Rising Senior Applying to Prestigious Universities

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hello CC! I'm a Coloradan senior to-be excited for the college-seeking process. I plan to enter one of these majors: urban/city planning, computer science/engineering, architecture, and/or architectural engineering (depends on which schools offer which majors). Before I go on, I should be completely blunt: I realise most of my college choices are reaches for me, especially considering my lacking ECs. However, I'm still applying to most, if not all of them, just to see if at least one will accept me. With this in mind, here are my top choices for college: Columbia, Stanford, Pomona College, Northwestern, UChicago, UPenn, Cornell, WashU, USC, and NYU. My match/safety schools include CO School of Mines, any CU school, CSU (CO, not CA), and University of Denver. I would appreciate it if someone suggests any other schools matching my criteria.</p>

<p>Academics Will update empty scores once I get them!!!
Grade UW: 3.9048 out of 4
Rank UW: 30 of 539
Grade W: 4.2381 out of 5 (A grade in AP=5, B in AP=4, etc.)
Rank W: 3 of 539 (so close to salutatorian...!!!)
SAT score: 2060, 680R 690W 690M (plan on retaking it)
SAT Subjects: Math II (), Chemistry (), US History ()
ACT score: 35, 34Eng 34M 36R 34Sci (state-mandated test didn't have writing portion)
AP scores: US Govt (5), Physics B (4), US History (), Chemistry (), Lang & Comp (), Calculus BC (), Chinese V ()
Senior workload: AP Physics C, Calculus III / Diff. Eq., AP Psychology, AP Studio Art: Drawing, AP Lit & Comp, AP Chinese V</p>

<p>Extracurriculars
Activities: Tennis JV 3 yrs, Speech & Debate Varsity (Orator) 1 yr, NHS member 1 yr, NCHS member 1 yr, entering Link Crew senior yr
School Awards: Academic Letter (11th gr. both semesters), Academic Excellence (9th & 11th gr.), Social Studies Award (9th), English Award (11th), Speech & Debate NFL Letter (11th)
Work Experience: plan on getting a job over the summer
Volunteer Experience: 30+ hrs in local natural history museum, couple other hours for other stuff & NHS (plan on doing more)</p>

<p>More Info
Gender: M
Ethnicity: Chinese American
Income Bracket: low-income or working class
Outside Awards: QuestBridge College Prep Scholar (plan on applying through QB's National College Match process)
Perks: first-generation college student, first-generation immigrant, low-income applicant (I receive free lunch), non-native English speaker, native Cantonese speaker (are these last two perks per se?)</p>

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<p>Update with test scores!</p>

<p>SAT Subjects: Math II (720), US History (750)
Soph. AP Scores: US Govt (5), Physics B (4)
Junior AP Scores: US History (5), Chemistry (2), Lang & Comp (5), Calculus BC (3), Chinese V (5)
(Probably won’t be reporting my Chem AP score, still considering whether to report Calc BC.)</p>

<p>All other stats are unchanged. I’m also considering applying as an undeclared major…</p>

<p>Can anybody give me tips? Thanks in advance!</p>

3

<p>Submit your ACT and not your SAT, I repeat, NOT YOUR SAT. Heck, I wouldn’t even bother re-taking the SAT considering how high your ACT is. Report your Calc II score but not the chem score, trust me on this one. A 3 is better than an AP Calc BC class on the transcript with no score reported. This will give you a MUCH better chance. Assuming all of this information is true, you could quite possibly get into two or three, maybe even four, of your top ten choices without sweating it. Don’t bother applying to the crappier schools, you’ve got too much talent. You’ve picked some damn hard schools to get into so realistically, I wouldn’t hold my breath on getting into more than seven out of the ten but in a good admissions season, you could get into five of them. GOOD LUCK!</p>

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<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1671202-community-college-to-great-university.html#latest”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1671202-community-college-to-great-university.html#latest&lt;/a&gt;
Chance me back.</p>

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<p>I’d like to point out that most prestigious universities only consider the ACT WITH the writing section. Since you did not take the ACT with writing, I am afraid that you have to retake the ACT but this time with the essay portion. You should ask your counselor for further confirmation but based on my own research as a rising senior I think this is true. Best of luck!!</p>

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<p>Which USC are you talking about?</p>

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<p>Your SAT II scores are good, and as you probably already know, the SAT I scores need improvement. The ACT scores look great.</p>

<p>But you are in a quandary: you have taken an extremely rigorous AP curriculum and have a few blemishes. The AP courses will show up on your transcript, but if you don’t submit all of your scores, the Adcom members will wonder why. If you have a good explanation on why you have a few bad scores (2-3) then explain it somewhere in your application. Not reporting these scores will make readers wonder.</p>

<p>The first generation status you have is a great hook, exploit it to the max. Do you have any work experience?</p>

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<p>Thanks for all the replies! Would be okay if I retake the SAT and submit both my ACT & SAT scores, since my ACT is w/o writing? I wasn’t able to take the ACT w/ writing since the ACT w/o writing is mandated by my state. I’m afraid that if I do retake the ACT w/ writing the score will most likely go down, which I’m hoping won’t be the case for my SAT score. </p>

<p>Yeah, I do realise I screwed up on my Chem & Calc BC scores this year, which will make getting accepted a larger hurdle than it already was. Oh well, got to accept it for what it’s worth. Would it be better if I submit the Calc BC (since it’s still a 3) but not the Chem score? I don’t plan on majoring in anything chemistry-related anyway, and I’m even considering foregoing engineering altogether as a field. In fact, these past few years I’ve been doing consistently better in English, social studies, and Chinese, so I might even consider taking on something more along the lines of linguistics or social work.</p>

<p>I’m telling myself to get a job this first semester so I can at least put it down on my application, but it would conflict with tennis season (August to September). Ugh, college applications are so stressful! Thanks again for all the input.</p>

<p>PS: By USC, I meant University of Southern California.</p>

9

<p>Why don’t you use the College Search forum to look for schools, not chances. Here is the deal I see with you. Doing QB is good because you will get to more fully explain your situation. Do you know if you are EFC 0? Just wondering. For match schools, you might look at the QB partner schools that meet need. Some of them Asian is a little underrepresented, like Grinnell, I think, so you can be a bit strategic that way if you like the school. Pomona seems to take a lot of QB, though so you may have a good shot with them. One of the problems you might have is your safety schools not being affordable because of not meeting need. Did you price out all of those?</p>

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<p>If I recall, I calculated my EFC to be zero, or somewhere very close to zero (aka <$1,000). Pomona does seem to take a lot of QB. I’ve even visited their campus, asked questions, and liked their overall environment, not to mention the opportunities with Consortium classes, which is why it’s one of my top choices. One of my family members went to a state school and got a well-sized financial aid package in spite of a meagre application, which is why I’m not too worried about tuition. I’m hoping I’d be able to get a nice scholarship package if I become a finalist but am not matched so I could attend college with little debt. My only worry would be NYU, which has notoriously horrid financial aid.</p>

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<p>Columbia, Stanford, Pomona College, -High reaches
Northwestern, UChicago, UPenn, Cornell, WashU, mid-high reaches
USC, low reach
NYU. -match</p>

<p>You are aiming at some really hard schools. Your GPA is sorta low (since its under 4.3) but you have a heavy course load so that should be fine. Your ACT score will help you out also. But the problem lies in your EC’s (or lack of them). We already know asian kids can get numbers but EC’s are where people can really shine and you haven’t done anything unqiue. People usually get intern ships, lead something, start businesses, do research. You awards and club stuff are great, but a ton of people have that already. The worst part is that those high-mid reaches are schools that really look at EC’s since so many kids already have the grades. Since you are more of a numbers person I would suggest the UC schools. You can get into UCLA UCSD and UCB (its more of a low-mid reach since the engineering is killer). The UC’s are more generous to out of state kids like you. </p>

<p>Please chance me back!</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1672667-please-chance-an-asian-legacy-ed-wharton-app.html#latest”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1672667-please-chance-an-asian-legacy-ed-wharton-app.html#latest&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Write a killer essay compensating for the lack of ECs?</p>

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<p>Good scores. (Except on Chem and Calc, I wouldn’t report those. It won’t help you). Really try exploiting first fen college student. Will help tons! Just try to add a few more volunteer hours/work exp over summer. And at this late point in the application process, only thing you can do is focus on essay. Really work closely with teachers on recs too.</p>

<p>Columbia, Stanford, UChicago, UPenn, Cornell, -High reaches
Northwestern, WashU, Pomona College, mid-high reaches
USC, low reach
NYU. -match</p>

<p>Chance back please. <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1672492-chances-at-cornell-ed-columbia-ed-mit.html#latest”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1672492-chances-at-cornell-ed-columbia-ed-mit.html#latest&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>This sounds terrible (and a bit exploitive), but would the fact that I’m low-income make up for the fact that I’m not all that special in ECs? I’ve received some mails for summer internships and programmes at renowned universities (and some fishy for-profit organisations as well), but they all cost thousands of dollars. My college counsellor told me these programmes are essentially money-makers for colleges and add very little to my transcript. As for all the other unique ECs (creating a business, do research papers, etc.) I don’t really have an excuse there with the exception that it costs money to do these things. I’ve decided to forego tennis this year and get some job experience instead.</p>

<p>AmbiD77, I think that’s what my entire application’s going to come down to. I think I have a somewhat unique story, being a first-generation immigrant, college applicant, and English being my second language. When I applied to the QB College Prep Scholarship I wrote about my struggles identifying with both my native country and America and feeling the need to “pick a side”. My English teacher probably wrote an exhilarating recommendation, judging from her essay she wrote about me in an awards ceremony this year. I’ll just go along with what I have already done.</p>

<p>Thanks for everyone’s informative input so far!</p>