Hello College Confidential, I’m wondering what schools would be a “matches” and “safeties” for me.
Summary of my stats:
1480 PSAT (Very very likely NMSF, then 15k out of 16k get NMF, so that is likely as well)
1540 SAT
Straight As and A+ in all honors and APs. Will have taken 9 APs after this year (junior) is over. Only taking 2-4 next year, though, the rest “Post AP”.
Hispanic
Volunteer at a hospital (every summer) and a food pantry (last summer and this coming summer)
Had a paid internship over last summer working in a corporate office
Will have played in band 4 years at end of high school (and pep band)
Will have been on varsity weightlifting team for 3 years by end of high school
Will have been a member for 3 years and VP this year, P next year of a school political club.
Competed a few times in math/science competitions (all group competitions, though, small groups of 6)
Awards:
Won TEAMS competition two years/3 first place in state
First place in a local south florida chemistry competition (these two are the competitions i referenced earlier)
School math award 10th grade
and science award 10th grade
in 10th grade, only 2 department awards were given per grade, so I was one out of two for both of these.
Slightly over 200 ppl in my grade @ a private school.
11th grade school science award (they bumped it up to 4 people this year)
RPI Medal 11th grade
Generic stuff
NEHS, Rho Khappa
Here are a couple safeties I’ve come up with.
Full tuition/hopefully ride to UM
Full ride to UF (NMF scholarship)
Southern Methodist
What other schools should be safeties and what schools would I match with well?
I am open to any kind of school, LAC or research uni.
Are my safeties I listed too easy to get into to be even considered safeties?
A few schools other schools i’m interested in include, but are not limited to:
Wake Forest, U Richmond, Washington and Lee, Harvard, Princeton, Emory, Duke, Washu, Vandy, UScalifornia, Georgia Tech, Brown, Cornell
Could you all let me know what my chances would be for these schools? I appreciate it alot!
Schools with very low acceptance rates can’t be considered a match even though your stats technically make it look like it’s a match. What was your selection index for the PSAT?
@doschicos Yes, I would need to be on Financial aid to attend these schools.
Why wouldn’t cornell be a match? Am I missing something? Quite a few people with weaker stats from my school have gotten in.
I’d argue a school with a 12.5% acceptance rate is a reach for everyone. Your stats are impressive but tons of students with similar stats get turned away each year.
Do you qualify for need based aid or are you looking for merit aid?
So, there are tons of colleges out there. What exactly are you looking for? What are your areas of academic interest? Do you prefer rural, suburban, urban? Size preference? Is there a type of student body you see yourself fitting in with more readily? I see a few more preppy/conservative type schools on your list like SMU, W&L, and then I see Brown which is very different.
@doschicos I appreciate the help, even if my words may seem somewhat vitriolic (it’s hard to tell how people are expressing their words online).
I am conservative idealogically, but am not preppy at all. I am willing to go to a liberal leaning school, though, as most schools are that. Ideally I’d fit in with a school that has a little bit of everyone in terms of both race and ideology. I do like rural schools and urban schools. NYC seems cool. The problem for me is I wouldn’t be afford to have all my fun off campus. So, I’d really like a school that has a good campus life and not everyone having to spend the nights out and blow money. I kinda crossed Columbia off my list for this reason and the fact that they are very very left leaning.
My academic interests are largely stem.
I would probably be picking from Math or Chemistry, possibly double majoring. I’d also like to come out of college fluent in Chinese (just taking a couple classes every year would do that). Big schools would work. Small schools are cool too.
Originally I had narrowed my college list down quite alot because I was only going to apply to schools I could get merit from (with the exception of Harvard and Princeton, which give high quality FA). However, we talked to an advisor and figured out that we would receive a good amount of financial aid at almost any top institution. So, now I need to give a long look at the top schools again.
As an aside, due to your interest in Chinese, check out these programs - merit scholarships fully funded by the US State Dept. whereby you could study in Chinese in China.
Check out these LACs strong in STEM: Carleton, Haverford, Williams
Davidson would be a good LAC with a middle of the road student body.
For schools that would be more matches (and a safety or two): and more middle of the road: Denison, Lafayette, Bucknell, Franklin & Marshall, Dickinson, Colby, Colgate, Hamilton, St. Olaf, Sewanee, St. Lawrence. Some of these provide merit scholarships in addition to need based aid.
If you are female, there are a few women’s colleges I’d recommend considering.
One other thing to think about… make sure that the financial aid they are offering is gift aid and not mostly loans. It depends on the school, for example, a highly ranked OOS public may be more generous with gift aid to a state resident and offer OOS students mostly loans. You’ve listed quite a few private schools which may increase your odds, so your research should include how much need is met, and how much need is met with gift aid vs. loans. You can find this information on the common data set for each school and run the NPC for each school. So… your first hurdle is acceptance to these top schools (a school with a 12.5% acceptance rate is a reach for everyone, because 87.5% are denied), then your next challenge is making sure the FA doesn’t strap you with too much debt.
Don’t base matches off of stats when yours are that high because that would mean your matches (meaning schools you have a decent chance of getting in) would be schools with a 10-20% acceptance rate, which is completely wrong. Matches for you, I think, would tend to be schools with a 25-35% acceptance rate and a safety would be 35% and above.
U Richmond would be a match/safety, along with Brandeis and Wake Forest. Emory and Washington and Lee (maybe) are matches. Brown, Harvard, Duke, WashU, Vandy, Cornell, and any school below 20% will be a reach, but personally I think you have a shot at the Ivies and you could probably get into at least one school below a accept 15% rate IF you make your essays really shine along with your good ECs and stats.
By the way, I strongly believe that Brown is the most liberal school on your list, especially compared to Duke, Vandy, UR, and others, so I would do extensive research to make sure you want to apply to Brown and visit to see if you really do like the vibe and liberal atmosphere (the application is also pretty heavy-duty so don’t waste time on it if you don’t care).
@doschicos Which of the following LACs would you say are the strongest in stem?
Claremont, Pomona, Amherst, Williams?
I am a guy BTW.
I visited Davidson, but I did not like the vibe for some reason. Everyone there seemed incredibly polite and the campus was very nice, but for some reason I didn’t like it too much. I think that maybe because they have many Gen Ed requirements and you can only test out of a couple with APs. @snorkelmom Very true. Umiami offers mostly “self help”. It is actually ridiculous the amount of loans they would want me to take.
For the record, I’ve visited Davidson, Wake Forest, UF, UMiami, and Emory. While Emory is a better school than Wake, I really loved Wake’s campus.
I feel like Financial aid is drastically different at schools like Hamilton vs Harvard… And I’d only be able to afford school at the latter.
@doschicos The cost is the most important part of the puzzle to me. I need to first figure out which schools have the best financial aid, then I can worry about fit.
Do you guys worth it’s applying EA to Harvard or princeton. I recognize it is restrictive, but it nearly triples the admission rate. Harvard’s website says that they don’t favor ea vs rd, but what do you guys think?
I’m honestly not very familiar with Claremont and Pomona to have an opinion but I’d give an edge to Williams on STEM over Amherst but Amherst has the benefit of few required courses if that is desirable to you. You’d get a stellar education at either. Amherst also has the 5 college consortium which provides a very broad range of course options if needed.
That’s why it’s a good idea to look at the FA picture now while you’re doing the research. Then there won’t be any huge surprises next spring! And BTW, make sure you have a financial safety that you love on the list. If you are in FL, that might be UF, with your NMF scholarship.
