waitlisted RD. I wish you the best of luck and hope that you find the right school, wherever it is!
I don’t think the Johnson is about tippy top test scores. I think grades, recs, and the writing samples count, as well as notable achievements in an extra-curricular that would show that one would make a significant campus contribution. My daughter’s ACT composite was only 33 (but she had 36s on Reading and English) but her writing was outstanding, she had national level achievements in her extra curricular activities, and her recs showed that she was a person of high academic achievement and honorable character. She is a Johnson scholar class of '22.