I am currently a Sophomore in high school and ive wanted to attend MIT since middle school. Ive always been considered smart by my teachers and peers and have been known to take initiative to learn. I have not taken any APs so far which i regret, so to make up for it, this will be my last year at public high school because i will be transferring to a middle college high school where I will take only the high school classes i need to graduade and everything else at a (community) college level. So far in my high school career ive had one B in my fresman year and straight As since. The only place I feel to be lacking is test scores and maybe extracurriculars. Earlier this school year I got a 27 on PreACT and 1300 on PSAT. This is obviously is in the low range for the the schools im interested in. I took the SAT two months ago and got a 1310, just 10 points better. Ive been in TSA Club both years (making video games for competition, never even placed at regionals), IT Club this year (went to a robotics competition and won the state competition, coding) and thats about it. I do have a huge interest in electronics though, and i actually do a good bit of self-taught electrical engineering at home, but i dont know the best way to apply that to something that admissions officers will care about. I havent done any sort of community service but i was thinking that building a house with habitat for humanity would be something fun for the summer (do you have to be 18 to do that?). Im just a little lost on what my next step is. I want to do something that will wow admissions but i just dont know. I see skme of these “chance me?” Posts saying how theyre teaching english in china or building homes in a foreign country, and what am i doing? Playing fortnite and scraping by with As. I want to eventually work for NASA or SpaceX on satellites or rocket avionics, so i need to step up my game.
For MIT, chances are going to be lousy no matter how great your stats are. When you deal with a hyper-competitive school like that, your stats are going to look exactly the same as everyone else. There’s really no way to stand out. Get the best grades/scores you can and apply and see what happens. Don’t put your self-worth on it. There are tons of schools that can put you just as far as MIT that aren’t hyper-competitive.
OP: You need to create a larger list of target schools.