I’m a senior in Texas and I need some serious help cutting down my list. My goal is ten. I’d like to keep the free applications on here as well.
GPA: 4.2225 W/ ~3.8 unweighted
Class Rank: Top 7%
SAT: 2170
ACT: Taking September (scoring between 29-33)
SAT 2: Taking Math 2 and US History in October
Awards: Regional and State History fair awards, 3rd place in basketball tournament, orchestra awards, AP scholar with distinction
Summer Activities: Working, TASS, NIDA Internship, Dartmouth Bound
Race: Black
Gender: Female
Income: 80,000-90,000
Proposed major: Bio/Neuroscience (may change to something more humanities-ish)
I don’t really like hot weather. Qualities I like in a school: collaborative, not too focused on one field, small to mid size, good professors, good research/internships
Schools (in no order):
Penn
Dartmouth (free app)
Harvard (lol)
Brown
Duke
Johns Hopkins
Tufts
Haverford
Vanderbilt
Emory
USC
Scripps
Pomona
Rice
Tulane (free app)
Spelman
Bryn Mawr
UT
UTD
Please help me take some of these colleges off my list because I’m really stuck. Also the reason its so reach heavy is because I already have UTD and (maybe) UT because of automatic admission. Thanks for the suggestions!
You said you “don’t really like hot weather.” Let’s start there and remove all the universities in hot places, except for your Texas safeties and free app at Tulane, since you want to keep those:
Duke
Johns Hopkins
Vanderbilt
Emory
USC
Scripps
Pomona
Rice
Spelman
Wash U
That leaves you with 10 universities, your target number:
Penn
Dartmouth (free app)
Harvard (lol)
Brown
Tufts
Haverford
Bryn Mawr
Tulane (free app)
UT
UTD
That’s a good eliminating factor, I wonder why I didn’t think of it before.But, for some reason, I have a real affinity for Duke and have been wanting to apply there so I may just switch it in for Bryn Mawr or Tufts. Thanks for the suggestion!
Take Penn off. It is neither small nor is it collaborative. Biology will be a competitive major because so many students are preprofessional. This means premed, prevet, and pre-dental. Keep Tufts and Bryn Mawr.
Have you run net price calculators for all of them? They are on the financial aid webpage of each colkege. Can your family pay what is shown? That could make a difference in your list.
I’ve run net price calculators for almost all of them and most them range within ~ 15,000-25,000 without loans (with the exception of Harvard, which is much, much less). My parents don’t really want spend that much (mostly because Harvard is so much cheaper) but we do have a 529 plan. Also, as for Penn, I’m thinking about taking it off my list because I did hear it’s kinda competitive,but I’m applying to PEEP, so I’ll wait on that decision before taking it off my list.