Demographics: White male from a pretty big (~2000), mediocre, public high school in MA.
Intended major: Definitely CS, probably combined with something else (Math or CE most likely).
Academics: SAT: 2360 (single sitting)
SAT II: 800 Math II, 740 physics, 730 US History (single sittings)
Class rank: 10/455
UW/W GPA: UW 3.83, W 4.65
Coursework: Most rigorous possible. Most AP’s out of entire school through self studying. Classes at local CC in tech/higher math. Online courses that my school doesn’t offer.
9th: H Alg 2, H Bio, H Eng 9, H US history, Intro CS, Spanish 1
10th: H Chem, H Precalc/Trig, H Programming, H Spanish 2, APUSH (5), AP Lang (5), CC Computer Hardware, CC Computer Networking
11th: School Newspaper, H Spanish 3, AP Calc BC & subscore (5), AP Lit (4), AP CS (5), AP Physics 1 (5), AP Physics 2 - self study (4), AP US Gov (4)
12th: AP World, AP Physics C: Mech (online), AP Physics C: E&M (online), AP Seminar, AP Stats, Advanced Data Strctures & Algorithms, Newspaper, CC Linear Algebra, CC Calc 3, CC Diff-E-Q
Awards: National AP Scholar, National Merit Commendation, Dartmouth Alumni Book Club Award
Extracurriculars:
-Robotics Team (President this year, Lead programmer for the last 2 years). We compete in botball in the northeast. Not a great team overall, but I put a lot of time into the club and into the process of building and coding the bots. Run by my physics teacher who I’m tight with. I’ve been doing it for 3 years (F/J/SE).
-Computer Club (Founder/President). This is my big one. I devote ALL of my energy to this club, and it serves as the student face of the CS department in our school. We host big events for people to come and learn about tech (hour of code and build a computer day mainly), and we have a lot of different projects going on throughout the year. Planning a hackathon for our members and for nearby schools this year as well. But besides that, the club allows me and my friends to help my programming teacher a lot. Through the time I spend in and out of school on this club and on CS, I helped to design and test the Advanced DS and Algs class that was just started this year. (SO/J/SE)
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->Through Comp Club, we got the opportunity to help the tech department with the rollout of the 1:1 laptop initiative at our school. I help organize logistics, provide tech support, do repairs, and generally act as a student liaison for the whole thing. (J/SE)
-Debate club (president this year). I do group discussion, and placed 6th in states last year. I’ve been doing it for 3 years. (F/J/SE)
*-Northeastern Young Scholars Program - I was 1/24 picked out of ~160 students in MA to be a part of this program. Very selective. Paid research program; I was in the college of computer and information science. Focus on ML, where I looked at blackjack playing and betting strategies. (Summer between J and SE)
Already got my recs:
Programming teacher - 11/10. Incredible, said I was the best he’s ever had - even better than past students who went to Harvard, CMU, MIT, Yale, etc… Really personal and heartfelt and really speaks to my passion for CS and my ability/potential.
Physics teacher - 9/10. Personal, speaks to my leadership and collaborative side. Also really focused on my work ethic and skill in science.
Newspaper advisor - 8/10. Haven’t read, but he told my parents about it and they said it sounded pretty good.
Counselor - Generic. Basically rehashed my resume/transcript, but did put some emphasis on the work I do in the high school community/my maturity when speaking and dealing with teachers. Talked about a big presentation I gave to all the faculty/staff and said that I sounded like a seasoned adult presenter, so that’s a plus.
Professor from YSP - ?/10. Haven’t read. He was out for half of my time there since his wife gave birth during the program, and when he was there, he was kind of an absentee advisor. He would have nothing bad to say, but probably just spoke about my work and results and that I was a good little researcher.
I thought the essays I sent into my EA schools were pretty solid. Not perfect, but showed my personality and interests a whole bunch. I’m only nervous for MIT essays since I didn’t spend a lot of time explicitly stating my love of CS - hoping that comes through the recommendations/EC’s/blurbs I did include/research.
Schools:
MIT EA
Northeastern EA
UMass Amherst EA
Caltech
Stanford
UCB
CMU SCS
Possibly more depending on how my EA round turns out
Any advice or thoughts would be appreciated