Please recommend some match schools for me? =)

College Search & Selection
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<p>Hi! :). Asian-American rising junior from the Northeast here, doing early research!</p>

<p>I had a really terrible freshman year. I had to kick every bad habit that I ever built just to keep up with the kids at my high school :(. Mind you, it takes a lot of will to kick an 8 year gaming addiction when you had an excellent account/player built up :(.</p>

<p>For some perspective on my high school, we have a 2000ish average SAT score with 2000+ kids.</p>

<p>School doesn't rank, but I am currently in the top decile with a 3.33 unweighted GPA. </p>

<p>GPA (unweighted)
9th - 3.03
10th - 3.63? (It didn't specify; I'm guessing based on the cumulative gpa they gave us)
Cumulative - 3.33</p>

<p>I feel kinda iffy about my GPA. Percentage wise, my GPA is 85-86% out of 100% for 9th grade and I don't think that's a 3.00. The official percentage isn't recorded on our transcript, though.</p>

<p>SATs
Freshman year PSAT - 205. Didn't take it soph year.
Taking the SAT this fall, hoping for 227+.</p>

<p>SAT II Bio - 720 </p>

<p>Course load
9th - took hardest possible... then got rejected from most of the honors/AP classes for 10th.
10th - only 2 honors: math + foreign language
11th - will be hardest possible (all honors/AP) </p>

<p>EC's
No ECs at all until 10th grade (except for JV sports in 9th). I had a surprisingly lucky 10th grade. I made varsity for basically everything I tried out for (academic teams) and had good to excellent finishes in every tournament that I competed in. Joined policy debate, some good results. Several upcoming and current leadership positions in yearbook. YB received a silver medal awarded by Columbia University -- despite this being a cumulative effort, can I put this on my app? ECs are a bit broad, but I am actively involved in all and genuinely love them -- I'm very thankful!</p>

<p>Other
Hopefully, essays will be pretty good, but I'm a bit "ehh" about teacher recommendations. Teachers here tend to favor the top students and ignore the rest, but I'm going to try hard to establish a good relationship with my teachers for this year.</p>

<p>Majors
I was originally dead set on medicine (working in third world countries and helping places with few doctors, Doctors Without Borders, working for WHO, etc), but then I realized that I basically love everything. Humanities, business, sciences, etc. Not sure of my career path, now.</p>

<p>Important college factors for me:</p>

<p>Looking for Merit Scholarships and FA if I can get it, but my parents are fully capable of paying everything without loans. I just want to go onto graduate school and graduate debt free or even have $ to start with, but if worse come to worst, I can do without FA.</p>

<p>-Urban location/setting (can be anywhere in the country)
-Preferably small classes, but not strict on this factor
-Good advising program
-Study abroad opportunities (not strictly required, but it'd be nice)
-Course flexibility or Pass/Fail option for classes </p>

<p>My safety is Northeastern University -- is this more of a match or safety?
I was originally considering JHU, Brown, NYU, WUSTL, UCLA. *Should I be shooting lower or higher, or this is about right? *</p>

<p>If you can recommend match schools for me to look at, I'd be very happy! Thanks! :).</p>

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<p>Take a look at Rhodes. It’s different from the others you mentioned in that it’s a small liberal arts college. It is located in the heart of a major city (Memphis). Good financial aid, good study abroad, average class size is about 14, student to faculty ratio is 10:1, tons of study abroad opportunities, and there are pass/fail options and some other ways the curriculum is flexible (e.g., in some cases a single course can fulfill multiple degree requirements). Liberal arts colleges are great for people who love everything, because you’ll be able to study broadly and still major in something you want to dive into. If you do decide to be a doctor, our med school acceptance is about twice the national average.</p>

<p>Good luck with the last two years of high school!</p>

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<p>lynxinsider - What you’ve said sounds interesting! I notice that it is a religious school, though. What is the atmosphere like? Is it heavily religious? I’m atheist, but I respect other people’s religious affiliations, but would dislike other people imposing their views upon me. </p>

<p>I’ve also looked around the Rhodes website, and the medical school acceptance rate is nice. Is there screening, however?</p>

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<p>Northeastern is not a safety for you maybe a match but def not a safety. BU CGS would be a safety for you.</p>

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<p>BU would be a good match, maybe closer to a safety</p>

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<p>look at your flagship state school. If you are in MA then Umass Amherst is a safety for you.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the imputs everyone :). Will most definitely consider BU.</p>

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<p>@first - </p>

<p>Rhodes isn’t what I would call a “religious” school. It has an affiliation with the Presbyterian church, but that’s more historic than anything. The way that affiliation is borne out is a requirement to take one of two 3-course humanities sequences called Life or Search. Life is basically religious studies/bible courses (though from an academic perspective, not a theological one). Search is basically philosophy and western civilization. Only other evidence of the church affiliation is the fact that there is a chaplain on staff who is a Presbyterian.</p>

<p>I’m not completely sure what you mean by “screening”. If the question is do they restrict who can go into biology, chemistry, and similar majors, the answer is definitely no. I will say a lot of people start at Rhodes thinking that they want to go to med school and end up changing their minds. The intro biology courses are not easy!</p>

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<p>At this point I would just keep your mind open. Maybe visit some schools that are large/small, urban/rural, to see what you like.</p>

<p>“Looking for Merit Scholarships and FA if I can get it, but my parents are fully capable of paying everything without loans.”</p>

<p>If this is true then you won’t get any FA, you’ll need to look for merit aid. If you make NMF then Keilexandra has compiled a great thread with scholarships for NMF.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the suggestions of BU and UMass :)! </p>

<p>Erin’s Dad – thanks for the advice on merit aid =). I’ve gone to overnight summer camps a lot at various different colleges (living in the dorms, etc). Might this be enough to give me a perspective or should I continue visiting colleges anyway? I loved having access to everything when it came to cities (i.e., NYU) and hated being in an isolated location (like Dartmouth).</p>

<p>lynxinsider - I see. Thanks for the information! =)</p>

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<p>Bump 10char</p>

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<p>Temple University</p>

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<p>diotechristmas - Thanks, I’ll look into that!</p>

<p>It’d be nice if someone could also answer my questions about whether I’m shooting too high/about right :D.
It seems from the colleges that people have given me, that I should be looking much much lower, though.</p>

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<p>You sound as if you can function well at your selected schools, but some are really hard to get into. JHU and NYU sound all right. Look at University of Chicago. Tulane may fit and may even give you money. Rice may fit. UCLA is hard if you are not from California. U of Rochester- low match/safety. How about USC?</p>

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<p>Maybe American.</p>

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<p>Your GPA is probable too low for some of the school listed. If you can improve significantly in 11th grade, you should try to apply to one or two reach schools. You might hit the jackpot but don’t count on it. I agree that your state U should be your safety. Of your list</p>

<p>Northeastern University – safety if you do well this year
JHU, Brown – Super reach. Pick Brown, JHU is very brutal for pre-med
NYU, WUSTL – reach
Forget about UCLA, pick Wiscosin for your match big state school.
I will add Trinity College, Brandeis, Connecticut College, Rochester, Whitman, Macalseter, American U and Temple to your list.</p>

<p>Hope this will help. :)</p>

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<p>Maybe look at Case Western?</p>

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<p>OneMom – Thanks for the recommendations! =)</p>

<p>poi – Thanks for the recommendation! It says on their site that the average GPA of admitted students was 3.8 with an average SAT of 1266. I’m assuming that’s out of 1600 :D. </p>

<p>t1388 – Hm, I’m getting the feeling/implication that it’s a bad idea to apply to too many reaches. Brown is more selective than JHU and thus, wouldn’t I have a better chance of applying to JHU if I should only pick one? Thanks for your other recommendations, though!</p>

<p>Erin’s Dad – Thanks for the tip! =)</p>

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<p>Bump 10char</p>

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<p>Bump 10char</p>