MIT, Georgia Tech, Cal Tech, Purdue... What are my son's chances??

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>My son is going into his senior year and is really wanting to get into a top tier engineering school. He has mentioned MIT, Cal Tech, Purdue, Georgia Tech, Univ of Maryland, Univ of Michigan, Stanford, and Cornell. I was wondering what his chances are at those schools and which ones offer the best financial aid packages???</p>

<p>Rank: 2 out of 440
GPA: 4.0 Don't know his weighted GPA
Ethnicity: Hispanic
ACT: 34<br>
SAT 2100 Will be taking again...</p>

<p>Activities:
Band member for 4 years. Division I band competed at regional level where he was recognized for his solo performance on the sax. Qualified for state competition for sax quartet. Section leader for 2 years.
HOSA member for 4 years... qualified for regional meet and attended national conference.
NHS member for 3 years and NHS president senior year.
People to People Student Ambassador his Sophomore year traveling to France and England.
NASA High School Aerospace Scholar this year... attended NASA weeklong internship this summer.
Masterminds competitor for 3 years.
UIL/TMSCA for debate, math, and science.
Wrestling his freshman year
Food Bank volunteer on various occasions
Blood Drive volunteer
Job shadowing at local hospital
Bible readings at local nursing homes</p>

<p>Has taken:
AP World History - Sophomore year
AP US History - Junior year
AP English III - Junior year
AP Stats - Junior year
AP Physics - Junior year
AP Calculus - Junior year</p>

<p>Will be taking this year:</p>

<p>AP English IV
AP European History
AP Gov/Economics
AP Physics C
AP Calculus B/C
Dual Enrollment - Biology II</p>

<p>Any feedback would be appreciated... Thanks.</p>

2

<p>Stanford, MIT and CalTech are not going to happen with that SAT score.
He has an extreme outside shot at Cornell.
He’s in everywhere else.</p>

<p>What were his SAT II math scores?
What were his AP scores in Calc and Physics?</p>

3

<p>While Stanford, MIT and Caltech are a reach for everyone, he has a shot. Cornell would be a low reach. In everywhere else.</p>

4

<p>soze, you’ve got to be kidding, right? The bottom 25% of HYPSM students have SAT scores of less than 2100.</p>

5

<p>yeah but the bottom 25% of those schools are generally hooked applicants in some way or another. or so I would assume.</p>

6

<p>

Well, a 34 ACT is above the twenty fifth percentile at all of those schools, and most people consider being a URM to be a hook. He is hispanic, which people on CC call a URM.</p>

<p>In sum, he has an ACT score above twenty fifth percentile and he has a hook.</p>

7

<p>I don’t know his SAT II Math scores but he received an AP score of 5 in both Cal and Physics. Thanks for the responses.</p>

8

<p>oh geez sorry I didn’t see that he was hispanic. I would say his chances are good then, to all of the schools listed. I wouldn’t send in the SAT scores if he got a 34 on his ACT.</p>

9

<p>Don’t send the SAT scores as highschoolrules suggested previously, since he did better on the ACT. Stanford, MIT, and Cal Tech are still mid reaches, in my opinion, with a good shot at Cornell and solid matches on the remainder, with Purdue and UMaryland considered safeties.</p>

10

<p>Cal Tech doesn’t really consider race (or athletics, for that manner), but the NASA internship should help, because that show sa dedication to Math and science. For Cal Tech, it is imperative that he has an 800 on the SAT Math II subject test.</p>

11

<p>

Most likely acceptance at Purdue and GT</p>

12

<p>Stanford and MIT are reaches for everyone, but he has a great chance</p>

<p>He is a very low reach or match for everywhere else, i would not be surprised if he got into Cal or Cornell</p>

13

<p>Honestly I think he has a better chance at MIT than he does Cal.</p>

14

<p>Update… S decided against applying to MIT. Instead he applied to Stanford, CalTech, Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, GaTech, Purdue, U of Michigan, UIUC, UT, A&M, Cal Poly, and Cornell. </p>

<p>Just received notice from last university and… he was offered acceptance into all of them. Stanford email came in today. Now to figure out which one to attend???</p>

15

<p>Stanford and MIT are reaches for everyone. I have no experience with the other colleges so I’ll talk about these two briefly to give you a quick idea:
After the grades, they look at subjective aspects like ECAs, recommendations, essays, and interview reports. They’re arguably more important than the grades at that point. Your son’s grades are excellent, especially if that 2100 is split evenly into 3 700’s. If he can get all 3 up to 750’s it would be perfect. Anyway, after the SAT and transcript and such (and it definitely looks like he had a rigorous courseload), they’ll see whether or not your son is a fit with the university, compared to the applicant pool. Therefore, it’s impossible to predict whether or not he’ll be admitted, even if he’s a great fit in your opinion, because there simply might be so many more well-fit applicants in the pool that you don’t know of.
But, if rejected from these schools (the ones that consider the application holistically), you can be sure it wasn’t because of his grades, and more because of bad luck (few spots to offer a lot of excellent applicants.)
Good luck to both of you.</p>

16

<p>well then. Congratulations.
Hopefully I have a good shot with my mediocre grades.</p>