<p>Decision: Rejected</p>
<p>Objective:[ul]
[<em>] SAT I (breakdown): 2300 (CR 740, M 800, W 760, Essay 12) one sitting
[</em>] ACT (breakdown): 35 (E 35, M 36, R 34, Sci 35, Essay 10, Eng&Writing 33) one sitting
[<em>] SAT II: Bio M 800, Chem 800, Physics 800, Math II 800, Chinese 800
[</em>] Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0 (96.xx out of 100.00)
[<em>] Weighted GPA: 101.67 (out of 100.00)
[</em>] Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 2/837
[<em>] AP (place score in parentheses): Biology (5), BC Calc (5), AB subscore (5), APUSH (5), Eng Lang (5), World (5)
[</em>] IB (place score in parentheses): none
[<em>] Senior Year Course Load: AP Gov’t, AP Macroecon, AP Microecon, AP Eng Lit, AP Chemistry, AP Comp Sci A
[</em>] Number of other RD applicants in your school: I think like 5 or so, but they’re all with lower objective stats.
[li] Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.):[/ul][/li]Science Olympiad medals (9 regionals, 2 states), Rochester University Bausch & Lomb Honorary Science Award, NYC Metro Math Fair Bronze Medal, USABO semi-finalist, USNCO semi-finalist, 14th ranked fastest Rubik’s Speedcuber in New York State</p>
<p>Subjective:[ul]
[<em>] Extracurriculars (place leadership in parentheses): Science Olympiad (Engineering & Biology Group Leader), Columbia University Medical Center research internship (helped publish a scientific paper), Rubik’s Cube Club at school (founder & president), Calculus Challenge Team (2nd in country last year), Calculus Tutoring (all tutees got a 5), Jazz Band (lead alto saxophone & president), Webmaster of SciOly and Sci Dept website.
[</em>] Job/Work Experience:
[li] Volunteer/Community service:[/ul][/li]Columbia University internship for one year (Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics professional laboratory work)
Surgical Center (observed and helped with >200 surgeries)
Library
Senior Center</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Writing (Write a brief description and Rate Quality on 1-10 Scale; 10 as Best):[ul]
[<em>] Essays (Include Subjects):[list]
[li] Common App: Rubik’s cube & how it impacted my personality and way I approach and solve problems; original & creative; 10+[/li][</em>] Supplement: Told a story about my pet grasshopper and how his death changed the way I viewed the world. 90% was telling the story; only the last paragraph was actually meaningful stuff. (Same essay worked for Yale EA…O<em>O)
[li] Other:[/ul][/li][li] Teacher Recommendation #1: 5 pages. SHE LOVES ME. from AP Bio teacher <3. basically tells almost everything about me through my activities (likes and dislikes, sense of humor, maturity (O</em>O), etc.) 10+[/li][<em>] Teacher Recommendation #2: 1 page. AP World teacher, like a mom to me. Rec is pretty run-of-the-mill, though. 7?
[</em>] Counselor Rec: Saw afterwards, sort of a laundry list. 5
[<em>] Additional Rec: Wrote it myself and got AP English teacher to sign it. Attests to outstanding writing talent and insight to reading literature (mostly true). 9
[</em>] Interview: Nothing special. Talked about Brokeback Mountain for a bit.
[li] Art Supplement:[/list][/li]NO. there are more than enough people out there more talented than I am at violin, piano, and alto sax, combined. I am in jazz band though :)</p>
<p>Other[ul]
[<em>] Date Submitted App: 3-4 days before deadline? O_O
[</em>] State (if domestic applicant): NY (NEW YORK CITY HOLLAHHH!)
[<em>] Country (if international applicant):
[</em>] School Type: LARGE PUBLIC (4000+ students)
[<em>] Ethnicity: Asian (■■■)
[</em>] Gender: Male
[<em>] Income Bracket: not important here.
[</em>] Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.):[/ul]
Rubik’s cube - 15 second solves; sent a video of a 13.76-sec solve on a CD with my counselor’s rec and transcript and such. Hope they had fun with it 
Great essay writing (?) I’ve been told I have a way with words, apparently HAHAHAS.</p>
<p>Reflection[ul]
[<em>] Strengths: grades (spanish aside), rank, SAT IIs (I BEASTED ALL OF THEM YO!), Rubik’s cube! >:) MUAHAHAHA
[</em>] Weaknesses: Asian, public school isn’t magnet or specialized (quite the opposite actually…), but doesn’t downright suck, either. It’s pretty moderate in terms of grades and smartness of people in general.
[<em>] Why you think you were accepted/waitlisted/rejected: Rubik’s cube? O_O I don’t know how many applicants have sub-15 averages -shrugs- SAT II grades were definitely a plus (haven’t seen another CCer with 5 800s yet :p)
[</em>] What would you have done differently?:[/ul]
not much, really. maybe I should’ve paid more attention in my Spanish classes so my grades wouldn’t have been too terrible there HAHAHAS. might’ve gotten valedictorian too LOL :p</p>
<p>Other Factors:
General Comments/Congratulations/Venting/Commiserations, etc:
Oh wells hahas, I’m not too destroyed. Princeton, UPenn, Yale EA, and Cornell took me so it’s okay. An African-American girl ranked 19th from my school got waitlisted…and also beat me out for MIT & Hopkins. eh. whatever.</p>
<p>YALE FTW ! (probably going to matriculate within the next few days :D)</p>
[/li][/ul]General Comments: Congratulations to everyone accepted!!! :)</p>
With Columbia pending, I’ll most likely be deciding between Wharton and Yale, which were my top choices anyways.</p>
In our opinion, she was accepted because: (1) took nothing for granted; (2) wrote and re-wrote her essays over a 3-month period. Did not stop until she thought they were perfect and were “her”; (3) has a great relationship with all of her teachers and counselors. It was actually difficult choosing which teachers to ask. They were all willing; (4) Interviews very well.; (5) Stats were in the 75% or higher range for every school she applied to; (6) attends a feeder school; (6) sent in all 14 of her apps early (before December 1).