UC Berkeley, MIT, Columbia University

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>I'm a Female Asian 11th grade high school student at a over-achieving Asian high school. Just last month the school was bragging about being in the top 300 public schools in the nation. FYI.</p>

<p>My overall GPA is pretty low, probably around 3.5 unweighted. My school doesn't release weighted GPA or class ranks. But there's about 4000 people at my school</p>

<p>I'm a really conceptual person, so intellectually-wise, I think I'd succeed at UC Berkeley. However, I am not sure if my personality will suit the university well. I am not as passionate as I'd like to be. I hoped to have the intellectual atmosphere stir my passions, but I'm not sure if that'll work :&lt;/p>

<p>I think my strongest point is in being open-minded. This allowed me to more easily see things from different perspectives, and find at least one good or beautiful part about something. It also helps me be more creative (hopefully). </p>

<p>Freshman Year:</p>

<p>Alg 2 Honors: B/C
Biology: A/A
Eng 9A: A/B
Modern World History: A/B
Robotics Engineering: B+/A
PE/Track and Field: A/A</p>

<p>Sophomore Year:</p>

<p>AP Computer Science: A/A
Pre-Calc/Calc A: A/B
Eng 10H: C/B
Chem H: B/A
Beginning Dance (not UC approved): A/B
Japanese 1: A/A</p>

<p>Junior Year:</p>

<p>Japanese 2: B/A
AP Calc BC: B/A
US History: B/B or A
AP Physics C: A/A
AP English Lang: C/C
Advanced Robotics (later changed to Engineering Development and Design): A/A</p>

<p>(Note Junior Year second semester are projections)</p>

<p>Senior Year Classes:</p>

<p>Japanese 3
AP Stats
AP Comp Gov
AP Chem
AP English Lit (Might drop to regular English.... doubt it though)
Engineering Development and Design
(If I don't manage to mess up again, I will take Linear Algebra at PCC)</p>

<p>AP Bio: 5
AP Computer Science: 5</p>

<p>(Projected)
AP Calc BC: 5
AP English Lang: 4
AP Physics C Mech: 4/5
AP Physics C E/M: 3/4</p>

<p>My current SAT score is 2010 (R: 640 W:600 M:770). I am retaking it in June, and hope to get at least (R:700 W: 650 M:800) (Fixed my math mistake from 2060)</p>

<p>My extracurricular activites
- Art: Practice 2-3 hours a day
- Robotics: 2014 NTMA Sportmanship Award, 2013 JPL Invention Competition Smallest Entry Award
- Piano: I played the piano since I was in 2nd grade. I never played competitively; only for pure enjoyment.
- Latin Club Secretary: teach the Latin language and Roman Culture
- Volunteered at the Arboretum: 100-150 hours </p>

<p>I tried to apply to a few classes at PCC, but because of my pure luck, I never passed the registration period.</p>

<hr>

<p>My "low" grades mostly amounted from generating interest too late in the semester to save my grade. It always happens. Tips to get rid of this annoying habit?</p>

<hr>

<h2>My personal statement is about me wanting to be able to create something unique and beautiful on my own. I'll focus on how my encounters in AP Biology, art, and Advanced Robotics led me to want to approach being as amazing a creator as nature is.</h2>

<p>My dream colleges are UC Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, and Columbia University. But I'm also planning to apply to all UCs, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, University of Illinois Urbana Champlain, and University of Washington. There might be more, but I forgot. </p>

<p>Chance me real quick?</p>

<p>Also, what other schools should I apply to? I plan to major in Mechanical Engineering and minor in Psychology, and possibly Architecture.</p>

<p>And what should I do over the summer? My plans to take summer classes at PCC are dead, and it's too late for internships. It's not going to help my app much, but I want to be productive.</p>

2

<p>Sorry for the repost… just cleaned up A LOT of information</p>

3

<p>*an over-achieving lol
“intellectually-wise”-- you can just say intellectually</p>

<p>lol I"m so sorry I’m a grammar/english nazi. Sorry. I’ll continue reading ahahhah</p>

4

<p>I really don’t want to be too harsh, but I think UCB, Stanford, MIT, and Columbia are long shots. Of the other UC’s you should have a chance @ all except for UCLA. Still, UCSD and UCSB wouldn’t be considered a solid match. UMich is a reach. I don’t know too much about University of Illinois. You should have a fighting chance and U Dub, and I’d call it a high match.</p>

5

<p>For Stanford, MIT, and Columbia, I’d say it is pretty unlikely for you to get in. The others you have a decent shot at. Here’s my justification for why I say this. For one thing, the GPA is quite low and it does you no service to have mostly Bs and a C. At this point, there is very little you can do to hide those grades as I assume your junior year is pretty much down to the final month, which is a small window of time to pull some of those Bs up to As and the C to a B if at all possible. The quick fix is to start out senior year strong and get nearly all As, which could help you by showing an upward trend, but it’s easier said than done. You really need to put in the time and effort to do such a thing. If it helps maybe you should constantly think about the satisfaction of receiving an acceptance letter in January to help you chug through the lulls of school.</p>

<p>Your test scores are pretty much out of the middle fifty for all of these schools, but that’s an easy fix if you take the SAT a third time in October and really work to improve your scores, or even give the ACT a shot (I scored a 2030 as my highest of 2 SATs and took the ACT and got a 33 on my first try). As for the June SAT, if you really want that improvement, I would advise that you start prepping a lot within now and the test day. A 140 point rise is difficult to achieve within one test especially once you pass the 2000 threshold.</p>

<p>For your summer, I would suggest sticking low by doing volunteer work or find a job to make money to pay for college. I would also take some considerable time to work on your college application especially the essays for the Common App and supplementals for schools that release them during the summer. Really work on getting all the stressful work out of the way before senior year starts.</p>

<p>Lastly, for other schools, I would suggest Boston University, Villanova, Lehigh, and George Washington University. All of these schools I think you would have an easier time getting into. </p>

<p>If I crushed your dreams, I am really sorry, but I want to be honest. By no means should you not apply to those schools, I just think you have a lot of work to do if you want to get into any of them.</p>

6

<p>Thanks guys. I dislike sweet-talkers, so I’m glad you guys are blunt. </p>

<p>By “intellectually-wise” I mean I’m smart enough to not die at those schools (not calling myself genius). And sorry for the grammar mistakes… I just flew through and rephrased some things (and not others).</p>

<p>The SAT is my priority right now. And I took that last SAT in January, Hopefully I can get that score. </p>

<p>And I have other dreams too. So I’m not over yet. :)</p>

7

<p>HAHAH I thought you meant like SO, intellectually, Berkeley would be a fit. I didn’t know you actually meant intellectually wise!! HAHAHAH So Sorry</p>

8

<p>They are all reaches</p>

9

<p>Your chances at MIT, Columbia, Stanford, and Berkeley are minimal. I would apply to only 3 of those and be sure to spend most of the time on the other applications.</p>

10

<p>Especially since most of the kids at your (competitive) school are applying to the same colleges.</p>

11

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</p>

<p>Incorrect. You have a good shot at UDub and a decent shot at UIUC too, but try to pull up your grades. Your SAT is fine for both these schools, and is even fine for Cal as well, but with such a low GPA, you have almost 0 chances since the UC’s weigh GPA much more. In your case especially, you’ll be applying to the CoE for MechE, which is much more selective than Berkeley in general, so the average GPA is actually much higher. Similar scenario to a lesser extent with UMich, but it’s not out of reach like Berkeley is - this is good because UMich is fairly strong at MechE, so you should try pretty hard to get in there since it looks like your best option that’s more or less reasonable (apply EA, not RD… it will boost your chances significantly). </p>

<p>Stanford, MIT, and Columbia are out of reach as well.</p>

12

<p>Your school sounds a lot like a school I know (Arcadia high school). I think u have a good chance for all the UCs except UCLA and UCB. </p>