Safeties/Matches/Reaches

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hi Everyone,

I am trying to finalize a list for the fall, but I’m not exactly sure what schools would be safeties, matches, and reaches. Here are some schools that I’m thinking about:

Boston College
Bucknell
Colgate
Cornell
Dartmouth
Georgetown
Hamilton
Notre Dame
University of Richmond
Villanova
University of Virginia

Old SAT: 1410/1600 (math and reading, not going to send for schools that don’t require all scores)
ACT: 34 (definitely sending this instead)
GPA: 4.00 (I’m pretty sure this is weighted)
My school does not rank

Grades:

9th:
English 9- B+
Geometry Honors- A
World History- A-
Physics 9 Honors- A-
Spanish II- A
Religion- A-

10th:
English 10 Honors- A-
Algebra II and Trig Honors- A-
AP Euro- A
Chemistry Honors- A
Spanish III- A
Religion- A

11th (so far):
English 11 Honors- A-
Pre-Calculus Honors- A
AP US History- A
Biology Honors- A
Spanish IV- A
Religion- A

ECs:

Cross Country 9, 10, 11 - Captain 2 years
Golf 9, 10, 11, 12 - Captain 2 years
Debate Team 10, 11, 12 - Head for 2 years
Mentor to Middle Schoolers 9, 10
Choir 9, 10, 11, 12
Volunteer at local clothing bank - 9, 10, 11, 12
I’ve played guitar since 6th grade
Newspaper - 10, 11, 12 Editor for 2 years (Editor-in-Chief as senior)
Community Service Club 9, 10, 11, 12
Spanish Club 9, 10, 11, 12
I am a retreat leader next year (only seniors can do this)
I’m also very involved with breast cancer. A friend and I started a group for our town to support the cause and I joined the club at school and have done community service for the cause too.

If you guys could give me any kind of feedback or advice I would really appreciate it. Additionally, if there are any other schools that I didn’t list that could be matches based on all of this info, I’d love to know.

2

Boston College: match
Bucknell: match
Colgate: high match
Cornell: reach
Dartmouth: reach
Georgetown: low reach
Hamilton: match
Notre Dame: low reach
University of Richmond: match
Villanova: match
University of Virginia: OOS high match, instate match

Not many safeties so apply to your local state college.

3

Your results may roughly correspond to the entering standardized scores for your current choices:

Notre Dame
Dartmouth
Cornell
Georgetown
Hamilton
Colgate
Boston College
Virginia
Richmond
Villanova
Bucknell

If you applied to all of these schools, you would be likely to get into 7-9 of them. Good luck.

4

Thank you for your responses! For safeties, I am thinking about Lehigh and Holy Cross, but I haven’t really looked into them much yet.

5

A “safety” is a college that you can afford with no problem, as well as get admitted to. I agree that you should apply to your state flagship university, assuming that it is affordable.

6

^ Yep. Lehigh and Holy Cross aren’t safeties.They’re probably matches.

Here’s how I would rate them:

Boston College - High match
Bucknell - High match
Colgate - High match
Cornell - Low Reach or Reach (depending on school)
Dartmouth - Reach
Georgetown - Low Reach
Hamilton - High Match
Notre Dame - Low Reach
University of Richmond - Match
Villanova - Match
University of Virginia - Match in-state, high match OOS

7

Lehigh: low reach
Holy Cross: match
Boston College
Bucknell: high match
Colgate: low reach
Cornell: reach
Dartmouth: reach
Georgetown: reach
Hamilton: low reach
Notre Dame: reach
University of Richmond: low reach
Villanova: match
University of Virginia: if instate, match/if OOS: reach

Once you reach a certain level of acceptance rates, you may match their stats and still have a reach/low reach simply because they admit so few of all qualified applicants.

You need two safeties - universities with acceptance rates of about 35-45% where, after you’ve run the NPC, you’ve shown the results to you parents and they’ve confirmed they can afford paying that much. One would likely be your state’s flagship (and its honors college), one could be a LAC ranked 40-60.

Other possible matches: Dickinson, Denison, Skidmore, Trinity CT.