<p>English and Mandarin are my native languages. My mom was a stickler about teaching me to read and write Chinese from an early age, and I’m so grateful to her for that. I then lived in Montreal for a year in elementary school, where I became fluent in French since all the classes were taught in that language. I took Spanish in school since middle school up to AP level and beyond, and have practiced with native speakers at every chance I get. I’ve been self-studying German since 9th grade, occasionally with the help of tutors but mostly on my own. To prove my claims of fluency, I took the APs and SAT IIs for all these languages - 750 SAT II Lit and 5’s for both AP English Lang and Lit, 800 SAT II Chinese and 5 AP Chinese, 800 SAT II French and 5 AP French, 790 SAT II Spanish and 5 AP Spanish, and 4 AP German and… (gulp) 530 SAT II German with Listening. This was one of the November SAT IIs I was talking about earlier. I took the test in a testing center abroad, so it was the international version, but my listed address on my admission ticket and answer sheet was in the U.S., so I suspect they may have used the answer key for the U.S. tests to grade mine by mistake. I just returned from the post office - I sent my score verification request via mail. Fingers crossed…</p>
<p>Anyway, about learning the languages, I’d say that exposing yourself to as much of the language as possible is by far the best way to learn. Immersion trips rock! </p>
<p>(This post got a lot longer than I wanted it to be…)</p>
<p>@Bob- Yes. It’s on Harvard’s website. December 15th at 5 p.m. eastern time sharp. Though it can take upto two hours from there to get your email. I think they send them out in regional “waves.”</p>
<p>I applied to Yale RD. Not applying to Princeton, and at this point probably not to Stanford either. But I did submit an application to the University of Cambridge for Law. :P</p>
<p>@waitingforIvy, I still see only one spot in the “future plans” section. I just made a new version of the common app and it still only lets you choose one.</p>
<p>when I submitted my Emory app, though, I chose more than one route of interest. Maybe you’re thinking about some other school’s application?</p>
<p>@smart-No, I don’t think many do. I just think that some think that not putting down anything hampers their chance of admission and as a result, even though they have a vague idea, they put something down. After all, they’re not going to get questioned right?</p>
<p>But I have more respect for applicants that put undecided because they’re being honest about it and want to explore what they want to do. That’s part of what the first 1.5 years of College are for (at least that’s what my Princeton interviewer told me). :D</p>
<p><em>sigh</em> I’d love to study in England, but there’s no way that we’d ever be able to afford it. What other schools are you all applying to that give out good merit aid?</p>
<p>:O am i the only one that went to school early? i just turned 16 among all these 17 year olds in the harvard applicant pool. feel so insignificant and small >.<</p>
<p>My mom was actually talking to me regarding the possibility of a gap year at the start of my senior year, because she was concerned that I would be too young to start college right away. She also had a number of concerns, some of which were related to my health. Then it turned out that the best school I was accepted to was UC Berkeley, but as a non-U.S. citizen it turned out to be incredibly expensive. This year was a way for me not just to take time off, away from a stressful school schedule, but also a chance to develop my interests more in-depth and to use them in a more “real-world” kind of sense. This has definitely been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I’ve had so many opportunities to travel, meet people, do new stuff, gain new insights into what I want to eventually do, etc.</p>
<p>Has anyone learned (by reading through old thread perhaps) if a deferral to RD is the kiss of death since the application has already been deemed marginal at best? Or do the apps really go into competition with the others on an equal footing?</p>
<p>^looking at past years Yale threads, it seems that deferred applicants are accepted at least at the same rate as RD applicants, so I wouldn’t call it kiss of death. I suppose Harvard will do the same, otherwise what would be the point of deferring? They could reject right away to lessen their own workload</p>
I then lived in Montreal for a year in elementary school, where I became fluent in French since all the classes were taught in that language. I took Spanish in school since middle school up to AP level and beyond, and have practiced with native speakers at every chance I get. I’ve been self-studying German since 9th grade, occasionally with the help of tutors but mostly on my own. To prove my claims of fluency, I took the APs and SAT IIs for all these languages - 750 SAT II Lit and 5’s for both AP English Lang and Lit, 800 SAT II Chinese and 5 AP Chinese, 800 SAT II French and 5 AP French, 790 SAT II Spanish and 5 AP Spanish, and 4 AP German and… (gulp) 530 SAT II German with Listening. This was one of the November SAT IIs I was talking about earlier. I took the test in a testing center abroad, so it was the international version, but my listed address on my admission ticket and answer sheet was in the U.S., so I suspect they may have used the answer key for the U.S. tests to grade mine by mistake. I just returned from the post office - I sent my score verification request via mail. Fingers crossed…</p>
</p>
But I did submit an application to the University of Cambridge for Law. :P</p>