<p>...so that I wouldn't feel SUPER insecure about my scores! What does a 2230 means, considering the fact that I don't speak English at home, in school or in everyday life? Is it decent to apply to the Ivies? </p>
<p>Half of the test takers here are striving to get 2300+, and I honestly know I can't reach that. I got 2080 on my first try, so I don't think I'll be able to bring my score over 2250.</p>
<p>It's just so hard to figure out whether scores are ok for international applicants. </p>
<p>A 2230 is a <em>great</em> score…very high, I would say certainly high enough for the the Ivies. I think it might be helpful if you give us your score breakdown, however, so that we can give you the best advice possible. Unless your score is distributed <em>really</em> unevenly across the 3 sections, I doubt you really need to retake…</p>
<p>I already went through a whole CR workbook and studied words and everything. My score increased by 50. I know that if I retake, Math & Writing will probably go down (I think I got fairly lucky on these sections in the past). </p>
<p>I think it might be useful to get a 700+ in CR, wouldn’t it? Idk, I mean I think its understandable that my CR score is lower than my Math one, and 690 is in most Ivies ranges, but it still won’t look very nice. On the other hand, if I retake in October and get something like 2100 with 710 in CR, that will not be advantageous either…</p>
<p>it depends on what ivies you want to get into. if its hpy, then yea, retake it even if your other scores might go down (doesn’t matter). but if its all the other ivies + mit/stanford, i wouldn’t bother… your score is fine. keep in mind though… SAT doesn’t really matter that much any more, so with a 2230, i wouldn’t stress over it.</p>
<p>the fact that you don’t speak english at home wont really help you that much unfortunately. i don’t speak english at home either and i got 2350 (750 on reading). but again, 2230 is pretty darn good.</p>
<p>Oooh congrats Wingless 2350 is pretty awesome!</p>
<p>I understand that the fact that I don’t speak English at home will not really help me. I’m certainly not the only one in this situation! But I was also never educated in English… Could that make a difference?</p>
<p>Oh, and yes, I plan to apply to HYP. I’ll just retake in October I guess :).</p>
<p>um… i remember harvard asking a lot about what my first language was and the places that i have lived at… so i guess it certainly could matter to some extent, but it is best to focus on getting a good score and hope for the best. also, make sure your college essays shows who you really are. i sent in essays that were like… completely random and somewhat off topic, but i somehow got in and i think its because i really meant my essays.</p>
<p>Yeah, I totally get what you mean about the language. I won’t rely on the fact that it’s not my mother tongue to excuse my scores. It’s better to work as much as I can :)</p>
<p>Thanks for the advices! I have some ideas about my essays, I just hope they’ll be unique!</p>
<p>Wow, you got into Harvard! that’s AMAZING (altough you must hear that all the time ^^ )! Have fun next year :)</p>
<p>Wingless, do you mind posting your stats!!!
your subscores, ECs/Awards, and your unique characteristic(this is what Ivy Leagues want, correct? ^_^;;)</p>
<p>one of my friend who got into Harvard participated in violin contests in Europe and Asia, pretty unique I guess…lol,</p>
<p>and my other friend who got into Harvard won a gold medal in a chemistry contest in Russia and one from the math Olympiad…</p>
<p>haha you have amazing friends. unfortunately, im not that amazing (which i guess is all the more encouraging??) anyway, i never thought about going to harvard. in fact, i spent less than 30 minute on the harvard app before sending it out (i just recycled my essays for caltech and filled out the harvard specific questions), so you never know right? anyway here goes:</p>
<p>-2350 SAT (750 reading)/ 800 math2/ 800 physics/ 760 us history
-All A’s… i think im up to around 14ish APs, all 5s so far.
-ranked 1/600ish
-Bunch of useless awards not worth mentioning.
-i worked a decent amount (fluctuating around 14 hours/week), just quit one of my jobs so i can enjoy senior year though
-very involved in 2 community service clubs in which im president (the adviser of one-also my physics teacher-wrote one of my recs)
-i play school hockey all year
-all the other stuff you know (science olym, stupid useless recognition clubs that i haven’t paid the fee for, etc)</p>
<p>anyway, sounds pretty solid yet ordinary these days right? i don’t know how i got in and i think i will go ask when i visit later this month. my guess is that they liked my essays. i talked about how my dad cuts my hair and i expanded it to my views on life. and the other essay was about my thoughts about physics.</p>
<p>i also got into princeton. the only school i didn’t get in was stanford (and i ironically spent like… 10 hours on their app too, lol).</p>
<p>I love how you presented your stats. You said the least possible, yet you still seem amazing!
You’re the Ernest Hemingway of college admission stats ahahaha :)</p>
<p>Okay, yeah, after seeing the distribution, I’d say you <em>could</em> retake if you want and it wouldn’t be completely crazy, but you don’t really, really need to.</p>
<p>I’ll see if I get enough time in the summer to study, with the TOEFL and everything… If I score lower than 2230 in October, but still manage to bring my CR score up a bit, do you think it would have a positive or negative effect on my chances?</p>
