Tips on my current college list?

<p>Asian male in Southern California interested in chemical engineering.
Low income ~35k so cost is a big restraint</p>

<p>No big preference on location, but I prefer medium to smaller schools over giant state flagship ones. I also prefer schools without a large Greek culture.</p>

<p>3.97 uw, 4.54 weighted total, UC GPA 10-12 uncapped 4.71</p>

<p>36 ACT all sections
800 on Chemistry and Math II, 740 World History, 790 Korean Language</p>

<p>I will have taken every AP offered at my school by end of senior year for a total of 17.</p>

<p>Founder of Tutoring Club, Varsity Academic Team, President of regional chapter of national volunteer service group and hosted a sleeping bag fundraising event 2 years in a row, President of a school of children with mental disabilities. Captain of science bowl. Founder of a company that connects high school tutors with elementary/middle school children.</p>

<p>I did research with a professor at a local university last summer and I will be attending Garcia Program this summer</p>

<p>My current tentative list is.</p>

<p>UC Berkeley
UCLA
UCSD
UCSB (Safety)</p>

<p>Stanford (Early Action)
Princeton
MIT
Cal Tech
Harvard
Harvey Mudd
WashU in Saint Louis
Cornell
Columbia
Carnegie Mellon
Rice
University of Rochester</p>

<p>Every school on my list other than the UCs, Carnegie Mellon, and U of Rochester guarantee to meet 100% of need so if I get into at least one of those schools, I should be set financially. If not, I should be able to afford UC price.</p>

<p>I'm enrolled in UC ELC so even if I get shut out I will have automatic admissions to UC Riverside or UC Merced for a last ditch effort.</p>

<p>So what do you think about my list?</p>

<p>I think the list is fine and hope you get application waiver for all schools. You deserve it.</p>

<p>Your list looks great. I would also apply to Minnesota-Twin Cities. </p>

<ol>
<li>At $20,000 OOS tuition, it is relatively cheap</li>
<li>Given your academic credentials, you will likely get a nice scholarship </li>
<li>Their ChemE department is one of the top 5 in the nation</li>
<li>They have lovely winters! ;)</li>
</ol>

<p>@artloversplus‌ thanks, that’s very encouraging!
@Alexandre‌ Thanks for the advice, looks like a great choice! I’ll definitely look into it more</p>

<p>You have a solid shot at pretty much all of these schools. I’m just a bit concerned that your list might be a bit too large- so remember to pace yourself and start as early as possible.</p>

<p>@dividerofzero‌ yeah I’ve had that concern also. I’ve already started and made revisions of the Stanford and CA essays and I’m hoping I can reuse some of those for other schools. All the UCs can be shotgunned anyway so that should be ok. If I were to cut some schools, which do you think least fit me? I haven’t had that much time to research all of them so a couple of them I’ve gone just by name or stuff I’ve heard around.</p>

<p>If you want to lock down UCR as a guaranteed admission safety (rather than depending on UC ELC which would probably give you UCM (which does not have chemical engineering), or worrying about the holistic admission and essay evaluation at UCSB or other UCs), you can sign up for that during June or July and then include UCR in your regular UC application. See <a href=“http://admissions.ucr.edu/whyucr/ourguarantee”>http://admissions.ucr.edu/whyucr/ourguarantee&lt;/a&gt; .</p>

<p>@ucbalumnus‌ hmm ok. Is that still an application or am I guaranteed if I meet those 3 criteria?</p>

<p>The three criteria are a guarantee for admission if you sign up during June/July and then include UCR in your regular UC application, as described on that web page.</p>

<p>@kei04086‌ All of them are excellent at chemical engineering but think of them like ice cream- they’re all really good flavors that run out quickly but they’re all different too.</p>

<p>Going through that list, here’s what I see:</p>

<p>Schools that immediately stand out as strong chemical engineering programs:</p>

<p>MIT, UC-Berkeley, Stanford, Caltech, Princeton</p>

<p>For those, I think the majority of your work would be browsing sites like Quora (and taking a virtual/real campus tour and e-mailing professors) to get a feel for how the program differs from others at the same level. Some of them will be really, really solid but just not fit in with your interests or have the sort of culture you seek in a college and you might want to reconsider them. That said, I think these five should remain on your list unless something serious comes up. I’d also consider Georgia Tech, UT-Austin, and Minnesota-Twin Cities as they’re around the same level. I don’t know how they’d work out financially, as Georgia Tech does appear to have a limited budget (based at least on how it pays its professors).</p>

<p>The other UC’s: UCLA is a solid alternative to Berkeley, and I’m not familiar enough with the UC system (Texas resident) to comment on the other two- but I don’t think having multiple UC’s would hurt since the UC app covers most of it.</p>

<p>The others bring up questions, though:</p>

<p>Harvard- they’re not the most solid engineering department in the Ivies, but they’re research-heavy (have a really good number of graduates becoming professors and at least getting PhDs compared to other schools)</p>

<p>Harvey Mudd- did you pick them as an “engineering school” or specifically as a “chemical engineering school”? Just curious because it appears that not all of their departments within engineering are equally competitive. I guess the Claremont experience is nice- how attractive of a factor is that for you? You seem pretty well-rounded so I guess you might want something like that.</p>

<p>WashU in Saint Louis- another good school but I’m not sure where it stands out in chemical engineering</p>

<p>Cornell- the Ivies’ other engineering powerhouse? Again totally unsure about their status as a chemical engineering program.</p>

<p>Columbia- another Ivy that seems to have some sort of engineering reputation, although I have yet to see them on the Top 20 for ChemE. Also confused about what drew you to Columbia.</p>

<p>Carnegie Mellon- this one’s a peculiar case; CMU is incredibly interdisciplinary but their programs also favor computational fields- for example, biology isn’t that good but computational biology is solid; Tepper is solid but computational finance is where it becomes ridiculously good; and SCS obviously is the big stand-out at CMU. How interested are you in the more computational aspects of your field? CMU functions kind of like a giant think tank, bouncing ideas around, and if you’re into that + computers and chemical engineering, it’ll be a blast for you. If not, the chemical engineering department is Top 20 but there’s some Top 10’s that you’ll probably easily get into (Georgia Tech, UT-Austin, Twin Cities)</p>

<p>Rice- their engineering department is solid when it comes to BME and really pushes research (I contacted one professor about neuroscience + got responses from the entire department in less than 24 hours- instead of industry, most people are pushed toward working in a graduate lab over the summer). Not sure about Chem.E rep though, but they’re undergrad-focused and promote innovation through the Engineering Design Kitchen.</p>

<p>University of Rochester- totally unsure about this one, too; seems like another safety but I’m not familiar with it either.</p>

<p>Overall, I think that Harvard/Princeton/Columbia/Cornell (4/8 Ivies) is a bit confusing because they’re completely different Chem.E departments/environments and I’d encourage you to look into them more to narrow that part down. I think, between Princeton, Stanford, MIT, and Caltech, that you’ve got enough “reach”-level schools. Add Berkeley- and possibly Georgia Tech and UT-Austin- and you’ve eliminated the need for most of the other schools. With the UC safeties in there, you’re pretty much solid- and that’s a list of just 10 (+ 2 through the ELC program).</p>

<p>It all comes down to what you’re looking for, though- some of the programs I skimmed over might just be what you’re looking for, but I think with your credentials that you don’t need a lot of match schools. I mean, getting a 36 itself isn’t ridiculously tough- but getting a 36 while doing all those EC’s and having limited financial resources? That’s impressive and definitely going to wow some adcoms.</p>

<p>Just think of the UCs as one application. So 12 is not horrible. UC will meet your need, but you will have about 25k loans in the 4 years depending on Regents and a few thousand student contribution meaning you have to work in the summer if your parents can’t help. You might think about what schools an Asian male would be nice diversity at in case you get shut out of superreaches.
<a href=“ABET-accredited Universities | AIChE”>https://www.aiche.org/community/students/abet-accredited-universities&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I don’t know if you have considered Questbridge. I bet you would be a Finalist. You can just apply to college like regular but all application fee is waived for all partner colleges (likely you will get waiver anyway.) If you want you can try Match. You can list up to 8 colleges but can just put the nonbinding colleges Stanford, MIT and Princeton in preferred order. and leave it at that. Apply RD to the rest. Or if you want to put those 3 first, you can add the other partners Caltech and Rice if you don’t mind binding match. Otherwise don’t and apply any partner or other schools RD. If you don’t match, you just revert to RD. </p>

<p>If you don’t follow me, go to QB homepage or the QB forum here or ask or PM me. The nice thing is full freight paid, no loan, no family contribution pledge. !!!And it is like getting to apply to 3 of your schools EA or an additional 5 ED!!
<a href=“QuestBridge”>http://www.questbridge.org/partner-colleges/overview-listing&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I have seen some horrendous application to Stanford I don’t know what some of these kids are thinking but some of it is not enough time spent and being too confident to run it by someone for a reality check perhaps. I know of a QB finalist URM same stats as yours rejected EA this year no deferral. Maybe he should have tried MATCH (or maybe just bad essay.)</p>

<p>@dividerofzero‌ wow, thanks for the crazy informative reply! It’s really people like you that make CC worthwhile. I’ll go down the list and try to rationalize my choices - and change them of course.</p>

<p>I know Georgia Tech has great chemE but Id prefer if possible to stay away from the south. That being said, I may swap CMU out for GTech. </p>

<p>And you’re right, I really put Harvard there only because it’s Harvard. I come from a small town in Korea that sends maybe 5-6 kids abroad? Much less to Harvard. The name is just so huge that I couldn’t resist it - of course, it’s not my top priority, and if I end up not having enough time I might just drop it.</p>

<p>Harvey Mudd is really there because it’s the only engineering liberal arts college I know - and I just thought it’d be a nice option to have if possible. I really don’t know that much about it though, so again I may scratch that one for the final list.</p>

<p>I want to keep Wash U be cause I’ve heard their campus life is amazing - it’s one of the happiest college campuses in America. Plus, I’ve heard their engineering is decent too.</p>

<p>Cornell is really there for one reason : it has good engineering. Again, it’s not my top choice to say the least so its standing on the list is tentative.</p>

<p>Columbia - I really just LOVE the idea of living in NY. It just seems like a crazy once in a lifetime opportunity. I don’t know much about it to be honest. If anyone could shed some light on its ChemE program, that’d be greatly appreciated.</p>

<p>CMU - I really didn’t put much thought into that one. I just heard it’s engineering is pretty good and it’s around match level for me which is why it’s there. I really felt my list was lacking matches, so it went. If there are better alternatives for the match spot, that’d be also cool.</p>

<p>U of Rochester is similar to CMU. I’ve heard their engineering is good and it should be a match.</p>

<p>So for now the schools I’m thinking of replacing/cutting are Harvard, Harvey Mudd, Cornell, Columbia, CMU, and Rochester. Does anyone have suggestions on which to replace/ replace with?</p>

<p>Again, thank you so much for the help everyone!!</p>

<p>keep the list you have and start working on you application, essays… and make sure your essay is read by at-least 2 professionals for polishing… and wait for the “MIRACLES”…
BEST OF LUCK TO YOU.</p>

<p>@ucbalumnus‌ and thanks for the info, I will definitely enroll for that! Should take care of my safety I suppose.</p>

<p>@BrownParent‌ thank you for the tip but I did apply to QB CPS and got rejected haha. I will try again for NCM but I guess I’m not really QB material.</p>

<p>@ccco2018‌ thanks, good luck to you too!</p>

<p>@kei04086‌ Are you planning on working abroad- like in Korea? In that case, I can see why Harvard is a good choice- because most good colleges don’t really have a name presence abroad (I don’t know about Korea specifically; I guess US influence would mean that companies should know more than just the Ivies + Stanford/MIT).</p>

<p>If you’re looking for campus life, I’d keep Rice and WUSTL on there (campus life is the selling point for both of them).</p>

<p>If you want to get better acquainted with Columbia, I’ve found their Wiki to be amusing: <a href=“http://www.wikicu.com/”>http://www.wikicu.com/&lt;/a&gt;
It doesn’t say much about Chemical Engineering, though. Columbia (like Berkeley) is also known for being protest-heavy.</p>

<p>I’d go with the move of replacing CMU with Georgia Tech or UT Austin. If you want to avoid the South but are willing to tolerate being located in the South, Austin’s a solid choice because it’s nothing like the rest of Texas.</p>

<p>@dividerofzero‌ no, I’m planning on staying in the U.S. it’s just it’s been my parents dream to send their son to Harvard, and even if I don’t go, it wouldn’t hurt to try right?</p>

<p>And yes, I think i will replace CMU with GTech. Thanks!</p>

<p>You will have a better chance of getting need met from CMU over GT because OOS public, unless you snagged one of the Presidential scholarships. UT Austin will be unaffordable for you. Don’t give up on QB for college match.</p>

<p>Derp. I totally forgot the financial aspect.</p>

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</p>

<p>Check the net price calculators on each of these three schools. It is likely that you will need to aim for the top merit scholarships at each of them, rather than just admission.</p>