<p>I'm french and just 14 YO...
I love maths/physics/biology ! But i prefer physics and i want to be an astronautical engineer!
So i want to to know which school is the "best" for that.I think it's the MIT? And i'd like to know if people who are at MIT,Caltech...are just gifted or people who have hard worked in their high school!</p>
<p>Thank you !</p>
<p>And I'm not gifted, just a bit smarter than average...lol!
And i really want to go there and i'm really motivated so i can work hard, but i don't know how to do, someone there can help me?
I really love science and i see some people who know things that my Phd friend doesn't know, and i'd like to know how the do?
Thank you to all of you !</p>
<p>Your typical MIT/Caltech student was head-and-shoulders beyond their high school classmates without really trying. And when they do apply themself, they are competitive in state and national academic competitions. </p>
<p>However, a lot of people fitting the above description think of “gifted” people as like von Neuman or something. It’s all relative.</p>
<p>I am going to MIT next year, and I am going to study aeronautical & astronautical engineering, so I think I can answer your question!!</p>
<p>I can just speak for myself on this one, and I don’t know if everyone else is like me. But I’m no genius, I am just intelligent, and I definitely work hard. I’m not even the best maths student at my high school (then again, I go to a smart school) and I got in to MIT.
What a lot of people think is that you need to be BRILLIANT at math and science from the beginning in order to go to MIT. I don’t think that’s true, you just have to be very very smart and have a genuine interest in learning the math/physics of it all. Then, once you graduate (and do TONS of work), you will be brilliant!</p>
<p>^^that being said though, you will be around the best math/science students in the country. i’m nervous about it.</p>
<p>I got waitlisted at Caltech and rejected at MIT, so I may not be the person you are looking for, but dude, no way, is it only for the extraordinary!! My brother got in and although he was (is) a very hard worker, intelligent and focused, he wasn’t an outright genius!</p>
<p>I have taken the toughest courseload at my school at have an A- average in my classes. They consider your freshman through junior grade if you apply early action, and your freshman through midyear senior grades if you apply regular action.</p>
<p>by hard work, it really means study a lot, and put a lot of effort into something outside of school that you are really passionate about.</p>
<p>I was accepted to MIT last year, but chose to go to Stanford instead (the reasons don’t matter too much for the purpose of this rant). </p>
<p>Now, when people think “gifted” it brings up connotations of people who have some magic problem solving ability or some innate talent that they were born with. While this is true on the very fringes of mental capacities, as long as you display some aptitude (which is built through hard work) and interest then you should have a decent shot at MIT. I never displayed any outstanding aptitude for math or science or physics during my high school career, but I had a strong interest and took the courses that were offered at my high school. I was a good student, who worked hard (at both school and extra-curricular activities), scored within in the middle 25-75% of SAT scores for MIT and answered the prompts on the application. I’m not saying it wouldn’t help to show that you’re really good at math and science and everything, but schools have multiple parts to the application for a reason; they want to see all the sides of you. If you’re a great science and math student: awesome. If you’re a great science and math student who has put serious effort into endeavors that hope to achieve something for someone other than yourself (ie, community), then even better. </p>
<p>Writing ability is huge too. If you can’t write well, how the heck are you going to convey your ideas to the admissions officers? How do they know you outside of your essays? Letters of rec only go so far. I would say work on developing your writing ability. As ironic as it is, that’s probably how I got into one of the best tech schools in the country. </p>
<p>So, NO you don’t have to be gifted. You just have to be good at school, things outside of school and at writing and you’ve got as good of a chance as anyone.</p>
<p>Actually, i can get A(is A- suffisant?) as average in everything(french schools are most difficult than US’s) and i just need to do an incredible thing !(lol) i play guitar, and i’m the best in counter strike if it helps lolz</p>
<p>It depends what you mean by “gifted.” I did not apply to MIT or Caltech, but of those who did get in from my school, they were no doubt at the top of the class. However, there are many who did not get into MIT who could compete with them academically, including myself (even though I didn’t apply, I’m 99% sure I would not have been accepted). Yes, they are extremely smart, but they are not all super-geniuses in the way that most people would probably expect.</p>
<p>You seem to think a 4.0 GPA is the only way colleges assess academic performance. The way they assess performance beyond 4.0 GPA (or close) is to look at the recommendations. Besides what they write, there is a box they can check for the following categories: top student I’ve ever seen, top student this year, top one percent, top 5 percent, etc. So a student with a 3.9 may have recs that mark the “top student ever” box and may in fact rank higher in the classroom performance than a 4.0 in the top 5%.</p>
<p>Secondly, a minority of schools in the U.S. rank on a 100 point system instead of 4 point. Basically, the percent average in each class is reported.</p>
<p>Thirdly, there are plenty of high schools where it is tough to get an “A”. I knew more than a few people who got job offers as professors at HYP and MIT who could not get an A or even a “B” in some of the tougher classes in my high school. And they were trying. </p>
<p>So the unqualified statement “French schools are harder” is incorrect. And as I’ve said before, the existence of a point system doesn’t mean a school is harder as colleges look at several letters of recommendation to assess performance.</p>
<p>French House at MIT (see link). Not everyone is actually from France, but yes, there are French people. You can probably tell by their names who is actually a French citizen.
[url=<a href=“http://web.mit.edu/lmf/www/]Home[/url”>La Maison Française]Home[/url</a>]</p>
<p>For questions, see email below.
<a href=“mailto:lmf-request@mit.edu”>lmf-request@mit.edu</a>
They probably could get you in touch with a French MIT student.</p>
<p>And I’m not saying that US schools are easier or something else, I just say that, to get an “A” in US schools is easier than to get a 20/20 in french schools.</p>
<p>“gifted” was not the adequate word,i juste meant if people who are there were just hard worker or people who get full A without working.</p>
<p>To give you a French reference point, typical MIT admits would be equivalent to French students scoring with at least a mention “Tres Bien” on the French bac, possibly with an award at the Concours General in math or science. The profile is not very different from the top candidates to the Grandes Ecoles such as the Ecole Polytechnique or Ecole Normale Sup. This is from somebody who went through the French Grandes Ecole system and then to MIT for graduate school. </p>
<p>Unfortunately for internationals, the admission bar is typically higher than for US citizens because of a quota on international undergraduate students. At the same time, every candidate is different and there are few French undergrads at MIT as compared to nationals from China, Korea or India for instance. No matter what, you will need a stellar transcript plus some additional awards.</p>