Long Island ISEF 2nd Place/NSDA 14th, Trying to Pursue Formula One Engineering, Trying to Pick a REA/ED

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Asian American Male
US Citizen
Long Island, New Yorok
Public High School (Competitive)

Intended Major(s)
Intended Major: Aerospace/Mechanical Engineering

Weighted HS GPA (98.34/100)
Unweighted HS GPA (District does not provide, I have 3 B+s in AP/Honors classes)
SAT: 1550, 800 English 750 Math (Will take one last time in August)

Coursework

  • AP Psychology (5)
  • AP World History (5)
  • AP United States History (5)
  • AP English Language (5)
  • AP Computer Science Principles (4)
  • AP Computer Science A (4)
  • AP Statistics (4)
  • AP Physics 1 (4)
  • AP Physics C - next year
  • AP Calc BC - next year
  • AP Literature - next year
  • AP Government - next year
  • AP Microeconomics - next year
  • Spanish 4/(Maybe AP Spanish, trying to switch) - next year
  • Johns Hopkins University Engineering Innovation college-level summer course (A)
  • I have 3 B+s total, in AP Physics 1, AP Statistics, and a honors Math Theory class my district provides

Awards

  • ISEF 2nd Place Grand Award
  • Lincoln Douglas Debate NY State Champion
  • Top-15 finish at NSDA Nationals in Lincoln-Douglas Debate
  • AIME Qualifier
  • Top-3 finish at Princeton Classic in Lincoln-Douglas Debate

Extracurriculars

  • Captain of Lincoln-Douglas Debate
  • Founder of school F1 in Schools club, team qualified as North American Finalists
  • Founder of F1/motorsport-inspired clothing/streetwear brand (raised $1000 for Urban Youth Racing School, motorsports/stem education nonforprofit)
  • Co-founder of ISEF Machine Research Bootcamp
  • Member of Mid-Atlantic Interscholastic Sailing Association Sailing Team (Varsity-level)
  • Published paper in fairly prestigious scientific research journal
  • Nominated to Sigma Xi Research Honor Society
  • Interned at Ferrari designing next-generation electric vehicles

Essays

  • Personal statement will be about my passion for Formula One and desire to pursue an engineering/team leadership role with an F1 team
    LORs
  • From my English Honors teacher and Research Director, should both be very good at least in my opinion

Cost Constraints/None

Schools

  • Duke (ED)
  • Penn (ED)
  • Harvard (REA)
  • Princeton (REA)
  • Yale (REA)

Personal Note: I know I have struggles in the GPA area, which will harm me, but I have never been the best student nor test taker, and as such I hope my awards/extracurriculars can make up for it. My dream is to one day be the Team Principal of a Formula One racing team, and I will express that in my essays/supplementals. I am currently trying to choose a school to ED to. I loved Duke, Penn, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale. I know that ED-ing to Duke and Penn are statistically more advantageous than REA-ing to Harvard/Yale/Princeton. Do I have enough of a
realistic shot at Harvard, Yale, or Princeton given my holistic strenghts and weaknesses to warrant risking REAing, or should I ED to Duke or Penn? I like Duke and Penn very much. I think that I have a unique passion/interest, and strong awards, but admittedly a not-perfect GPA record.

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I can’t chance you or help with the ED/REA decision. You should definitely clear the bar in terms of academic expectations – despite how you might feel about your GPA – but I don’t feel qualified enough to analyze your chances any further.

The only thing I see that I would encourage you to reconsider is your personal statement topic. Admissions officers will see your passion for F1 through your clubs, internship, and choice of major. If you expand even further on this interest in an essay, you are squandering an opportunity to say something new and interesting about yourself. Mentioning this interest in an essay can be okay, if it happens organically, but I would not make it the focus of your personal statement.

One last question/comment: You mention that your second LOR will be from your “Research Director.” Is this an AP research course or someone who supervised research work outside of school? Some of the schools on your list will require two teachers. Princeton, for instance, wants two teachers in two different core subject areas (English, language, humanities, social sciences, natural sciences or math).

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There’s nothing wrong with your GPA or your SAT score (a 1570 or 1580 won’t move the needle for you in this test optional world). Your ECs and awards are indeed strong and should help you.

Yes you certainly do, but as you’re likely aware these schools are super reaches for almost all students, because they get so many outstanding applicants. So, which other schools are on your list where you have a much higher chance of acceptance?
There are excellent engineering programs at public flagships that are higher ranked for aero/mech than the schools on your list and have a higher acceptance rate.

Finally, regarding ED: you have checked that all these schools are comfortably affordable to your family?

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I’m honestly surprised this is your list based on your intended major and your F1 ecs. Have you looked into Michigan, Cornell, GT or Purdue?. IMO all would be stronger programs for your intended major and interests.

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Adding Oregon State as a top destination for F1 engineering.

@hebegebe, thoughts on OP’s REA/SCEA/ED choice?

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Confuse him more :slight_smile:

OP I agree - lots of schools strong in automotive. And I agree with @momofboiler1

I’d ask this a lot your initial question. These schools vary - in strengths, environment, geography, etc.

Have you been to all? Which is right for you ?

Sure you can ED1/2 but you don’t need to ED at all. No point in gaming for admission and then attending a school that isn’t your favorite.

Btw there are schools that have motor sports programs. Both UNCC and IUPUI rate highly.

You can likely get to F1 or motor racing from any school.

For automotive, I’d likely add Clemson and ASU as safeties. Frankly you’d likely be better off overseas at a school like Cranfield.

Good luck.

Ultimately you need to choose the right school for you. It sounds like you are looking to play the admissions game and that’s dangerous as you will be at the school four years - day after day.

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My son also loves F1. We spent a lot of time looking into this.

Try looking into schools with strong Formula SAE teams. Strong schools in this area may not be the same schools you are thinking about as high prestige right now. For example, here are a few schools with outstanding teams that could launch you into this career, that are also much more likely for admission than the schools on your current list:

Oregon State - Global Formula Racing
U Minnesota Twin Cities - Gopher Motorsports
U Akron - Zips Racing

F1 teams like Red Bull actively recruit students from Formula SAE teams at schools like Oregon State. Here’s an article that you might enjoy: https://www.redbull.com/us-en/theredbulletin/global-formula-racing-formula-sae

Here’s an in-depth video from UMN’s team that is a great way to learn more about what students do in Formula SAE: Gopher Motorsports: How Students Design and Build Race Cars - YouTube

For more selective schools to add to your list, I would look at schools like U Michigan, UIUC, Georgia Tech, Purdue. Michigan is probably the strongest Formula SAE team right now (at a very strong engineering school as well).

As @tsbna44 mentioned, there are also overseas universities, particularly in the UK and Germany, that are very strong in Formula Student and are feeders to F1 careers. However, going overseas isn’t a requirement for this career as we do have many good schools in the US as well. Students told us that the F1 teams actively recruit from all the best programs.

When you visit each school, write to the Formula SAE team, and ask if you can come meet with them when you visit the school. This turned out to be the absolute best way for my son to learn about each school. This way, he could see the project facilities and resources available for teams at each school, and talk to other MechE students to learn more about each school’s program, and which companies and teams recruit from that school.

Another thing to consider when visiting schools is how students apply to join each team. For example, my son was very interested in UW Seattle since they have a strong FSAE electric vehicle team, but then he visited them and found out that the team rejects most applicants. He did not want to attend a school where he did not have a good chance of actually getting to join the FSAE team.

I am not sure why you have schools like HYP on your list, if F1 is truly your goal. For example, Harvard doesn’t have a FSAE team, as far as I know.

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I agree with this list of colleges.

Stepping back a bit, there seem to be three major ways to get onto an F1 team these days. The first is to be involved in powertrains. The second is to be involved in data analytics (an F1 car generates about 3 terabytes of data of data during a race, and this data stream is used to make real-time decisions). And the third is to be a talented racer who isn’t good enough to race in F1 (the principals of Red Bull and Mercedes fit this category).

If we look at the first two paths, the above listed colleges work for both of the first two paths. Other colleges that are great for the second path include strong CS programs like CMU, Berkeley, MIT, and Stanford.

The OP has listed a set of great colleges, but I don’t really understand how they are related to F1. In terms of chancing, the ISEF 2nd place grand award is normally considered a significant boost. Does it relate to motorsport in any way?

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