Ok. Chance me.

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

So I want to start as anyone would start in this forum. I want to apply to UPenn, Harvard, NYU, University of Miami and Columbia University.
And these are my statistics:

SAT: higher than 1450 expected
No extracurricular activities to report
Converted GPA to 4.85 from my south american high school.
No APs, they aren’t available in my country.

I know what you are thinking… or probably not, or I shouldn’t know. I am a just a student.

Well, actually I am also a person, an 18 years old peruvian male, and I know what is the difficulty to get into these universities.

And I want to know from you if I have a chance, but I think you should consider these things:

I always like to think in a global way. Every new invention, discovery or study I like to think what could them benefit not only a certain country, but the whole planet earth. When I travelled to another countries, I didn’t feel like I was some kind of an inferior person, or a superior person. My parents always thought me that everybody in the world are equal in value. I always felt that every culture, and I mean everyone, is interesting and contributes to our world society. Even if in my country were some political parties, I have never been in favor of a political tendency of the left or right. I think that the center tendency would be the one I would support, because I don’t like that a person is ignored or rejected by his political thinking. What I think is that everybody has something useful for the world, not only the left or the right, everybody has something to give to all of us.

Look, I think it doesn’t matter what a paper says about your knowledge or your activities you didn’t do. The universities doesn’t like at all, in my opinion, when you are like a robot, an almost same copy of another student, who likes to memorize formulas, doesn’t create or propose new ideas but just solve them, and, the worst of all, just thinking about the grade and the degree and nothing else.
These universities doesn’t want that, they want their students to think so they can learn. They want them to not be just focused on their lives, but on the rest of them, they want them to be a very singular person, a person who has a personality, probably, and that balance his imagination and his intelligence in a harmonic way. In general, they want to be someone who won’t change the world, but guide the world so it will change itself, not because the student wanted.

Thank you

2

What is your TOEFL score? Reading your post there are many grammatical errors. Contrary to @sourpatchkids you will not definitely get into Miami and NYU. Can you afford these schools? NYU and Miami give little financial aid to internationals.

3

tomsrofboston, I would be very thankful if you remark my grammatical errors, I always like to improve my english skills.

4

I admire your centrist mindset and the educational philosophy geared towards the process of learning rather than the end result; however, with absolutely no ECs, there is probably little to no chance of admission at NYU or even UMiami, much less the Ivy League institutions.

Of course, I don’t know what your financial situation or home life is like, but these elite schools will always question why you did nothing outside of school to act on your supposed passions. What’s your intended major? Do you have any awards to report?

5

There is not enough realistic information. I would suggest you study for SAT and let us know your real score. Also having no ECs does not give you a good chance at any university. What do you do when you are not at school?

6

Just bs some ecs. I dont mean fake I mean talk about your passions and maybe exaggerate them a bit. (e.g. if you enjoy photography mention you spend hundreds of hours photographing). Dont report nothing

7

Think big and talk big are great, but before that, I think those schools you are aiming for probably would rather know what you have done or plan to do in your own community, such as at your school, your church, your immediate family… than your future plan on guiding the world.

8

Given the lack of ECs and struggles with persuasive writing, admission to the top selective US colleges is unlikely. If you can afford to pay full tuition and fees there are probably many good colleges that would be happy to have you. If you end up with a very high SAT score (1500+) that would help for admission to the good colleges as well. It won’t work for the top selective ones, but there are still good colleges that would admit you with no ECs and weak essays if you can pay and your SAT score is high.

9

Use 4.0 max GPA scale. 4.5 means nothing. Get a real score before chancing.