very unusual extra curricular activity - good enough for only ivy leagues?

Applying to College
1

<p>Junior here and just got my transcript after switching schools. My total GPA so far is 3.71 unweighted and 3.78 weighted (if you factor 9th grade, which was bad. My 10-12 GPA is 3.75 unweighted and 4.0 weighted). </p>

<p>My extra curricular activity. I do reputation management and lead generation for local businesses. I manage everything on my own, from hiring employees to doing the service. Its a good gig but takes a lot of my time after school. I go home at 3:30 and work all the way until 7pm. Then I do homework for an hour and relax another two hours. I actually like my work and look forward to going home and working. So I have no other extra curriculars. It took me a long time to create my empire and I am extremely proud of maintaining good grades and having a business on the side.</p>

<p>My revenue is ~$20k and expenses run up to ~$1000 (exluding tax, tax is a killer lol). I have low expenses due to managing it all myself and hiring cheap freelancers. My only permanent is my little brother! He just writes stuff on envelopes. </p>

<p>Okay, so I am looking for only ivy league - business oriented ivy league schools. That's only to create a network and hopefully it comes into use in the future when I need to expand. If I go to an ivy league, I am going to be amongst the most brilliant people in the entire world. Networking would be worth it. </p>

<p>So what do you think are my chances? </p>

2

<p>The “most brilliant people in the entire world” aren’t all herded together in an athletic conference of selective universities. However the Ivies are generally fairly good at networking for prospective businesswomen and men. </p>

<p>I would not restrict yourself to ONLY ivies… there are plenty of excellent business schools that can provide the networking and opportunities you are looking for… first and foremost though, you need a financial and academic safety if you have not yet found one already.</p>

<p>Nonetheless your GPA is a little low for Ivies. That may be a reasonable GPA if your school is very rigorous and you took a challenging course load. and I don’t know your test scores. If you get at least a 33+ on ACT (or whatever the equivalent is for SAT), that is “competitive” for the universities in the Ivy League athletic conference. </p>

<p>Your EC is interesting and obviously very time-consuming, but it probably won’t pop the eyes of the admissions officer. There are kids who have run businesses or started apps that have made hundreds of thousands of dollars. It’s nothing new, but it does show interest and it certainly does not detract from your application. </p>

3

<p>With respect, I believe you’re missing something quite important. At the UNDERGRADUATE level, most of the Ivies focus on a traditional college – principally liberal arts and sciences plus engineering – curriculum. Several Ivies (Penn, Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Cornell) have fine MBA programs; it is possible – although not certain – some might allow an exceptional undergraduate to take a few courses there during his final semesters. In general, however, you won’t be engaged with the “business oriented” parts of these eight universities as an undergraduate. The clear exception to all this is Wharton, which has an outstanding undergraduate business program, as well as equally excellent postgraduate (MBA, PhD) studies in business, commerce, finance, etc.</p>

4

<p>+1 to TopTier…it’s important to keep in mind that generally the Ivies do not offer business as an undergraduate major. That doesn’t mean you won’t still gain valuable networking contacts for your future life in business, but if you’re looking for “business focused” you should look at a school like Babson that is deliberately aimed at fostering entrepreneurship and business innovation to calibrate your measure of what “business focused” really means. </p>

<p>This is an important thing to consider. The Ivy network is especially good for those looking to climb the existing corporate ladders. Future VPs of JP Morgan, that sort of thing. Given your self-starting entrepreneurial nature, you may actually prefer a school where the students pay more attention to TechCrunch than The Economist.</p>

<p>Now, if by “good enough for only Ivy Leagues” you mean “is this good enough that I can only apply to Ivy schools?”, I agree with Ctesiphon. I wouldn’t advise that course of action to anyone, no matter how compelling their profile may be. Every year there are stellar students who get rejected by every single Ivy despite having amazing applications and impressive resumes. You definitely need some safety schools. Moreover, there are surely going to be some of the Ivies that would simply be a bad fit for you - don’t let Ivy-colored glasses blind you to the fact that some schools are not going to be the right place <em>for you</em> no matter how prestigious. </p>

<p>Look further afield, even if you do decide that the Ivy path is your preferred path, but especially if you decide you want to include some more entrepreneurial options (e.g. Babson, USC, UTexas, Stanford)</p>

5

<p>Why not get back here when you have some standardized test scores to look at? Making a prediction based on two years of high school GPA and a small business is absurd.</p>

6

<p>I’d add a comment to @DreamSchlDropout‌’s fine information. While it’s absolutely true that the Ivies – and their few peer national research university and LACs – are “gateways” for Morgan, Goldman and other outstanding (usually large and well-established) enterprises, it is also true that entrepreneurs must obtain capital from “angels” and investment banks. One’s contacts and credibility may be greatly enhanced, with these VITAL funding sources, with an Ivy, Stanford, MIT, Chicago, Duke, Northwestern, Hopkins, etc. background. That’s often critical; great technical ideas and other innovations frequently result in zero, without solid management and ample financing.</p>

7

<p>And to @TopTier‌ I say “Trudat”. Even the self-starter can’t do it all alone.</p>

<p>Moreover, some schools do very well in both columns, (e.g. Penn, Stanford) , and that is worth thinking about.</p>

<p>All the more reason to consider <em>both</em> of these questions when deciding where to apply:</p>

<ol>
<li>What will I gain access to by attending? (e.g. alumni network, career placement services, graduate admissions, internships, milieu)</li>
<li>What do I want my four undergraduate years to help me to make of myself (available majors, curriculum, extracurriculars, social life, etc.)</li>
</ol>

<p>And the two questions are more interrelated than you might think. You won’t get much out of an Ivy network if the school offers no majors you want to pursue and social life revolves around events you disdain to attend. </p>

<p>To use the network you have to connect to it, and being dispassionate won’t help you to make many connections.</p>

8

<p>Babson.</p>

<p>Really. Take a long hard look at it. Not “Ivy”, but possibly the top undergrad business program in the country and an excellent network for its graduates.</p>

9

<p>I agree with Happymomof1. Anyone who wants to study business as an undergrad should look at Babson. Otherwise, major in whatever you want as an undergrad, and apply to an MBA program.</p>

10

<p>There are very few extracurricular activities which would make up for below average grades and I don’t think your business would qualify. If you are interested in business I’d join others who suggest that you researching the many excellent business schools around the country. Look at schools where your stats (whatever they end up being) are a good fit and that are affordable. And yes, the only Ivy League school with an undergraduate business program is Wharton at UPenn which is hyper-competitive to get in.</p>

11

<p>I certainly agree with @happymomof1 (and many others, I’m sure) re Babson’s excellence and applicability. However, the OP’s original thrust was entirely Ivy-oriented (“so I am looking for only ivy league - business oriented ivy league schools.”), which is why several of us responded with Ivy-focused information and advice. </p>

12

<p>I don’t think you guys understand how important this is for me. I used to live in a third world country and my family was rich. We had everything we wanted, maids, guards, cooks. We truly lived a good and fruitful life. </p>

<p>However my parents moved to America during freshman year high school. I was ripped out of the perfect and comfortable rich boy lifestyle to the average, middle class teenager. I was faced with problems I never had to deal with before. I went from the 1% to the 99%. That was hard. It took willpower and focus going to school everyday and looking at so much… mediocrity. I was engulfed in a sphere of average people looking to do average things in life. They had average grades taking average classes and planning on going to an average college to get an average degree and then continue to live an average life. This struck a chord with me. I wanted to be DIFFERENT. I wanted to stand out. I am not a sheep in this ever lasting flock. I wanted to be the 1% back again. </p>

<p>So long story short, my end goal was money. Nothing more. Money was (and is) my greatest passion. Call me shallow, but I am wired that way. I was working 8 hours a day after school trying to find leads and sell them my product. It was hard work, it was tedious work. But every time I felt down, I would look on my Twitter feed and see the averages going about their mediocre lives. This spurred me to action EVERY TIME. The fear of being consumed into the mediocre lifestyle was a permanent motivation for my journey. </p>

<p>So this business, it isn’t some little gig. It is my savior. It is the beacon of hope as I sift through the masses of average. You guys thing its some little app that I wrote and sold off. No, this business is the foundation of my dreams and goals. </p>

<p>I looked at Babson. It looks like a good school, but as someone above indicated, I need investors in the future. I may end up going to community college for two years and then transfer. Is that a good idea? </p>

13

<p>You probably shouldn’t write that on your college essay.</p>

14

<p>fredinthecut – I admire your work ethic. But you admit that you only spend an hour a day on your homework…you don’t say what your test scores are, but your GPA is not strong enough to compete with most applicants to the Ivys. Furthermore, you do not have the academic preparation in terms of managing homework to possibly handle the workload that would be demanded by most highly selective schools. In terms of attending a community college and then transferring, this can be ideal for many students. But if your plan is to transfer from a cc to an Ivy, then you need to investigate what the transfer acceptance rate is for the Ivys.</p>

15

<p>I hope the OP is very open about his goals and motivations in his personal statements. It’ll get him exactly where he belongs.</p>

16

<p>I don’t mean that you make $40,000, you are average and I look down upon you. I mean that these people had no passion towards anything. They wanted money, cars, girls but never worked towards it. Hence, that is why I call them average. They figure they’ll just get some IT job and make $100k/year. </p>

<p>My English teacher is genuinely happy about teaching and he is on a teacher salary. He is the happiest person in the world. He isn’t average. He worked towards becoming a teacher and became one. </p>

<p>I’m sorry if you took my post the wrong way. I never meant that if you are poor, you are looked down upon. </p>

17

<p>Wow, you sound really entitled. If you come across this way in your application you’re never getting in anywhere, let alone an Ivy League school. </p>

<p>Also, newsflash: if you were in the 1% back then (in a third world country of all things) and the 99% now, guess what? You were never a so-called one percenter. Get over yourself. </p>

18

<p>@fredinthecut‌ I just want to add another dose of reality. I, like yourself, was bitten by the entrepreneurial bug early. I started a similar business in junior year, similar revenues. I also have a 2300+ SAT and am taking a heavy IB curriculum. I will be applying to many reach schools, but also many matches and safeties, just like everyone else. I’m not trying to brag, because I don’t think my accomplishments (while commendable) are anything exceedingly special. There are a lot of similarly talented students out there, so do yourself a favor and apply smartly. </p>

19

<p>@Ctesiphon: Your post (#11) is quite a polemic. Maybe college – including an Ivy League education – isn’t appropriate for you (at least now). By your own words, you’re incredibly shallow, greedy, and self-interested: “So long story short, my end goal was money. Nothing more. Money was (and is) my greatest passion. Call me shallow, but I am wired that way.” That strongly suggests to me that you optimal future path is unconstrained entrepreneurship; take some community college courses in accounting, marketing, etc. and then hire experts.</p>

<p>If an elite undergraduate admissions department understood all this about you – and virtually every other reasonably respected higher educational institution, as well – I believe you would appropriately be immediately rejected:
a) You’re really not interested in an “education,” rather, you’re interested in business “training” . . . and there is a HUGE difference. Education focuses on expansion of your intellectual horizons, whereas training is highly – and exclusively – “skill set” oriented.
b) Furthermore, it’s evident that you want exploit the university (and its students, alumni, and probably its faculty, too) for its name, its reputation, and its long-term networking opportunities (“Okay, so I am looking for only ivy league - business oriented ivy league schools. That’s only to create a network and hopefully it comes into use in the future when I need to expand. If I go to an ivy league, I am going to be amongst the most brilliant people in the entire world. Networking would be worth it.”).
c) Moreover, ALL long established and credible LACs and universities DEEPLY believe their primary objective is SERVICE: to their students, certainly, but also to society. In your several posts to this thread, not one word suggests that you are concerned with anything altruistic; in fact, just the opposite is clear. You are not attracted by anything beyond your own accrual of great wealth.
d) Of course, the foregoing points overwhelmingly indicate universities would be ill served by offering you acceptance – which would necessarily deny another applicant, who, by their standards of education and service, is MUCH more deserving. Additionally, these institutions world thereby include a student (you) who seeks no real scholastic or intellectual connections with the university, its students, its faculty or its alumni – it’s all about, and it’s only about, you and your insatiable greed, your development of a network for exploitation, and your egotistical selfishness.</p>

<p>I request you consider something carefully that I believe is VERY important. You’re probably seventeen or eighteen. You live in the United States, which offers you incredible freedom and opportunity, having fled from another nation. As you read this post, other American kids – some your own age and almost all not much older – are risking their lives and their futures to ensure your freedoms and your opportunities (just last week, for example, a young Marine was killed in Southwest Asia V-22 operations). I was privileged to serve as a naval officer for decades, and I know the sacrifices some of your peers make daily on your behalf. Yet, it’s absolutely apparent that you don’t give a damn about those youngsters or anything else but your future wealth. That, sir, is shameful.</p>

20

<p>Sounds like the OP would be a much better fit for a state flagship.</p>

<p>I don’t see acceptance to an Ivy as probable and don’t see matriculation as being wise. The goals just don’t line up. </p>