Please Chance Me for Ivy Leagues and Other Schools!

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hey guys! Please chance me based on the following schools and for schools in general on a similar level.</p>

<p>Harvard
UPenn
Columbia
Stanford
MIT
UChicago
Cornell
Berkeley
NYU
USC</p>

<p>11th Grade
Asian Male
High School Gifted Program (Top 1% of Nation) - IB Diploma one year early
Middle/Upper Middle</p>

<p>GPA: 4.00 (UW) 4.86/5.00 (W)
Class Rank: 1/343 Top 1%
SAT:
730 CR, 740 M, 720 W (10 Essay) Total: 2190 (one sitting January)
Plan on retaking SAT and taking the ACT.</p>

<p>SAT II:
USH - 770
Math 2 - 800
Bio E/M (June)</p>

<p>AP:
Gov: Pending
Bio: Pending
Lit: Pending
Environmental: Pending
Lang: 4
USH: 5
World: 5
Calc AB: 5
Computer Science A: 5</p>

<p>IB:
Math HL (Pending)
History HL (Pending)
English A2 HL (Pending)
Spanish B SL (Pending)
Physics SL - 7
ITGS SL - 6</p>

<p>Courses:
Toughest in the district/state.</p>

<p>Awards/Honors:
NHS
IB Diploma (end of this year)
AP Scholar with Distinction
Assumed National Commended/Semi (PSAT 219)
Math Is Cool Competition 2008 - 2nd Place School
Washington State Math Championship 2008 - 15th Place Team
Future Problem Solving State 2008 - 1st Place Individual
Future Problem Solving Internationals 2008 - 3rd Place Individual
Future Problem Solving State 2009 - 1st Place Individual
Future Problem Solving Internationals 2009 - 13th Place Individual
Microsoft's Regional Hunt the Wumpus Programming Competition Participant
Swim Team Varsity Letter/Districts Qualifier
WIAA Swim Team Academic Champions
Participated in the Presidential Youth Inaugural Conference by Congressional Youth Leadership Council
Certificate of Recognition by LeadAmerica
Washington DECA Area Finalist
Certificate of Community Service Achievement by Walking Tree Travel
Certificate of Excellence by Northwest Chinese School 2008, 2009, and 2010
Chinese Knowledge Contest By Northwest Chinese School - 3rd Place
Regional Knowledge Bowl Competition - 18th Place Team</p>

<p>ECs:
Started up my own non-profit - raising political awareness and battling political apathy around our community
Co-Founded school's Future Problem Solving Club (Co-Prez for 2 years, VP currently)
Newspaper Club (Chief Editor/Layout Manager)
Tutor Math and Biology (expected to get 75+ hrs by end of senior year)
JSA
NHS
DECA
Robotics
Key Club
Math Club
School Swim Team (will be 4 years)
Club Swimming (2 years)
Violin (private lessons, performances, regional youth orchestras, will have played for total of 11 years by end of high school)
Northwest Chinese School (study Chinese, will have enrolled for total of 6 years by end of high school)
Went to Costa Rica last summer for language immersion and gained 30 hrs of community service
Volunteered for the AP Institute, gained 30 hrs
Will attend Stanford's EPGY this summer</p>

<p>Work experience:
None so far
Plan to seek an internship in business entrepreneurship during senior year</p>

<p>Any thoughts/criticism is welcomed!!! Thanks!</p>

2

<p>^bump bump</p>

3

<p>Areas for Improvement:</p>

<p>SATs. Top schools require top scores, especially for ORM (overrepresented minority, aka Asian) applicants.</p>

<p>ECs. That is the very definition of a laundry list! My recommendation is to focus on the areas where you’ve won awards (math, etc) and drop all clubs that don’t fulfill you personally or help flesh out your math/science profile.</p>

4

<p>Well those are not my current EC’s, but all the EC’s that I have participated in through my high school career. I plan to only include a couple and I already know which ones to include and which ones to leave out.</p>

5

<p>

That is flat out wrong use of the word require. There is a reason why people with 1900 SATs will get into places like Harvard every now and then. High SAT will help, but is NOT a requirement.</p>

<p>That said, your entire resume just simply SCREAMS the typical Asian Ivy League applicant. Academics, academics, academics. There are only couple exceptions to this on your list that show commitment and consistency. Especially given that you are nowhere near the top of the “typical Asian applicant” pool, you should try to pull yourself away from that stereotype.</p>

6

<p>I agree that I have a lot of academics, but I disagree that I am all that and no other stuff. I was on high school swimming and will be for all 4 years and I received varsity awards and qualified for districts competition. I also volunteer a lot and have volunteered for all my high school life, doing unique things such as the Costa Rica service/language immersion trip. Also, I do do a lot of EC’s, but I must agree that I should not have listed them all, and rather, just the ones I’m committed too. Which in that case, means wiping off 3 of the clubs I listed. But I am very committed to a few and have leadership positions, so I don’t think that I resemble an all-academic Asian.</p>

7

<p>There’s no point in you explaining all that here. Your resume looks REALLY like a laundry list on the first glance. There’s a reason why I said there are only few that shows commitment and consistency. Given that huge size of all that other clutter, there only is a few in proportion.</p>

<p>Just on paper, you are a typical academic Asian. Sadly, a huge part of it comes from simply you being Asian. You need to pull yourself away from that stereotype by using essays. It’s almost impossible to pull yourself in your condition away from that using your resume alone.</p>

8

<p>Thanks, I realize that. No way am I going to write all that on my actual application. My friend told me to list everything out on CC and apparently, that was not very good advice.</p>