What are my chances at Yale SCEA and other T20 Institutions? (Chance Me I guess)

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Hi guys! Was just curious. I’ll be applying Yale SCEA, and other T20 institutions such as Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, Vanderbilt, Duke, etc.

I’ll be applying under political science/economics for most schools.

Here are some stats about me:

Identity: Asian Male

GPA: 4.0 UW/4.75 W

Coursework: AP Bio (4) and AP Compsci A (5) sophomore year, APUSH/AP Chem/AP Spanish Lang/AP Calc BC/AP Lang junior year

SAT: 1530 (740 R/W, 790 M)

SAT Subject Tests: 700 Math II, 740 Bio M

AWARDS:

Tournament of Champions Finalist in my debate event

Various Best Delegate awards and other Model UN award on the local and national level

Have quarterfinaled and semifinaled at various national debate tournaments, and have championed a 400+ person regional tournament

Regional Silver Key in Poetry

ECS:

Participating in TASP/TAOS this summer

Debate Co-Captain senior year, was on board last year for managing research. For context, the team is roughly 150-200 people and we go to 15-20 tournaments yearly.

Model UN Director of Education senior year, and it’s a board position that focuses on education for a 100-150 person team.

Freshman Mentor, serving on the board for recruitment on senior year but have been mentoring and leading an advisory for junior/senior year.

On National Honor Society and Tri-M Music Honor Society

Have played violin for 9 years and participated in school orchestra for all 4 years

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Am Muslim, go to a competitive Midwest high school that sends roughly 40-50 kids to T20s per year. Already asked both my teachers for LoRs and they responded very positively. Let me know if you need more information!

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edit: never mind, i covered it up there but idk how to delete a comment

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What is your class rank?
Do you need financial aid?

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You have a unified application which is good (your ecp’s all relate). There is a clear theme which relates to your major. Nice Job!

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sgopal2: my school doesn’t rank, but i am assuming top 5-10% due to a highly competitive school. i will be requesting financial aid but i am certain that i’ll be full pay at most schools

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If you were say in the top 2-3% of your HS, then Yale SCEA would be a strong possibility. But coming from an overrepresented group (Asian) doesn’t help. In the early rounds they tend to take hooked kids and superstars. Its good that you don’t need aid, as the budgets will be tight next year. But if you’re on the lower end of the top decile, then its more unpredictable.

You have wonderful ECs by the way. I would say your chances at Yale SCEA are probably 10-15%. If you were to apply to a binding program during the early round (Columbia, Chicago, Penn, Vanderbilt) your chances would increase much higher (prob 25-30% range). The farther down in selectivity you go, the greater your chances. Take for example a school like WashU or Emory. They are both in the top 20 and would love someone like you. If you applied ED to either of these, you’d almost certainly see an acceptance.

Good luck!

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Also wanted to point out that even though your HS doesn’t rank, its a trivial exercise to figure out where you are ranked. Yale will have a history of students applying from your high school. From this they can determine what a 4.75 weighted from your HS equates to. This is an estimate of course, but then they also get to triangulate from other sources (letters, phone calls to guidance counselors, etc). So they know who the top few students in each high school class are. If you are outside of the top 5 or so students, it will make things more difficult for you. But not impossible.

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If you have access to Naviance in your school, you can compare yourself with those admitted to the specific school in the previous years.