<p>OP, I’m a parent of a current Yale student. Bulldog Days is where you are courted by the students of Yale. Their job is to help you fall in love with Yale, not to decide whether they like you and want you. That’s the admissions department’s job. </p>
<p>Best wishes. Your thought process is solid and I love your willingness to consdier some great advice. You are the kind of student CC was made for, IMO.</p>
<p>I can understand where you are coming from, and I’m glad you left your old school. I hope that you are enjoying your new system of schooling :)</p>
<p>I strongly apologize for posting this on your thread, but I am new to this site, and I was wondering, is there any way that I can view the posts I specifically answered without having to go:
Ivy league–> Yale—> [specific post]?</p>
<p>I am very sorry that I am in a sense ‘spamming’, I just didn’t know where I else I could ask this question :/</p>
<p>And also, [to OP] will your GPA raise at all by the time you apply?</p>
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<p>Then I definitely stand corrected. Isn’t there just as often bad information on the internet as there is good information?</p>
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<p>I love it. It’s such a joy to be able to work at my own pace. It’s also really nice not to have to fight the scheduling system or any sort of cap on AP and honors courses. And the classes are much, much tougher than they were at my old school. It costs like $225 a month, though, so I have to work even more - but it’s okay, my schedule is more free to work.</p>
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<p>You are not “spamming”. Post #35 was good advice. Unfortunately, I really can’t answer your question.</p>
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<p>I’ll be applying to Yale SCEA, so probably not. As for my other schools, the first semester should bring my unweighted GPA up a couple of hundredths of points if I work really hard (which, of course, I will!). That said, I’m also taking challenging classes that are beyond my comfort zone - with the exception of classes I don’t like (physics!), I’m not going to NOT take a explore a subject because of a hundredth of a point. Even a 4.0 would only bring my GPA up to a 3.88. But nothing hurts, so I’m not going to discount that.</p>
<p>You are right, nothing would hurt to raise your grade! I see where you are coming from about a very rigorous course load, I myself am dreading physics :o
Your GPA definitely isn’t bad, and I do not think it will bring your chances of acceptance down at all. Just maybe work on some EC’s, that you are passionate about, perhaps?
Overall, best of luck, I think you have a great chance.</p>
<p>Thank you for attempting to answer my somewhat unnecessary question lol, I greatly appreciate it! :)</p>
<p>It’s actually not too expensive to fly from the East Coast to California. I bought a one-way ticket from JFK to Oakland for $110 just this Spring. I would say that if you start early and check the deals regularly, you can usually grab tickets for under $350 round trip quite easily, unless something unpredictable occurs, such as gas prices going up or the economy fluctuating. I actually live 30 minutes away from Stanford, but I decided to go to Yale. Even though I am in a similar economic situation as you are, that was definitely not a factor that swayed my decision to apply or to attend Yale, and it shouldn’t be a decision for you not to apply to Stanford. If you get in, there will be more than enough financial-aid to cover travel, even if it does mean using work-study money.</p>
<p>Well, I was reading up on Stanford’s financial aid, and I was really dissapointed. The MINIMUM student contribution for summer is $4500. Since my summer money is my only books/transportation/spending money, I can make almost no contribution to that. My mom can spare absolutely NO money, meaning if I want money, I have to make it during the summer - unless I never, ever want to leave my dorm room (and I’m only budgeting $75 or less per month spending money anyways, including incidental fees and necessities like shampoo, transportation, books, etc.), I simply cannot afford a $4500 student contribution. That means I’d already be guaranteed $4500 a year in loans. I was really disappointed. Thanks for the plane ticket advice, though.</p>
<p>Yale is ridiculously selective. You definitely have a chance, but if you don’t get admitted at least you have WashU to lean back on. That’s not too bad of school there either ;).</p>
<p>You ask if the interview is necessary. I asked myself that same question. I was so nervous when I scheduled mine because there was absolutely no way of really preparing myself for this interview other than doing some more research on Yale and my interests within the university.</p>
<p>That being said, I DON’T regret at all my decision to do the interview. It was more than an interview, it was a conversation. The interviewer and I spent 1 hour talking about Yale, New Haven, traffic jams and Latin America, and it was awesome. I truly believe it solidified my application because it helped to flesh out the personality I had conveyed on paper. I was certain the admissions officer would now see me as a person, not an applicant, and that made all the difference. The interview may help you not only to stand out as a real individual, but it may also tip the scale in your favor should it ever come between you and another applicant.</p>
<p>I know it all depends on the interviewer, and on how well you manage to present yourself throughout the interview, but if given the chance, do it. Try to make the best of it, and make it a two-way process: Make Yale learn more about you, all the while you genuinely try to learn more about Yale.</p>
<p>One other small point to look at re Stanford: The budget to which you will be required to contribute $4,500 should include an allowance for travel and books. So it’s not as if you would have to earn money for travel and books plus $4,500. (Stanford may still have worse financial aid than Yale, but it’s unlikely to have worse financial aid than any other school on your list.)</p>
<p>Jordi - good advice. I’ll look into an interview. It definitely doesn’t sound as stifling as I thought. It might not be so bad after all.</p>
<p>JHS</p>
<p>You almost certainly know more about Stanford than I do, but this is all I was able to find on the website:</p>
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<p>Other schools on my list may very well not have financial aid that is as good (but they have fantastic merit scholarships for which I am very competitive), but if I’m going to take out loans for my undergrad - any amount of loans - I want the school to be my dream school in every aspect. While Stanford is certainly commendable, it doesn’t sound like one of my dream schools, so I’d rather not take out loans to go there. I am perfectly willing to go to a school that’s less-than-perfect if it’s free (although Yale matches my description of the perfect school pretty closely), but I’d rather put the loans toward another school. Know what I mean?</p>
<p>That said, I was given the advice to explore Brown and not write it off as too-hipster, so I will definitely research it and continue to look into Stanford.</p>
<p>You have to read carefully. I believe the phrase “your college costs” includes an allowance of about $1,500/year for books, $1,000 for personal items, and an amount TBD for transportation (based on where you live). When it all gets figured in, the amount you would have to pay the university may be something like $1,000 or less. The other thing Stanford does (and not many other colleges) is to have outside scholarships reduce your contribution, not theirs. </p>
<p>I think that every college has a required student contribution, absent an extraordinary merit scholarship. Stanford is just being honest in telling you what theirs is. To compare colleges, you need to look at what their student contributions are, what goes into the costs that students must contribute to, and how they deal with outside awards.</p>
<p>I’m sure you have researched merit scholarships. I believe there are very, very few merit scholarships available that would really cover everything, and those few are insanely competitive – more so even than admission to Yale. You can’t count on that. Furthermore – and here I am speculating – there may well be a tendency to target such scholarships to students for whom they will make a much bigger difference than they will to you. A college looking at you will know that you will get full financial aid from any college that meets full need. Realistically, any such college will be affordable for you, and a full-ride scholarship will mean a relatively small difference in cost, one that, logically, should not be enough to affect your choice. A student whose family makes, say, $170,000/year may well not be eligible for any need-based aid, so a large merit scholarship will represent an overwhelming cost difference between two colleges that could (and probably should) be decisive as to which college the student will choose. So that could create a tendency to award big merit scholarships to students who are not otherwise eligible for significant aid. </p>
<p>You seem on top of all of this, so I should stop giving you advice. You certainly don’t HAVE to apply to Stanford, or anywhere. (But, yes, you should look harder at Brown, too.) In the end, all I (and others) have been telling you is that you probably shouldn’t be so conservative about applying to the richest, most selective institutions, because you are competitive there, and they are likely to be both your least expensive option and the one most likely to help you get where you want to go in life.</p>
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<p>That last bit is really, really good to know. Financial aid websites for colleges have very conflicting information about outside scholarships. Some schools even seem to conflict about their own scholarships. At some schools you can be awarded a merit scholarship and a need-based scholarship, but can only choose one - what? Why be awarded both in the first place? I think deciphering some parts of financial aid is an art.</p>
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<p>This is definitely true. I’m usually seeing figures from $1000 to $2500, plus $1000 to $2500 work study. Most of that will be loans for me - but it’s all less than a Stafford loan, and graduating with only Stafford loans is commendable (at least I think so, coming from such a low income household!). I will probably donate some time to work study, but for selfish reasons (and I’m willing to pay for these selfish reasons with loans! as a current victim of debt, I know how debt can affect me) I’m keeping that to a minimum - preferably not at all, but I hope I’ve shown I’m not TOO incredibly unreasonable.</p>
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<p>This is a great point. At the two schools I’m looking at for merit aid, however, most merit aid is need-aware. This does fit your description though, and I’ve never thought of it that way - as being need-aware but helping the higher-income (but not necessarily better off) family. That’s a new way of putting things. On the other hand, Boston University does outline its program as being lower-income + merit-worthy oriented. If only every financial aid website was as transparent…</p>
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<p>I have absorbed and noted every piece of advice in this thread, so I hope you don’t think that my occasional resistance has been a sign of ungratefulness. I have definitely appreciated all of the new information I’ve gotten - to be honest with you (and honest, not modest!), I really didn’t think I was competitive for the richest, most selective institutions. Just being told to be more confident and less conservative has opened a lot of doors for me, especially in terms of financial aid.</p>
<p>I’m going to have to deal with a similar problem. Here’s the thing: you need to emphasize that you haven’t been able to be involved with a bunch of ECs (which, btw, don’t need to constitute a laundry list) BECAUSE YOU’VE BEEN WORKING 25 HOURS A WEEK AND SUPPORTING YOURSELF AND YOUR FAMILY. And 2013yale815 (or whatever his name was) was flawed in his reasoning. For one thing, a 2230 is a fantastic score. Lots of kids get into Yale with far less. And his anecdote about a friend with a 3.97 getting rejected from U Penn proves the point: it’s more than your grads that matter. Your essays and recommendations need to tell your story vibrantly and cohesively. As someone else noted, it needs to be a biography. Yes, being a URM will probably give you some extra attention in the application process, but you sound like an intrepid, ambitious person with lots of aptitude. Show this with your essays and recommendations. </p>
<p>(Btw, my sister, who had virtually no awards, besides National Merit in Iowa, nearly no ECs, spent her summers working, and got a B in math one semester, got into Yale. Granted, it was in 1994, but it was totally because of her essays. She submitted her ACT score (33), because her SAT score was bad.) </p>
<p>Ultimately, obviously, you can’t know until you try. Just don’t get discouraged.</p>
<p>I don’t think that you should really emphasize that you haven’t been able to do other extracurriculars because you’ve been working instead. The people reading your application can do the math, and I think it’s a much more powerful statement for you to simply lay out what you do with your week than to include some kind of justification for your lack of extracurriculars, which would in my opinion sound more like an excuse than a simple fact.</p>
<p>Most of what needs to be said has already been said, but I think that the reason that your application seems likely to be successful at so many schools is the personality that I’m pretty confident you’re going to be able to communicate through it. I really think that it’s PERSONALITY combined with everything else (grades, scores, blah blah blah) that make the application happen. As long as you are really clear and bold about demonstrating the warm and driven person that you have in these posts, then your shot really is as good as other people in this thread seem to think it is.</p>
<p>I’m glad WishyWashy refined my point. He’s right, you should emphasize it to the point of being an excuse – but like he said, tell the story. :)</p>
<p>One thing to remember: it’s not just <em>summer</em> earnings Stanford (and schools like it) expect you to use to contribute to that $4500 sum. It also includes money from the “academic year,” which means on-campus jobs that generally pay more than $10 an hour at minimum.1</p>
<p>Oops: <em>not</em> emphasize it to the point of being an excuse. ^^^</p>
<p>Well, I have to say I’m surprised this thread got dredged up again.</p>
<p>I think my best bet is to feel neither encouraged nor discouraged. My chances of getting in are just as dismal as anyone else’s, and to be honest with you, I’d be just as happy at my safety as I would at Yale (and happier at my matches!). One of my biggest reasons for applying to Yale is the money. It’s not just graduating with almost no debt - it’s being able to take out loans for books, transportation, summer sessions, study abroad, and other experiences if I have to or really, really want to. Since Yale is similar to many of the other universities I’ve chosen, that’s just a door that Yale opens that other schools can’t or can’t open as far (although Rice actually has a better financial aid program).</p>
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<p>Well, thanks.</p>
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<p>Stanford’s figure does include both, but most schools list these figures separately. And the figures are different for each school. Yale is about $3800, whereas Rice is only $1800 (total, since students with a 0 EFC do NOT have to make a summer contribution). I will probably take a work study once or twice, but I plan to be busy with study abroad and internships, which will most certainly hinder my ability to to work study for one year or two years. I’m going to be completely honest here, though. If the amount I’m supposed to contribute from work study toward my billed expenses (at Yale, this figure is $6750, at Rice, it’s $0), is less than $7500, I probably won’t do work study at all or for significantly less than what would be necessary, like five hours per week instead of ten. College is a unique experience. I intend to spend it researching, studying abroad, taking lots of classes, learning a new language, meeting new people, etc. I don’t want to spend 10-30 hours per week working, and I know that makes me sound lazy - but if it means paying off loans in the future and it’s less than $10,000 (total), then that’s the least of my worries. I know what it means to have to pay off loans, but if four amazing years leads to a great job or an unbelievable position in grad school, I’ve rationalized that it’s worth it.</p>
<p>You could be paid to do research and internships. I’m not sure if this is the case everywhere, but MIT made it clear that paid research positions are easy to get and count as work study.</p>
<p>I really wish I was into math, science, engineering, or technology. MIT is actually a really good match for me and I’ve only heard good things about their opportunities and programs. But I don’t necessarily want to be surrounded by math/science people. I like a ton of variety.</p>