Please chance my rising senior son for Aerospace / Mechanical Engineering [NJ resident, 4.0, 35]

Demographics

  • US citizen
  • New Jersey
  • Big public high school (700 students per class)
  • Asian Male

Intended Major(s) Aerospace / Mechanical Engineering

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 4.0 All As or A+s and only 2 A-
  • Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): 4.63 / 5.00
  • College GPA (for transfers): N/A
  • Class Rank: N/A
  • ACT/SAT Scores: ACT one try 35

Coursework
*AP all 5s - CSA, US History, World History, BC, English Language, Statistics. AP Spanish has a 3 but will not report. Will take AP Gov, English Literature, Physics C (both M and EM) in school and self study Macroeconomics.

Awards
NJ All State Wind Ensemble 6th chair, clarinetist
AMC 10 and 12 - Honor Roll
AIME from 10 and 11th grade qualifier
AP scholar with Distinction
Selected to represent our School / CJML A team for American Regions Math League and placed 5th in B Division among over 100 teams
NM Finalist

Extracurriculars
Founder of a chess club for teaching the elementary students in our township for free
President of Math Team and lead the team to various national math competition - HMMT, CMIMC etc. Created a math website to teach/promote competition math
Co-principal of the wind section of a Central Jersey Orchestra
Working on a AI and Aerospace research paper and expect to be completed by October
VP Science Honor Society - create a youtube channel to promote Science
Private tutoring for SAT and High School Math

Essays/LORs/Other
Extremely strong LOC from AP Calc BC teacher. Also, another strong one from the Physics teacher
Working on the essay currently. But my son is not a very good writer

Cost Constraints / Budget
Parents can afford

I’m not sure which Reach school I should ED.

  • Safety (certain admission and affordability) - Rutgers
  • Likely (would be possible, but very unlikely or surprising, for it not to admit or be affordable) - Case Western
  • Match - Purdue, UIUC, U Mich, UW
  • Reach - Tufts, Princeton, CMU, Duke, GT, NU, Cornell, MIT, Stanford

I think it’s fine. UIUC and UM are reaches but you’ll have good options with this list.

As for parents can afford - you have Purdue and then schools more than double the price.

What they can afford is not the same as they want to afford. What do they want to afford ?

You should ED if and only if you have a clear favorite and your parents can afford it.

If Purdue, UIUC, Rutgers or UWash were top choices, then you wouldn’t ED at all. No one has to ED.

Ps - CWRU isn’t likely. You have to demonstrate interest and maybe ED for that. They’ll see you using them as a safety and possibly defer or WL you. They WL 30% of applicants so show them love.

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If you ED, you should ED to the school that is a clear #1 that you would love to attend and that your family will pay for. If you don’t have a clear #1, then I would not ED.

I would move Case Western into the Match category, and you would need to show a lot of demonstrated interest for it. UMich I would move into the reach category. Which UW are you referring to? If Wisconsin, I agree with it as a match (or even likely). If Washington, it might be closer to a reach (also, if Washington, make sure you look into the policies to get the major you want…generally even if you’re direct admit into engineering, you’re only guaranteed one of your top 5 choices).

However, if UW is Wyoming, it should be a safety with assured admission for 3.0 HS GPA: Admission Requirements | Undergrad Admission | University of Wyoming

Note that Wisconsin does weed out for engineering majors, requiring college GPA significantly higher than 2.0 to stay in the major (varies by major): Progression - College of Engineering - University of Wisconsin-Madison

could consider RPI as a safety over Rutgers.

as someone recommended earlier, would recommend ED to one of your reach/dream schools.

Respectfully disagree. OP’s son can additionally apply to RPI if he likes, but should definitely apply to his in-state flagship, which has a good engineering school.

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None of them. Instead, your son should ED if and only if his top choice school offers ED and you’re comfortable paying for it.

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Different perspective.

All your matches are reaches. Things have changed the last 3 years. You will still most likely get in some but have more true safeties. I am assuming UW is Wisconsin

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My parents will support me. After I checked CWRU, I think the school is more focused on the medical field.

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I mean Washington. Thanks for your advice.

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Would you recommend some safety schools? My thought is that if I can’t get into any of my match or reach schools, I would just go to Rutgers.

Michigan State. You would get honors and merit. Iowa State University and Rose Hulman would also to name a few. Lots of mechanical engineers go into Aerospace…

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You will likely get into Purdue. Yes, I’m saying that.

If you want others - other than Rutgers - UMD - like Purdue - it’s a reach for most but you’d get in.

UDel, Ohio State, UMN, Pitt - any flagship will be solid.

If you wanted to take advantage of your GPA and save your family a bundle, both Alabama and Arizona are solid for aerospace. Not cheap but so is CU Boulder - all safeties.

btw - CWRU is excellent for medical but is not only medical. They have an Aero major.

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Since Terms of Service prohibits account sharing, I am closing this thread. The student is welcome to make their own account

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