<p>Hey guys i'm an international student applying to some uni's in the state cos it's become a global trend (about 6 people per competitive high school in New Zealand apply..) I had just under a year to get all the uni stuff ready so my scores don't look so great..</p>
<p>SAT I
CR 630 (terrible i know...)
Math 800
Writing 670 (11 essay if u must know)</p>
<p>SAT II (one sitting without study lol)
Math 2 800
Chemistry 800
Physics 800</p>
<p>AP (self taught and had to fly over to austrailia alone to sit it..)
Calculus AB 5
Chemistry 5
Physics b 5
(so regret not taking calc bc and phy c...)</p>
<p>School marks
3.72/4 or 6th in 600 people (big school)
no awards (omg!)</p>
<p>Teacher recs- both teachers loved me!</p>
<p>Interviews- they all lasted 50-60 minutes and mum made me wear a suit.... you can imagine... i musta looked like a waterlogged dog or sumthing..</p>
<p>essays- i was pretty proud of em but i have pretty low expectations (eng teacher wanted to publish them for the community journal)</p>
<p>EC-
community service (resthome)
Regional finals (piano) chamber music group comp (sent art supp)
High school piano comp winner
chess regional finalist
future prob solving national qualifier
soccer coach for 13th grader girls
soccer captain for boys 13th graders</p>
<p>National curriculum
National Scholarship Chemistry, National Scholarship Physics (placing me in the top 2.5% in new zealand in those respective topics) and overall endorsement with excellence (top 3-6% nz)</p>
<p>applied to reg (with fin aid in those i can) for the following schools (most are dream schools so please dont diss):
MIT (my love)
Princeton
Duke
Dartmouth
CMU
North Western
columbia
brown
swarthmore
wow i cant remember the other 2 schools.... </p>
<p>i'm pretty depressed cos my SAT1's pretty much kill my streak and results come out pretty soon... some encouragement (or forcing me to face reality) will help me continue with life here (i cant seem to sleep at night)</p>
<p>"Is English your first language? "
oops didnt see ur reply
lived 3/4 of my life in nz but i’ve gutta say that the first words i muttered were korean
i do consider myself a 1.5th generation kiwi-korean tho and made a big thing abwt it in my essay</p>
<p>lol guys you dnt havta worry bwt my self-esteem or my will to continue living! my life’ll continue even if i dnt got a chance to any of those unis up there… worst case scenario i’ll just try hard here and do my masters and phd over dere…
plox and ta for em chancez (honesty but no diss plz been having a bad week)</p>
<p>OK, the top colleges get a lot of kids who look like you, Asian, strong math/science, makes music. So you are in a super competitive pool. Your CR score is about 100 points below median at the top schools, so it’s an issue for someone who went to school in an English speaking country. </p>
<p>Then factor in no awards or notable math/science achievements and some of those schools are going to be very tough. The competition will have awards from major competitions.</p>
<p>Being from NZ is an advantage over coming from Asia, but the question is, will that be enough–will you be among the 2 best NZ applicants to each school, because that’s probably how many they want.</p>
<p>So in the end, who knows, but it’s an uphill battle. CMU and Swat, which my guess is doesn’t get as many Asian international applicants as the rest, look like your best bets. They are both great schools. My DS went to school at CMU after not getting into MIT and is now at MIT for grad school. </p>
<p>(*) thanks hmom5 here’s your star cookie!
Yep there must be a factory mass producing azns like me at 30 kids an hour! on top of that im just a B grade produce ay lol… i did get like 4 maths national and 4 science national recognition (like top 30 student for competition etc… ) but i guess the other kids get like olympiad golds and more… there are plenty 2400s here in nz this year… on top of that there are more than a handful 2400s in australia and they admission board does not specify that they take nz and aus as diff countries (ie i heard that they group us as pacific islands) hopefully all the other azn kids’ll look like factory produced machines and i’ll look like a human :D</p>
<p>mom is such a strange word… i onli use it on dota when indicating mask of madness…
dnt let them take the aus outta u kiddo! gutta keep the diversity flowing! aus and nz are beautiful and relaxed countries, they’re definitely ideal places to live in ay!</p>