Some tips and advice about schools?

Prep School Admissions
1

I was waitlisted at Exeter and Mercersburg this year, and I’m reapplying this year as a repeat 9th grader. Following most people’s advice here, I decided to expand my list of schools:

Exeter
Madeira
Holderness (contemplating this one)
Emma Willard
Deerfield
Miss Hall’s
Loomis Chaffee (also contemplating)
Linden Hall

I’m going into 9th grade, and an international student from Asia. I require full FA because my parents make approximately 40,000/year

Grades and Stats:
GPA: 9.5/10 or 3.84 (based on conversion table)
Mostly As and a few occasional Bs
SSAT Scores: 81 percentile (80 Reading, 87 Verbal, 66 Quantitative)
I’m planning to retake the SSAT later in the year.

Ive also had plenty of English Awards from the school and city (Won spelling bee 3 consecutive years, and placed 9th in a National TOEFL Competition- still got bronze medal for it tho)

Sport:

  • Bronze medal in Basketball City competition
  • Bronze medal for 400m sprint in track competition
  • Mostly been in school sport teams since 4th grade and occasionally won medals
  • Idk if saying going to the gym helps anything but ig i’ll just add it here

Other E/Cs:

  • Top 20 Speak2Inspire National Debate Competition
  • 9 years of Piano- I did some piano performances to raise money for charity, and recently got a merit certificate for the Grade 5 Trinity Keyboard Exam
  • Shuffle danced for about 3 years? I have a few videos that I also sent to the school
  • Had a lot of charity and volunteer work (yard sales for charity, planting trees in the park, etc etc)
  • I also sing and I did send in a video of me playing the piano and singing
  • I’m in the school band and we recently performed for a well known band here in Vietnam and the crowd loved us
  • I’m in the school’s Pride Alliance

Do you guys have more recommendations for schools and also what I should improve on?
Please note that I need full financial aid to be able to go, or at most under 10,000/year for tuition

Thanks!

​ ​ ​ ​

1 Like
2

I’m considering maybe changing Holderness to Lawrenceville?

3

Holderness and Lawrenceville are really different schools. Dig a little deeper to figure out what you want - it’ll help make your application more compelling. Based on the rest of your list, Lynn looks like the better fit.

Also, full FA for an international student is very tricky. Investigate that aspect fully. You’re an impressive candidate, but if a school has limitations on financial aid for foreign students and they don’t meet your needs, you’re just not going to get there. I

1 Like
4

I wanted to fit Lawrenceville somewhere, and Holderness kinda lost its appeal slowly after I did more research. My family has limited funds and I’m not allowed to apply to too many schools. I’m also thinking if I should remove Deerfield to put Lawrenceville in or apply to both of them.

Do you have any more schools I could probably add to the list?

5

If this is because of the cost of applying, schools typically give waivers on application fees for kids whose families are in similar situations. Just email the AO for the school and they will help you out.

1 Like
6

do application fee waivers affect my chances at admission?

7

Well, only Andover and Exeter are need blind, so other schools will know that you need FA. So in that regard it won’t change anything.

1 Like