Stanford EA vs. Questbridge Please Need Help!

Applying to College
1

<p>So Stanford is my #1 choice but I am also considering questbridge because my mom has low income (48,000), I have unusual circumstances (father was an abusive alcoholic), and I would also like to apply to other top schools...</p>

<p>So should I do stanford EA, because I know I have a better chance of getting in EA than through QB, or should I do QB because of my circumstances and it overall gives me a better shot for the top schools?</p>

<p>Please advise me!</p>

<p>Here are my stats if you are wondering:</p>

<p>Ethnicity: Asian Indian
School: Competitive Public (~500 students in each grade)
Area: Northern California</p>

<p>GPA (UW: 3.98) (W: 4.31)
Weighted is low because my school does not offer AP for grades 9/10, and it does not weight grades for honors classes in 9/10</p>

<p>Class Rank: 1/499</p>

<p>Courseload: Most rigorous and advanced as possible</p>

<p>Junior Year GPA (UW: 4.00) (W: 4.83)
AP Calc AB A- / A
AP US Hist A- / A
AP Psych A / A
Honors English A / A
Honors Chem A- / A-
French III A / A-</p>

<p>Very rigorous senior year
AP Econ
AP Gov
AP Physics
AP French
Academic Decathalon Team
Journalism
Math 1B (Calc BC) at Junior College OR AP Stats
English 1A (basically AP Eng) at Junior College OR AP Eng</p>

<p>SAT I: 2080
M 770
CR 690
W 620
(I know it is very low, esp. the writing, but I am studying very hard for it, going to retake, and hopefully I can break 2200, a 120 pt jump, so please take that into consideration before saying I have no chance at all with that SAT)</p>

<p>SAT Subject Tests: took in June, not sure yet</p>

<p>Extracurricular:</p>

<p>Member of National Honor Society (Grades 9, 10, & 11)
Member of California Scholarship Federation (Grades 9, 10, & 11)
Member of School Honor Society (Grades 9, 10, & 11)</p>

<p>President and Founder of my own political awareness club, we discuss current events and politics (11)</p>

<p>Community Achievement Award (Grades 10,11)
North Coast Section, CIF Scholar Athelete (Grades 9,10, & 11)</p>

<p>School Badminton Team (Grade 9) Varsity (Grades 10 & 11)</p>

<p>Volunteer at Regional Library (120 Certified Community Service Hours, I know its not much, but I use my time to try to improve the library instead of just piling on hours by shelving books) (9,10,11)
Founding Member of the Library Teen Advisory Council (10,11)
Only Youth Member of Official Library Advisory Board (11)</p>

<p>Paid Internship at a Biotech Company Located In Silicon Valley
Interned as a Reasearch and Development Analyst, published a research White Paper availible on company's website (9,10,11)
Possible Letter of Rec from CEO</p>

<p>California Boy's State 2009, going this saturday!</p>

<p>USAF Academy Summer Seminar (So someone told me its a free education and I decided to check it our because i did not know about Fin aid or Questbridge, but I am definiteley not applying there, but I will list it because it is a competitive program to get into)</p>

<p>Page Editor of Award Winning School Newspaper (12)</p>

<p>Academic Decathalon Team, always wins county and usually places in top 4 for state, only accepts seniors (12)</p>

<p>Started my own landscaping business to help my mom pay the bills, makes around $500 a month, and I dont do any work actually, just connect my friends to people who want their lawn mowed and I take half</p>

<p>I Hope that helps, any advice is greatly appreciated, thanks</p>

2

<p>I say questbridge but i was a qb kid but i’m biased. stanford is a qb partner so just apply through there. if you don’t get in qb can carry a lot of weight… at least i think so</p>

3

<p>thanks</p>

<p>but i am pretty sure i have a better chance of getting into stanford EA than through QB…but QB has so much oppurtunity, so i dont know</p>

<p>How did your admissions results fare with QB?</p>

4

<p>I applied to stanford princeton and penn through qb. it was a lot of work but i wasn’t matched. so my app got bumped to rd and things couldn’t have turned out better. i applied to other schools outside qb and i got into all of them plus princeton. i was waitlisted to stanford and rejected from penn. i think if i would have had more time i could have done better at penn and stan.</p>

5

<p>I know this is a dumb question…
but can someone explain Questbridge real quick? Like in their own words? =D</p>

6

<p>questbridge is basically a program for kids that have income less than 60K and/or unusual circumstances to have an equal shot at top colleges</p>

<p>so they select finalists, and if you are a QB finalist, you have a better shot</p>

7

<p>[QuestBridge</a> Home Page](<a href=“http://www.questbridge.org%5DQuestBridge”>http://www.questbridge.org)</p>

8

<p>so you ended up going to princeton? And penn rejected you, but you got into princeton? interesting…</p>

9

<p>anyone else care to give some advice?</p>

10

<p>Stanford’s nonbindng through QB, isn’t it? Can’t you still apply to other schools while you await a QB decision?</p>

11

<p>^^yeah you can it’s basically like EA. and yeah i thought it was kind of funny since upenn was the only school to reject me i thought it’s be the other way around. i did apply to wharton though maybe that did something lol. there is a thread on cc about qb already maybe you’ll find your answers there</p>

12

<p>yeah, although Stanford’s EA acceptance rate for class of 2013 was 13%…much higher than its 6% RD acceptance rate, and through QB I will be in the RD pile, getting a match is a a very slim possibility</p>

13

<p>Youdon’tsay, during the College Match portion of the program, even if you apply only to non-binding QB schools, you cannot apply EA or ED to other schools. It is okay to apply to schools with rolling admissions, and you could submit applications for Regular Decision to other schools. Once the College Match decisions are announced, if you are not matched then you could still apply Early to schools whose deadlines haven’t passed.</p>

14

<p>hmmm…im thinking I could just do questbridge for RD, but not do the match process and do stanford EA</p>

<p>I wonder if that would work…although, if i do the match process for stanford, MIT, princeton, yale…the apps will be automatically forwarded to RD even i dont get matched, so match process saves a hassle</p>

15

<p>cmon people i need some advice</p>