Trying to balance out college list with matches and safeties - tips?

College Search & Selection
1

Hey guys!

Trying to finalize my college list, and it sees pretty weighted towards reach and super-reach schools. I’d love some tips on which safeties or match schools to add and which reach schools are too far out. Ideally I like mid-size schools (around 6,000 ish) with a good campus feel, close to jobs and internships, not much of a party school, and good programs in economics, business, and international relations. Cost is a big factor but I’m low-income enough that NPC shows pretty much full rides from most of the big ivy caliber institutions. Mainly look for safety/match schools but if there’s a killer reach school you think would be a great match I’d love to hear. Thanks in advance! Here are my current schools:

Super reach:
University of Chicago
Stanford
University of Pennsylvania (Huntsman Dual-Degree Program)
Brown

Reach:
Georgetown (School of Foreign Service)
Cornell (College of Arts and Sciences, Legacy)
Johns Hopkins
Washington University in St. Louis (Because no supplement… why not!)
UC Berkeley

Match:
Claremont McKenna
UC San Diego

Safety:
George Mason (Honors College, Early Action, Recruited for speech team with scholarships)
American University (Honor College)
UC Santa Barbara
UC Irvine
San Diego State
San Jose State

It’s a pretty ridiculous number of schools but UCs are all one app and I get fee-waivers for most so I’m making do. Could drop Cornell/Hopkins but they have pretty short supplements anyways.

Here’s my stats and stuff:

California
White
Male
Low-Income
Public high school in wealthy area

Testing:
ACT - 36 Composite Single Sitting (36M 36E 36R 35S waiting on writing)
SAT - 2330 Single Sitting (800M 780R 750W)
Subject Tests - Math II 800, Literature 730, Spanish Reading 750, Spanish Listening 740
AP - Calc AB 5, Human Geo 5, English Lang 5, Spanish Lang 5, Spanish Lit 5, Statistics 5 (and a couple that I took for no reason without self-studying or taking the class so they’re 3s or 4s, probably won’t submit)

Grades:
Expected after 1st semester senior year:
UW: 3.8 UC: 4.25 W: 4.28
Really weak 9th and 10th grade years, very strong upwards trend (9th 3.8, 10th 3.8, 11th 4.8, 12th 5.0)
Senior year class load: AP Calc BC, AP Art History, AP Microecon, AP Gov, AP Physics, AP Comp Lit

Awards:
-2nd Place in a speech event at speech and debate national championship
-2nd Place at an international debate tournament
-1st Place FRC Robotics World Championship
-1st Place Boys State California Oratory
-1st Place Boys State California Legal Advocacy

Extracurriculars - these are just a few highlights I have more stuff I can add but don’t want to waste your time:
-Robotics: 2 years Business lead for hs robotics team, raised about $140,000 each year, and was invited to Japan for a sponsor tour
-Debate: 3 years Finalist for the US National debate team (Top 15 in the country, many individual awards, coaching middle school debate, and invited to a tournament in Korea over the summer
-Local Homeless Shelter: 9 years Volunteer for a long time, first ever minor on the board of director for a couple years, and head of a group of high school students that intern at the shelter
-Business Consultant (Paid): 3 years Coaching and working for local startups and larger corporations coaching on pitch decks, business strategy, and marketing
-Spanish Translator (Paid): 3 years Translating Venezuelan birth certificates, translating online college courses
-Entrepreneurship: 2 years Work with a small team to develop a GPS bike computer, pitched to local angel investors, project eventually failed but makes for a cool story and shows my interest

2

CMC is a reach

3

^^Agree - CMC is a reach.

For a student like you, I don’t believe in matches. You want a school that will give you big money in aid or merit.

Before deciding on American, take a good look at R&B. R&B at many schools is $11 - $15k. As a freshman, you can only borrow $5,500 in federal aid. Can your family afford $10,000/yr? Off-campus housing is expensive in DC. Even with the generous $30,000 scholarship, be realistic if you can afford it.

suggested Schools that will give you full tuition are Alabama or Ole Miss. Both permit stacked scholarships, so if you get outside scholarships, they will not reduce what the university gives you. Alabama is unique in that the scholarship for your stats is “the value of tuition” which means 1. it increases with tuition increases and 2. you do not need to use it exclusively for tuition. If you receive outside tuition scholarships, you get to keep both vs. American
from American’s website:
'If you are receiving more than one type of award that is designated as tuition only, then the combined total of your awards can not exceed your tuition charges for the semester or year in which it is awarded.

If your total does exceed tuition, then you are considered to be overawarded and your institutional awards will be reduced to make room for the outside awards."

Don’t forget to factor in travel costs.
Are any of the UCs in commuting distance to your house?
How much did George Mason offer you?

Focus on reach/high reach that meet 100% of need. Run the NPC at each school. Though you may think you are poor by CA standards, you may not be by the national standards.

Focus on 2 safeties that are affordable.

Don’t worry about matches.

4

I would recommend caution and applying to at least 13 colleges in total… possibly more if you can garner fee waivers. But keep in mind that not everything is free… it costs money to send CSS Profiles and Test Scores, as they usually do not grant waivers in all cases, especially if you apply to a large # of colleges.

I would recommend at least 3 solid safeties… and then maybe 4-5 perceived matches and 3-4 reach schools. Too often, applicants try for way too many Reaches. My daughter had amazing stats as well 3 yrs ago, but was still rejected by all reaches & all but one perceived match. So… what she saw as Matches were instead Reaches. She received 12 rejections out of 17 applications. She is very happy at the Match that did accept her however.

Regardless of stats, some colleges, those who routinely reject 92-94%, are Reaches for everyone. In your case, University of Chicago, Stanford, University of Pennsylvania, Brown, Cornell, Washington U. and UC-Berkeley are Reaches or even High Reaches simply due to the # of applicants and that is not a reflection on your stats. I would recommend caution even if you had a 4.0 uw GPA, 2400 SAT and 36 ACT. Those candidate types face rejection at the HYPSM level schools all the time.

While Georgetown and Johns Hopkins may still be Reaches, I would place them both in the Low Reach to Likely Match category… i.e. - safer bets as to admission vs. the other Reaches listed above. The next likely admit would probably be Cornell. But again… bank on nothing and leave yourself some good options come April.

If you were my child, I would likely suggest shortening your list as follows:

University of Chicago
Stanford
Brown
Georgetown
Cornell
Johns Hopkins
Washington University in St. Louis
UC Berkeley
UC San Diego
George Mason
American University
UC Santa Barbara
San Diego State

Good Luck