Hi all, I’ve posted on this forum before, at the beginning of my junior year. I received great advice from the always helpful College Confidential community, but now as I begin the application process and have more information about my app I’d like to ask for advice again! My list is very ambitious, but I’d like to know how you all feel about my chances, things I can do to improve my chances, or schools I haven’t listed but you’d recommend! Thank you for your time!
My list, in order of preference, is as follows
- Northwestern HPME
- Brown PLME
- University of Miami BS/MD program
- Dartmouth
- Stanford
- Harvard
- Tufts (father received both BS and MD from tufts university, and is a donor)
- Bates
- Plan II honors program at UT Austin
- Honors program at CU boulder
Obviously I am very interested in medicine, with 3 BS/MD programs being at the top of my list. I would also like to study chemistry as an undergrad student That being said, everything on my list seems scarily competitive to me. My stats are as follows:
Freshman year:
Biology H
Geometry H
Government H
English H
Spanish III H
I ended up with a 4.00 GPA and an average of approx. 96. I got high honors (avg>95) both semesters, and ended with the highest grade or tied for highest grade in a few classes (bio and gov off the top of my head)
Sophomore year
Chemistry H
Algebra II H
World HIstory (not AP)
English H
Spanish IV H
Again had a 4.00 GPA, and an average around 96. High honors both semesters, no highest grade in any classes.
Between my sophomore and junior years I moved across the country, from a very small primarily white private school to a large primarily hispanic public school. I don’t know if this has any influence but if I do say so myself I displayed remarkable adaptability, it was honestly a huge transition going from my old environment to this environment and I’ve made good friends and became involved in the student body almost immediately. I’m pretty social/popular, which I think is fairly impressive and may set me apart a little bit with my grades and being the new kid a lot of my life (shows adaptability) , but I don’t know if I should mention that to colleges, or if they’ll care.
Junior year
Biology AP
Chemistry AP
US History AP
English Lang/Comp AP
Pre-calculus PAP (pre-ap, new schools equivalent to honors)
Soccer x2 (soccer at this school takes 2 of my periods)
EDIT
AP scores:
APUSH 5
AP BIO 5
AP LANG/COMP 5
AP CHEM 4
During my junior year I also took the SAT twice and ACT for the first time, my scores are as follows:
Best SAT scores:
800 Critical Reading
780 Writing
720 Math
ACT composite: 33 (I don’t remember the split, however I do remember I scored a perfect 36 on science)
Summer between my Junior and Senior year I attended The Congress of Future Medical Leaders.
Senior year tentative schedule (subject to change)
Physics AP
Anatomy and Physiology PAP
Economics AP
English Lit AP
Calculus BC
Statistics AP
Forensic science
There may be another class, but my schedule is kind of up in the air in order to make sure I get my graduation requirements since they’re different at the high school I came from and the school I’m at now
Extracurriculars:
Varsity soccer since freshman year and sophomore year (on a very successful team at my old school, reigning state champs), JV soccer junior year (Due to district regulations I was not eligible for varsity sports as a transfer student), no soccer senior year.
JV basketball Sophomore and Junior year, hopefully varsity basketball senior year
NHS, Spanish honors society
Musician (drummer) for 8 years, played at church, in the youth church, in a few rock bands, and in a kind of exhibition/promotion band for a local music shop. As of my junior year I have began to play piano, guitar and bass.
Worked at an asphalt plant laboratory doing quality control and assessment
Shadowed my father (a surgeon)
Some volunteer hours
very fitness oriented (cook my own clean meals, run 10+ miles a week in the mornings and lift on top of sports)
My father was in the military and was deployed for long periods of my childhood, and I’ve moved a lot, including living in germany for 3 years during elementary school.
WPI frontiers program summer of 2014
Lots of traveling and exposure to culture
I am currently ranked number 3 in my class, out of 350 students, and there is a good chance I graduate as valedictorian or salutatorian
I think I could write some awesome essays about soccer (I truly believe the dedication and discipline that my old soccer team required from me played a large role in molding me into who I am today) and moving (I think I’m a highly adaptable kid who can excel in almost any conditions.) I’m also very passionate about science and medicine.
So the specific questions I have are these:
Does it seem as if I have the appropriate honors for these types of colleges? There is an academic honors section of the Common App but in spite of my high academic performance from highschool all I really have for that section is NHS, SHS, NSHSS, Torch and Laruel Society and some school banquets and stuff like that.
How should I work my moving across the country into my app? I don’t want to come off as melodramatic and make it seem like it was the biggest deal in the world to me, but it was fairly dramatic (as all moves are) and I’d like to highlight both my adaptability on my application, and how I was able to turn such a scary occurrence into a net positive for my life (met new great friends, been exposed to Mexican culture in a way I never anticipated, had an amazingly fun and academically fulfilling junior year). And tagging onto this topic, I also want to demonstrate how integral Mexican culture is to my community, and how I’ve had so much fun being a part of that (ie crossing the border to Mexico to get tacos, speaking only spanish on the soccer team, speaking to many of my friends parents and even some of my friends in exclusively spanish) has been for me, but also the amount of effort it took as a white guy to fit into and enjoy this environment. I’m kind of at a loss as to how to demonstrate this.
Should I submit my ACT score? I have a composite ACT of 33 which is lower than my composite SAT of 2300, but I got a 36 on the science section of the ACT. So would it be better for me to submit this ACT score, even if it is lower than the school/program’s average (like HPME) and show off my 36 on science, or to just submit my closer-to-the-plme-average SAT score?
I see myself as pretty “popular” (lots of friends, well known among student community, well liked) and as having a good handle on my social skills, basically as able to fit in and make friends anywhere. I think this is a fairly unique thing among high academic achievers, not that committed students are uncool or anything but I think very few of them would be able to check the “I get invited to bunches of parties” box, and seems like a positive trait to me. Is it? Should I work this into my application? If so, how?
Thanks for the time! I know this is a wall of text but I feel like it’s a good summary of my application so hopefully I can get some great feedback!