<p>*This will be my first and last post until my junior/senior year in high school so therefore it is very lengthy. Today I had very little HW so I was able to study my notes for a few hours and then type this long message. I spent 35 minutes typing this so I would really like a “well-thought out” response (basically a response you did not “pull out of your ass”).</p>
<p>Well, I signed up at this site at the spurt of the moment, after stumbling upon it at google, while researching for facts about Yale. I will not be appalled if you judge me based on my age but I do encourage everyone who responds to my questions to answer them with respect as you would to the other members of the C.C community. I believe that you could never be too young to start planning for college, especially considering how difficult it is to get in to the best schools. I will probably not visit this site very often. In fact, I don’t think I will visit this site again until my junior/senior year. I am trying to work towards my goal of becoming a yalie, which of course takes much time and effort so I cannot come here very often on my own initiative (I sold my video games and disconnected the cable box on my television to prepare for Yale without distraction). I have read some of the threads before this post to get a better, more realistic idea about Yale admissions. I would just like to ask a couple of short questions before I leave, in order to get direct responses.</p>
<li>What GPA should I aim for in highschool? Could anyone convert my current 95/100 average (it should rise, this was before I gave up video games and cable) into a GPA so I could see what my 8th grade GPA would look like?</li>
<li>Will playing the cello help my acceptance into Yale? I started lessons a couple of weeks ago, not because of college admissions but because I wanted to learn how to play a new instrument. I wanted to know if mastering the cello would help in any way.</li>
<li>How much community service should I do? I have about 30 hours so far, am I on the right track?</li>
<li>Is 1200/1600 (700 on the verbal and 500 on the math) on the old SAT (practice test) pretty good for an 8th grader? What score would get me into Yale on the new SAT.</li>
<li>Will being an URM (I am an African American and proud of it!) help me in the college admissions process even though my family makes much more than $60,000 in yearly income?</li>
<li>Do I have to play sports as an extra-curricular activity to be competitive for Yale? I am probably the worst athlete on the planet (not literally the worst but I do suck at sports and have sucked at them ever since I was very young). I am very skinny for my height (510 and 118 lbs.) and would not be suitable to participate in any such ECs. BTW, I tried basketball for a 6 months and only scored 10 baskets in every game we participated (in total, not each individual game). This finally dispels the common myth that every tall individual is good at basketball. If I have to play a sport in order to enter, I will but I would really hate to have to participate in one inorder to get into Yale. I would really rather just join the debate team as an EC (especially because I want to become a defense attorney) and then eventually become captain. I will probably also be active in a writing club, as I enjoy writing for pleasure.</li>
<li>Does the competitiveness of your high school matter in the college admissions process? I was accepted at a prestigious magnet school in New York (Stuyvesant High School) but turned it down to attend the humanities program at my local high school (Francis Lewis High School) because I believed that it would be easier to score in the top one-five percent. Was this the right choice? I really dont want to take that strenuous test again (to get into Stuyvesant), but I will take the test again if it will help me score a seat at Yale. BTW, does Yale have feeder schools?</li>
<li>Based on the information given do you think I am heading in the right direction? What would you recommend me do or improve on?</li>
<li>Lastly, is it easy to graduate from the Yale Undergraduate program and then go to Columbia Law School (disregard the money needed to attend both of these schools)? The reason I want to attend Columbia law school (or NYU law if I dont make it to Columbia law) is because I can only practice law in the state in which I was admitted in the bar. I want to practice law in New York (my home state) so therefore I must receive my education in New York.</li>
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<p>I would love for any of the current Yalies to list the status they had earned to get admitted at Yale</p>