<p>OK, I'm new at this, but please bear with me. </p>
<p>Junior
Asian Female from northern CA
public school that has usually sent three or four students to the ivies or equivalent each year
GPA: 4.0 unweighted/4.8 weighted
School Rank: 1 in 371
SATs: 780 math 800 reading 800 writing
PSATs: 80 math 78 reading 80 writing
SATIIs: 780 mathII 760 chem, will probably retake the math and also take english lit, bio, and us history, am expecting close to perfect scores
AP classes:
Chem (5)
English Lang
US History
French
Bio
Calculus A/B
I'll probably take AP Physics, Stats, Gov/Econ, and English Lit next year</p>
<p>EC's
paid bi-weekly columnist for the local newspaper (readership 60,000)
Student at SF conservatory of Music prepatory division (piano for 10+ years and competitive)
Founder and Captain of the Academic Decathlon team, ranked at state
Founder and editor-in-chief of an award-winning literary magazine
MATHCOUNTS coach
hospital volunteering 100 + hours
concerts at nursing homes and hospitals
Varsity Debate (9,10)
Junior Commission on the status of women (9)
Tomorrow's leaders today (11)
Scholarship student at Dominican University (MUN)
Dance for 8 years</p>
<p>Awards/Honors:
SET
Davidson Young Scholar
National History Day state finals and special awards
Multiple Medals at CA Acadec state
2nd place NFPW High School communication award (state)
3rd place Holocaust Remembrance Project (national)
Skipping Stones Magazine Youth Writing Award (national)
Writing Conference essay award (national)
Dozens of other publications in various magazines/newspapers
Panel winner (MTAC)- this is piano
numerous other piano competition awards</p>
<p>I did two summers of the Liszt international festival in Sopron Hungary (piano) and last summer I was at JSA Yale. This summer I've applied to a whole bunch of other summer programs (biology and humanities)
I'll probably have a very strong essay and stellar recommendations.
So...what do you think?</p>
<p>you will have a better chance if you DO NOT retake math ll Doing so will only make you look neurotic. there is no difference between 780/800. My son</p>
<p>sorry my computer froze. MY
son is at Yale so I do understand the admissions process and what these schools are looking for. For your own sake you should work on being more confident then worrying about 20 points</p>
<p>^^^
agreed. as long as you get above a 700 you're good; if you get above 750 then that's great. colleges don't really see any difference between a 750 and an 800.</p>
<p>anyways, i think that on paper you have an excellent shot. only part of your app that could use any improvement is your ECs/Award section. make sure that you can explain why they all interest/are important to you so it doesn't look like you went around trying to build a resume filled with lots of random ECs and random awards. </p>
<p>the most interesting EC in my opinion is that you do dance. also, one thing that could help is if you got a real job at some store this summer. if you do this you'll distinguish yourself from a vast majority of ivy applicants. (a majority of kids applying to ivies have no actual work experience.)</p>
<p>Thanks, everyone. I'm happy with my math SAT II score, but my college counselor says that 780 is actually a pretty low percentile, and told me to retake it.</p>
<p>The Math II is curved so badly getting an 800 only puts you in like the 88th percentile. You can skip like five questions or something and still get an 800.</p>
<p>But, seriously, perhaps there are better things to do with your time than to try to increase your score from 780 to 800</p>
<p>Agreed. Don't bother taking the Math2 again. With a CR+M of 1580 and a 2380 total SAT score, a 780 Math2, a 760 Chem, and a 238 PSAT score (Merit Semi-Finalist for sure, and probably Finalist) there's really nothing more you need to prove about your abilities. </p>
<p>With those scores, a number one class rank, and a raft of impressive ECs, you will be an extremely competitive applicant at any school you apply to.</p>
<p>Just don't be over-confident. Definitely apply to the top schools (if they have the majors/programs you are interested in, that is), but also apply to a few safeties. You're definitely HYPS, other Ivies, and etc. material, but their acceptance processes can sometimes be pretty random, and even kids with credentials as impressive as yours are not guaranteed admission.</p>
<p>Which Ivy? When you say the Ivies you are talking about a group of schools bound together by athletics. Beyond that, these the schools in the Ivy League have some very different strengths and weaknesses. I hope you are going beyond the name brand prestige factor and researching which school will be best for you - even if it isn't an Ivy.</p>
<p>You remind me quite a bit of chillaxin -- search the forum for her posts, and you'd see why! (I believe she was rejected by Stanford but ended up at Harvard.)</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for the comments. It's really hard often to gauge the quality of kids who apply to these colleges
For SBdad, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't considering prestige, but I went to visit almost all of these schools and JHU and Georgetown this summer. I loved that princeton focuses on undergraduate education and that you have a mandatory thesis your senior year. I loved the gothic and neo-gothic architecture at Yale. I loved Boston. I loved the tour guide at MIT ;) So I have an idea of what I'm looking for in a college - whether or not it's an Ivy.
That said, the new financial aid packages at Yale and Harvard (and I'm sure every Ivy or equivalent will soon follow) make it so that my parents can pay less at one of these institutions than at a smaller liberal arts college, or even at a UC school.</p>