Hi! I am currently a sophomore (female) at a competitive high school in NJ and I have been interested in attending Princeton since I was in elementary school. This interest augmented when I joined the track and cross country teams, performed well, and began to hope to run for Princeton’s track/XC team in the future. Right now my stats are fairly weak (or at least I think so, considering my lack of strong ECs, etc.), so I would like to know how much of a chance I have as of now. I would also appreciate suggestions for improving my application as I continue through high school.
Academics:
-Took all available Honors courses Freshman Year
-Currently taking a class called AP Capstone (a pilot program by the College Board), which is a 2-year course that allows for the opportunity to earn an AP Diploma (if a student recieves a 4 or higher on 4 other AP tests, which I am planning on attempting to do)
-Taking all offered Honors course for sophomore year
-Involved in Orchestra
-Current cumulative GPA: 4.74 weighted, 3.82 unweighted
Extracurriculars
-2-year member of Key Club
-Current (1st year) member of Bridges Club, a club that collects food and money to donate to the homeless on “runs” to Newark and NYC
-First -year member of International Student Leaders Club (I am planning on applying for a leadership position in the next election)
-Student Environmental Agency- first year member (have not been completely involved yet since I joined later)
-Science Olympiad member (1st year, first competition is this January)
Volunteer Work
35+ hours of volunteering at youth cross country meets, local 5ks and other track-related events
(I know that I definitely need to find more volunteer opportunities!)
Running Accomplishments
(I’m not sure if I should include this, but I’m a new member to this website and maybe it will help with your assessment of my chances so I will)
-All-county cross country award (one of 10 girls in county), 2 years
-All-conference, 2 years
-Not many significant wins (besides invitationals), but placed high in almost every race (track and cross country) excluding state Groups and Meet of Champions
Personal Records (outdoor and XC):
5k- 18:54
3200- 11:26
1600- 5:17
800- 2:24
Thank you so much in advance for any input you may have! I also apologize if I formatted this incorrectly/did not include enough information (this is my first post on this website )
Its hard to make any chances without standardized test scores. Come back when you are a junior and have some scores to tell us.
In the meantime, go to the Princeton XC team page and see how your times stack up. If your times are close to the times for the team members then you might be a viable recruit. If so then reach out to the coach to start a dialog.
Here are the results from a September HYP meet:
Princeton Finishers
Lizzie Bird 17:14
Emily de La Bruyere 17:40
Natalie Rathjen 17:48
Kathryn Fluehr 17:50
Brighie Leach 17:54
Ally Markovich 18:13
Nicole Marvin 18:18
Melinda Renuart 18:20
Morgan Lucey 18:54
Birdie Hutton 19:01
Taylor Bacon 19:06
Delaney Miller 19:07
Jessica Ackerman 19:26
Zoe Sims 19:33
Mim Buscher 19:51
Mary Hui 19:53
Mallory Edens 20:07
Sarah Porter 20:31
I am pretty sure Women’s DI XC races are 6000 meters (6k). When I estimate what you might run (around 23 min), you are a bit under what these girls are running. They also have 12 freshman on the team, so don’t think that it is all juniors and seniors making these times. That being said, you still have about a year to train to get your times down. I would say if you can train and start making times around 19:30 and keep your grades how they are, you have a shot!
Thanks to both of you! I did forget to mention that I took a (practice) new SAT without the optional essay, and received a 1290 out of 1600. I hadn’t actually prepared or studied for the SAT at that point, however, so I think I could raise that score in the future. Thanks for the feedback, especially since it’s not easy to make an estimate at this early of a point in high school I’ll keep trying to improve!
@runnergirl322 GPA needs a little bit of work, and I would recommend not padding your resume. We can’t chance you without official test scores, but some tips (especially because you are a sophomore) for athletic recruitment:
Reach out to the coach your junior year/visit the campus the summer before. Ask for qualifying times, talk about applications, etc.
Tell your coach that you want to run for a D1 school. They’ll guide you in a good general direction.
And remember, even if you don’t make D1 running, some of the best schools in the country are D3 (MIT, Caltech, JHU, WashU, etc).
as a fellow runner (much worse than you) and Princeton applicant, focus more on a specialty race; you have good to great times for high school in all races, but if you want to run Princeton track find a race to focus on and improve on; to me, you look like a better longer distance runner, but its completely up to you. just find a few passions to offer to princeton; that’s what they want. you’re on the right track with the strong extracurriculars root, make sure you have things you’ve done all four years or can talk honestly about loving to do. same goes with athletics, have a standout race, even with an all around strong running career in the back.
If you don’t already know, all the Ivies use the academic index. You will need to closely pay attention to your AI, as this basically dictates who the coach can recruit:
I also think I should probably come back in a year or so and ask for my chances then instead! Rookie mistake! But I’m so grateful for the tips since I have not really been exposed to the college world yet.
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