STEM Nerd Aiming for Northwestern for Mechanical or Chemical Engineering

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Demographics

  • US citizen
  • Illinois
  • White Female:

Intended Major(s)
Mechanical or Chemical Engineering

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 4.0/4.0
  • Weighted HS GPA (incl. weighting system): 5.34/6.00 (4.45/5.00)
  • Class Rank: 4/1150
  • ACT/SAT Scores:1550 SAT

Coursework
I will have taken about 14 AP classes and got 4s and 5s in all of them. Some of these also counted as dual enrollment. I will be taking Calc 3 senior year and took AP Chem freshman year. I did AP for the language I took (French). I also took 4 years of english (2 of which were AP english classes) and 4 years of social studies (2 of which were also AP).

Awards
*Science Olympiad State (Division C): Silver medalist Robot Tour, 5th place Disease Detectives, Silver Medalist Chem Lab
*Science Olympiad Regionals (Division C):Overall Varsity Team First Place
Gold Medalist: Disease Detectives, Codebusters, Chem Lab
Silver medalist: Anatomy and Physiology, Forensics

*Chemistry Summer Scholars Program at IIT
*NHS (and lots of volunteer hours mostly tutoring through my school)
*National Cyber Scholar Semifinalist
*Principal Harpist for Highest School Level Orchestra (4 years)
*Teaching Assistant for AP Chemistry
*Northwestern IN-FOCUS Seminar (Aerospace Engineering)
*Northwestern REACH CIERA Program
*Harpist for Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra
*AP Capstone Diploma
*Captain of Science Olympiad Team (4 years on varsity team)
*President of Chemistry Club and Vice-President of Hacking Club
*Engineering Internship (that I got paid for doing)
*National Merit Scholar Semi-finalist

(waiting to hear back to see if I made Illinois-All State Orchestra or got NASA internship)

Also applying Early Decision

I would really appreciate any feedback on how I could add to/improve my application, as well as where I stand in comparison to other Northwestern Applicants. I feel like I have pretty strong academics, but I am lacking in extracurriculars based on some of the other profiles I have seen for people interested in STEM. Please be honest, and I welcome constructive criticism. Thank you so much!!

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You have a great resume so far. Are you a junior? Study for the APs coming up. Finish junior year strong. Secure teachers for LOR: make sure to pick ones who know you well —hopefully you have been an engaged classroom member and are kind. Kindness counts, and the lack of it often seeps into LORs. Make sure you take the most rigorous classes you can for your senior year, not skipping hard APs offered at your school (and avoid taking DE elsewhere instead of AP at your school). Does your school offer AP Physics C? Take it if you haven’t already. It is a very important course for engineering applicants.Spend time this summer on essays as well as digging into a couple of activities with a focus on impact. Do not slack off senior year. Good luck! Based on what you have written, you have an above-average chance compared to the typical applicant.

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Congrats.

Write great essays showing them about yourself…maybe make it less STEMy and show another side of you. Your Harpist role shows that.

You’ve done great - a lot of it is luck but you certainly stand out as a strong candidate - so best of luck to you.

PS - do you have any cost concerns?- because if so, as a NMSF you’ll get a full ride at Tulsa and at least free tuition at many schools - and if you go up to finalist, you’ll do even better than free tuition - so $360K or more for Northwestern, if this is a consideration, you might look elsewhere (which then it wouldn’t be advisable to ED). National merit is the golden ticket!!

So if you look at NU career outcomes, they place at similar companies to other schools in engineering. Engineering is less about rank than other schools - most students will make similarly regardless of where they go. For example, my son at Alabama interviewed with Georgia Tech students - they all made the same, etc.

If you want NU, you certainly have a great chance relative to the normal odds.

Best of luck.

Post Undergraduate Survey Data: Northwestern Career Advancement - Northwestern University

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Congratulations on all of your accomplishments in high school so far. As has already been mentioned, make sure you finish strong and focus on producing the best application possible (including contacting the writers of your letters of recommendation). But there’s nothing additional that I think you need to be doing.

With respect to chancing you, I would check with your high school counselor, but my sense is that although your odds are probably greater than the regular chances for admission at Northwestern. Perhaps your chance is doubled? But that means your chances of acceptance might go from 7% to 14%. Even if you’re 3x likelier to be admitted, that still means you have about a 21% chance.

All of that to say is that I think you definitely stand a chance of admittance, but it is by no means a sure thing or even a likely thing. Make sure you have a well-crafted list of schools to apply to, with your “safety” school(s) as the most important: school(s) that you are extremely likely to be admitted to, know that you can afford, and would be happy to attend. If you need help coming up with ideas for schools where you are more likely to be admitted, let us know. What is your budget? Has your family run any Net Price Calculators (particularly at Northwestern) to see if the price will be affordable for them?

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Thank you so much! I will definitely take that into account for my LOR, and try do some activities with impact focus. My school offers AP Physics C and I am going to take that as well.

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I really appreciate the advice!! I will take into account to maybe focus on some non-STEM things for my essay. Thank you for the tip about NMSF as well!

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Don’t overlook your state flagship UIUC! Probably better known than Northwestern in both Mechanical and Chemical Engineering.

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Thank you! I know it is by all means not a sure thing to get accepted, but I want to give it a shot, because I think I would be very happy at Northwestern, and it is well-ranked. I also know that my family would be able to afford it if I were to attend.

I would also welcome help coming up with some ideas for other schools where I would be more likely to be admitted. The schools on my list right now that I want to apply to are (I know a lot of these are hard to get into): U Michigan, UIUC, Cornell, UPenn, Brandeis, NYU, Berkeley, Georgetown, and BU

I really appreciate all of your help!

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Thank you for the advice! I will make sure to take that into account. I am also planning on applying to UIUC, but I think in terms of school culture, Northwestern might be a better fit for me (even though the engineering program at UIUC is probably better).

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What is it about Northwestern (and its student culture) that appeals to you? That might help others as they think of likelier possibilities for you. (So would any other information about your preferences for a college.)

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Be careful. Not all the schools on your list have engineering. And again Engineering is less prestige based. You want to ensure your school is ABET accredited.

NU is great of course and very different than UIUC. But UIUC is one of the top schools in the country in engineering whereas NU is very solid.

There are engineering schools, large and small, at different price points. And all might lead to similar outcomes.

I would personally look less at rank

If an NU is good for you, perhaps a Syracuse would be a solid safety. It’s tough to find similar size safeties but maybe a Colorado School School of Mines or RPI although they are different environments.

Then you have great small schools like RHIT in neighboring Indiana. Their outcomes are INSANELY good.

Don’t look past the national merit (more go to Alabama than any school) or auto merit, at schools big and small. These kids are getting the same jobs. My kid is one of them who had great career success this year.

Truth is most top engineering programs are state flagships. And the rank is typically less important short of a few schools.

Also, if you decide it’s chemical you want, you’ll want to add schools like Delaware etc.

Don’t get caught up in prestige. But if NU is a good fit - it’s awesome. Unfortunately it will be tough to find like schools as safer schools of a similar vibe will be few.

For now, look at offerings at schools on your list as they don’t all meet your academic needs.

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Georgetown doesn’t have an engineering school so make sure you’d be okay with majoring in something else before you apply there.

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And Brandeis. Where they won’t have one for a few years and it’ll be general and non ABET accredited.

As noted OP needs to check her list carefully. She’s building on overall prestige and engineering short of a few schools - is anything but. And overall school rankings don’t equate to rankings on certain majors etc.

And truthfully NU is not one of those few. UIUC may be….

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Not probably, certainly. As others have written, UIUC is in the top 10 or higher, while NU is good. UIUC is well known worldwide in engineering, and is better known in engineering than Northwestern. My wife has been in CS for decades now, and we lived until recently in the Chicago area.

@Lily798 If you’re interested in a private college with low acceptance rates for engineering, you’d do better applying to Cornell. It has a top engineering program, it has all the prestige that you will need, AND it has a higher acceptance rate than Northwestern. CMU is another college which is one of the top engineering schools worldwide.

Something that you should consider is that, as a woman, you will have a bit better chance in some colleges, particularly those like CMU with a strong engineering tilt. That will not be true for NU. Acceptance rates for women to CMU were, last year, 14% (for NU they were 7%).

I get your attraction to Northwestern, BTW. My kid also grew up in the Chicago area, and did a few summer programs at Northwestern. The campus is really beautiful, it’s on the lake shore, etc. It looks like a university should look. Probably not the best way to choose an engineering school, though.

There are fields for which NU is a top college. However, for engineering Wisconsin, Purdue, and UMN are better, while UIUC and Michigan are far better.

No, you are not. Your ECs are great. It’s all in the presentation. Perhaps some students have an award or two more, but those are few and far between. Your ECs are well within the range of students who are being accepted everywhere.

That doesn’t mean that you will be accepted everywhere you apply, but it does mean that, so long as you keep on the way you’re going, you will be an extremely competitive applicant anywhere.

Safeties in engineering these days are not common. For you, UIC would definitely be a safety, and its engineering program is more than solid, Michigan State is also probably a safety, IIT may be, depending on your finances. Iowa State would certainly be a possibility, and would likely provide a very good set of merit funding.

Again, I recommend that you look at Cornell or CMU instead, but that’s your decision, of course.

You should apply to UIUC AE, of course, since it’s non-restrictive and non-binding. Also, applying early puts you in a better positions for any merit funding that they may have.

Looking at your SAT scores and your present GPA, the only reason that you would not be a Finalist is if you don’t apply. So you can make calculations based on that. I also think that you are a strong contender for National Merit Scholar.

U Michigan - top school, but may be expensive as OOS
UIUC - of course
Cornell - of course, better choice than NU
UPenn - no reason. Low acceptance, and it’s cost is not commiserate with its reputation in engineering.
Brandeis - no reason, it has no real engineering program
Georgetown - again, no reason, no real engineering program
BU - good school, and they have a $25,000 NMF scholarship.

If you’re interested in engineering, Drop Brandeis, drop Georgetown, and drop UPenn.

I mean, MIT has a higher acceptance rate for women (7% versus 6%), and you simply cannot compare UPenn’s engineering program to that of MIT. Well, you cannot compare UPenn’s engineering to that of Cornell, UIUC, or CMU either.

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Are you hoping to get merit aid, or is your budget large enough that money doesn’t matter?

Are you considering applying ED to Northwestern? Or are there other schools you might choose to attend even if you were admitted to Northwestern? Since you say it’s affordable, you very well may be one and done if you do ED there.

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