<p>I think all of those advices above are really good.
As someone mentioned above, unless your research is published it’s not gonna help you out that much for Duke and Columbia.
You need to realize that there are lots of people applying to those schools with great high school records, 3.9+ gpa from top 20 schools, and some research experiences.
Thus to make your research experience unique, you need to have it published or prove that your research experience and results were more productive than those of others. I mean, lots of applicatns do undergraduate research!!!
(I’m not trying to discourage you here, but to help you out in how to make your research stand out from other applicants)</p>
<p>so heres my honest opinion.
Duke and Columbia will be reach…
and others, you have decent shots.
but i think you should apply all of those college, since you never know about the admission</p>