Midwest hopeful wondering about ivies and elite summer programs...please reply

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>I tried this before but didn't get any responses, so here it goes.
ME: </p>

<p>junior at Edina High school (very competitive public school in Minnesota, top 100 by newsweek)- How does living in the midwest help in the application process, because I have heard that it makes it easier.</p>

<p>Ethnicity: Chinese and Russian</p>

<p>Scores/GPA:
ACT: 32 (took as a sophomore...going to take it again)
SAT: haven't taken
PSAT: Just got back..225 (pretty sure i'll be a nms)
GPA: 3.95 uw 4.4 (?) w
Rank: 36/500 uw 1/500 w</p>

<p>APs:</p>

<p>Calculus BC -5
Chemistry- 5
Computer Science -4
Euro -4
Human Geography -4
(AP Scholar w/ distinction by end of sophomore year)</p>

<p>Planning to take junior year: AP physics c (both), AP bio, APUSH, AP literature (both), AP statistics, AP enviro science</p>

<p>SAT IIs: planning to take soon</p>

<p>ECs/Awards (All from sophomore yr):
University of Minnesota Talented Youth Mathematics Program (very competitive accelerated math program)
Minnesota Scholar of Distinction in Math
Minnesota Scholar of Distinction in Science (first to do both in one yr and youngest to win either award)
2007 Davidson Fellows Honorable Mention
2007 State Science Fair and JSHS
School Orchestra (9-)
Varsity Debate (9-) I'm kind of a slacker in debate
Science Club (11-)
Math Team (10-)
US Chemistry Olympiad (hoping to qualify this yr)
Math tutor (10-)
Piano (10+yrs- top awards in state)
Started own volunteer non profit company (play music at retirement homes)
University of Minnesota badminton club (youngest member 9-)
Varsity golf (hoping to make it this yr)
Destination Imagination Captain (10-) 2007 global first place
Interned with very esteemed professor of cardiology at the U(niversity of Minnesota)</p>

<p>Summers:
2006- worked at micky d's
2007-Traveled around the world (shanghai, moscow, st petersburg, amsterdam, paris... possible essay topic????)
CDI debate camp
Internship at U of M</p>

<p>Colleges interested in (lots...looking to narrow it down)</p>

<p>HPYS
MIT
U of Minnesota
UW madison
Northwestern
Duke
Hopkins
U Chicago
USC
Wash U
UC berkeley
Caltech
Columbia</p>

<p>Any other Ivies that would be well suited</p>

<p>I'm also wondering about my chances to elite summer programs:</p>

<p>RSI
TASP
Bronfman Fellowship (I'm 1/2 Jewish)
Jackson labs summer internship</p>

<p>Thanks a bunch</p>

2

<p>Looks pretty solid. Write some good essays and you’ll get in wherever you want…I would know. My scores were lower 30 ACT (though better ECs and job experience than you), and I wrote some nice essays and got in HYPS Chicago, NU, etc, etc…So what I’m trying to say is that you should be fine.</p>

3

<p>How many last year? What is the news today…as early info is out. You can see the geographical profiles of each school on their website so you can evaluate for yourself what MN brings you. The fact that your school ranks might hurt and at the moment you have NO standardized test scores to compare.</p>

4

<p>Since you’re OOS, Berkeley will be very difficult. You have a strong GPA/ACT, and you have good honors/awards. Your ECs, though, don’t particularly distinguish you. You still have a good shot, though, as long as your essays were excellent.</p>

5

<p>Thanks for the replies everyone.</p>

<p>Hazmat, last year edina sent 4 kids to Harvard, 3 to columbia, 2 to stanford and probably a lot to schools like NU and madison.</p>

<p>Uh, just to clarify, i’m still a junior, so i haven’t started the application process yet. </p>

<p>Does anyone have any advice on ecs? I thought mine were pretty good with research (probably biggest ec), debate and piano.</p>

<p>How is my location in the midwest going to help me in the application process? I’ve heard that colleges have a lower standard for kids in the midwest because it seems more laid back here. Nothing like the cut throat competition in the West and the East coasts.</p>

<p>Finally, does anyone have any input on summer programs like RSI, Tasp? </p>

<p>Thanks</p>

6

<p>A lot of the replies in the What Are My Chances? Forum show amazing unawareness of the realities of the admission process. The OP’s high school is definitely on the radar screen of every top college in the United States; students go from there to elite colleges every year. </p>

<p>In general, replies on chances threads are too pessimistic. I always laugh when someone comes back to a thread like this a year or so later and reports where he got in–the results are always better than the predicted results implied by the consensus of replies to the thread. </p>

<p>P.S. For what it’s worth, before I learned better than to give replies to chances threads, the way I was wrong was always to imagine that an applicant’s chances were poorer than they actually were. In other words, I too thought that certain applicants would never get into colleges that they actually got into. Now I don’t make predictions anymore. ;)</p>