<p>Hello! Thank you for checking out this thread.</p>
<ol>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>MIT</li>
<li>Stanford</li>
<li>Harvard</li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>U of Illinois</li>
</ol>
<p>I come from a very small rural school. I plan on majoring in physics. I am a rising senior.</p>
<p>Demographic: white female
ACT: 36, English 36, math 36, reading 36, science 35, writing 9
SAT II: Math II 800, Physics 800, Chemistry 790
GPA: 4.0
Rank: 1
AP: Chemistry 5, Physics B 5, APUSH 5, Spanish 5, English Language 5
Senior schedule: Psych, Sociology, AP English Lit, AP Calc BC, Linear Algebra (keep in mind that I literally ran out of courses and I am taking Calc and Linear Algebra online)</p>
<p>Awards/ECs: I have won numerous awards at the state and regional level in math and science competitions. I have won regional and national awards in art. I am bilingual (not native speaker) in Spanish and have been employed as a counselor in a Spanish immersion camp. I am a senior NHS member. I also play trumpet in my local orchestra.</p>
<p>Whoo! I love fellow female trumpet players 
That, your non-native fluency in Spanish, and your math/science and art awards are definitely hooks.</p>
<p>HYP, Stanford, and MIT are obviously reaches for everybody, but you definitely are an extremely competitive applicant. U of Illinois would be a clear safety for you.</p>
<p>What are your matches?</p>
<p>Thank you for replying! :)</p>
<p>I guess I just came on here to confirm that I am competitive for those top schools. I know my ECs are weak, but I really haven’t had much opportunity for good ECs in my community. Again, I come from a small, rural school.</p>
<p>I was also thinking of applying to UPenn and Northwestern, but I would go to the U of Illinois before those places because of the UofI’s physics ranking. I believe the U of I is rated as the number one public school for physics.</p>
<p>Anybody else’s thoughts?</p>
<p>You should be accepted at UIUC, while the other ones, you should also have a decent chance although their acceptance rate is low. Are you doing EA/ED at any of them?</p>
<p>I would bet you will be accepted to at least one of your top 5. Good luck.</p>
<p>I am applying to UIUC and Princeton EA. (I believe that’s right. You can apply to one private and one public school EA?) Does EA increase my chance much?</p>
<p>You can do multiple public schools EA and one SCEA for private.</p>
<p>Thank you all for your replies. Any other opinions?</p>
<p>The number 1 public school for Physics is California Berkeley. The number 1 school in the country is Cal Tech; you should add it to your list.</p>
<p>As others have said, you are competitive. Very strong academics but very weak ECs.</p>
<p>rank 1 out of…?
- Princeton EA-- low reach
- MIT–reach
- Stanford–reach
- Harvard–reach
- Yale–reach
- U of Illinois–not too familiar but you should get in
- UPenn–low reach
- Northwestern–match/low match
you’ll probably get into one or two of the ivies.</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1532897-linguistics-chances-updated.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1532897-linguistics-chances-updated.html</a> if you want to chance back…</p>
<p>Just checked the rankings and you’re right. Berkeley is in California though and UIUC is in state for me. The reason I’m not applying to CalTech is that I really want to pursue my art (painting) in college and as far as I can tell visual arts is practically nonexistent there. </p>
<p>I am 1 of about 70. </p>
<p>Thank you again for all your replies! I really appreciate it.</p>
<p>Yeah for UIUC you would save $30,000+ a year to go to “only” the #2 public school for physics. Haha</p>
<p>Bump</p>
<p>I am also the daughter of immigrants. Would that do anything?</p>
<p>Bump</p>
<p>My main questions are:
Does applying to Princeton EA help much? (Princeton is my top choice) and
Does being the daughter of immigrants mean anything?</p>
<p>Your just about as set as anyone could be for the ivies. The only think you could possibly do is add a few more ECs but even how you are youre a top notch applicant. I would Say all of these schools are low reaches simply because of their low acceptance rate but im sure you could get into atleast one if not more of your top choices.
Chance Back?
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1533059-chance-me-ill-chance-back.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1533059-chance-me-ill-chance-back.html</a></p>
<p>If you are indeed a student from Illinois and is truly interested in physics or math as a major…and NOT engineering…I would strongly recommend you add Chicago to your list of schools…since ALL TOP schools FAVOR accepting their TOP students from within the state FIRST above others…because they know that students from within the state/region are MORE inclined to MATRICULATE closer to home…Do some more Google research on this matter…you seem smart enough…</p>
<p>All students who are strong applicants should be applying to their top colleges in their home state to get geographic preferences…</p>
<p>Massachusetts applicants have better luck getting into Harvard…California applicants have better luck getting into Stanford…etc…</p>
<p>The thing about Chicago is that it’s in the middle of a freaking war zone right now. 
Seriously, over 500 homicides in 2012 alone. And UofChicago is in the south side. I know that schools give preference to in-state students, which is why I’m applying to UIUC, but there is no way I’m going near Chicago.</p>