White, Jewish male from NY. EFC 26k - income >240k
GPA: I go to a nationally recognized very difficult public HS where an A- average is a real accomplishment. I have around a 91-92 average, with an upward trend from an 87.5 to a 93.We don’t rank, but I’d figure I’m in about the top 12-20% of my class of about 350. Kids with <96 weighted routinely get into top 50-75 schools (Tulane/Northeastern/Cornell, etc.)
Course load - AP World History (5), AP US History (proj. 5), IB English HL (not taking IB Exam) and AP Spanish (3 or 4 - shouldn’t have taken it and I’m barely cracking an 86 lol) We offer about 16-20 AP’s at my school, but nobody takes more than 8-10 in all 4 years. I’m also going to the RCC Honors Program (highly regarded community college program which routinely transfers kids to Ivies and Tier 1 schools) as a senior next year, so I will have an over entire year of college under my belt when I matriculate.
Tests: 33 ACT (35E, 32M, 33R, 30S), getting SAT scores back in a week - I hope for a 1520 but am most likely going to get in the 1480-1510 range.
ECs -4 years of Academic Team (~1.5 hrs./wk), and will most likely be the captain senior year. I also plan to run the Young Democrats Club senior year. It hasn’t met in a long time, so I could potentially start heading it earlier. I have an internship with a local legislator this summer, and I’m also hopefully slated to do a paid research internship at Columbia’s observatory.
Extenuating circumstances: I have dealt with high-functioning autism my entire life, and I had a grade drop last semester (~89 semester average w/ 2 APs, IB English and accelerated pre-calc; not god-awful) due to depression, anxiety and untreated ADHD. My freshman year also wasn’t that good, but it took me awhile to adjust to a high school workload and I doubt that schools would look down very hard on them considering my upward trend. My meds are in order now so my average this semester should be a 93-95 if all goes well. I know that my mental health issues and learning disabilities make me seem like a liability in admissions, but things are looking up and I have blazing LORs and will be able to write well about how I overcame adversity.
Major: Political Science/Public Policy. I want to work in legislation or grassroots activism one day, so I feel like studying PoliSci would be a good start.
Preferences: I’d like a school with no less than 4,000 undergrads and preferably nothing more than about 20,000, but honors programs at big publics are welcomed. My school should have a really good social scene and I want to have the “college experience” (parties, drinking, experimenting, making friends and meeting girls, etc.). I would also like a school with good alumni outcomes and ample networking opportunities - getting a job out of college is ridiculously hard so I want to have as many advantages as possible in this tough market.
“EFC 26k - income >240k”
Where did you get this EFC number from? Do you mean this is what your parents can afford (per student per year for you and your twin)?
I think that you should run the NPC on a few schools and see what it comes up with. I would be surprised if many schools other than SUNY’s and CUNY’s would cost you $26k or less given an income of over $240k.
Do you really think that Cornell & Northwestern are just in the top 50 to top 75 school range.
Statements like that accompanied by your confusing EFC versus family income number prompt me to encourage you to spend some time creating & editing your initial post before starting a thread.
I hope you do well, but I am unable to offer any advice or suggestions because your post is a bit confusing to me.
Ah I meant northeastern. And those are tippy-top examples anyway. The EFC is correct. I have a twin brother, so it is 52k before being split between us. We live in an extremely expensive area and don’t have that much saved for college so that may be why our EFC is lower.
Several calculators (collegeraptor/collegeboard/npc’s for a couple schools) all have our EFC anywhere from 21k to 34k. I have a twin brother and we do not have that much saved for college, so it is really 52k before splitting it.
All the information in this post is correct - there are no typos. I was just trying to clarify that GPAs at my school, which would normally be considered really low for top schools, aren’t representative of a low-achieving student body, but rather harsh grading and rigorous classes.