Drexel has an acceptance rate of like 75%… I’m positive it’s a safety.
Yes it’s Missouri S&T. A very good school.
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Yes likely …it’s a private money school…ie they need bodies who pay.
As said you’re going to do great. I hope you get into a top school. You should apply. Nothing wrong with dreaming. Just make sure you have schools you know you’ll get into on the list and that will fit cost wise.
My daughter got into 17 of 21. We thought she’d get into 16. Didn’t expect Wash and Lee. I wish she applied more up market. But the main thing was she landed 6 that financially worked for us. That’s most important - not just getting in but getting a deal that works for your family.
You say no monetary constraints but do your parents agree ? Would they rather you spend $35k than $75k? I mean if you get a similar outcome why spend more ?
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I realize I may be late to the party, but I see your college list and percentages to be pretty accurate. I would reduce Cornell to 10%, NYU to 20% and raise CMU to 5% and Purdue to 85%. BTW - nobody can truly know what those “exact” percentages should be but it is always fun to make an attempt and see how the results compare. Good luck!
Drexel is definitely an academic safety. However it’s also expensive and not a very good value:
The co-op system is better at U Cincinnati and Drexel Engineering/CS is no better than Cincinnati’s. You DO get “private school” amenities.
You can apply after running the NPC and checking it’s within budget.
I’m guessing Drexel would give you a scholarship to bring costs to 50-60k but it’s a guess, not a certainty at all.
Running thr noc may take Drexel out of contention due to costs.
(Your budget is 50k+5.5k loan + whatever savings you have from a job).
OP is planning to apply for CS, which often has lower acceptance rates at schools where one applies to a major. For example, UiUC’s CS acceptance rate (for the standalone major in Grainger) was 4% for class of 2024.
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Thats very funny, because I misread and thought he was giving his own odds. They are pretty close to reality IMO.
I think a lot will depend on how first year is seen. Plus his rigor…5-6 APs where they offer many.
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Not sure what OP’s percentages represent, but with a 3.5 uwGPA (albeit with a nice upward trend), UIUC CS is not realistic, just to take one example from the list.
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Agreed. Nor is Rutgers 90%. Not in the major.
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I mean, everybody who applies from my school gets in CS or not, so I thought that it would be 90%
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Two of my daughter’s friends got rejected, 3.4 UGPA, TO, not sure of their majors. They’re going to Stockton. Another friend got into engineering, no merit or honors, she’s going to Cornell instead.
That is also my experience. Part of the reasons people don’t like percentages is that it is very easy to disagree on them based on the small frame of reference people have. TBH - thats why I like them!
I really hope they would not look at the candidate as a 3.5 - any good AO would not. It’s a solid school though. FYI - 3.7+ students strong in math, with high scores to support, get in from top MA public schools more than not. I would not be surprised at all if OP did get in. Let’s check back in a year and see.
Ok then your odds may be better thanks to your school’s reputation at Rutgers, but be aware that there were many nasty surprises this year for instance (ever since the “new” Honors college opened its facilities students have been surprised and SOE has been really tough) and those on this “nasty” end aren’t likely to tell everyone in your school (o_O “Everyone gets into Rutgers but me” 
) so apply to NJIT and Rowan too for safety.
At colleges that admit by major, divide acceptance rate by 2 or so.
At some universities (like UIUC) the rate is far lower. (ie., roughly 60% are admitted to UIUC, but only 4% for CS…)
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That’s why OP has to do their research, along with their GC. A good GC should know where this student will have relatively more application success…and if they have a chance at in-state Rutgers for CS, for example. I would guess that Naviance doesn’t show major level detail on the scattergrams.
Bottom line, We don’t have a good enough understanding of OP’s relative rigor and rank to make nuanced recommendations. OP should apply to several reaches, a handful of targets and 1-2 academic/financial safeties. It’s not clear if OP is merit hunting, but if so, more applications may be necessary.
What about University of New Mexico?
I don’t like percentages for whole schools or departments because the don’t give a true picture for individual majors. At Cal Poly they accept 70% of Industrial Engineering applicants and 5% of CS applicants (yes, you read that right). The acceptance rate for the school overall across all colleges and majors is 28%. In this case, and you can know them because they publish them, the overall percentage tells you nothing. In almost all schools CS will be below, or as in the case of Cal Poly, far below the average.
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Your single best source for evaluating your likelihood of admission is your school: partly the people who have been graduated over the last 2 years and mostly your GC. You say that “literally everyone” from your school gets into Rutgers (ostensibly including the ones who apply to CS/CoE)- great! how do people with your stats from your school do in admissions to the schools on your list?
I’m guessing you have an idea (possibly from your GC) that they don’t fancy your chances at the schools that you - and your parents and friends- rate highly, and that you came to CC hoping for more encouraging feedback. You say that you are struggling to get your head around the idea that you can get a good education at schools that you look down on. A lot of the regular posters on this thread are trying to help you avoid what we see every spring: a student devastated by ‘only’ getting into their ‘safety’ school- or no school at all.
Start at the BOTTOM of your list- and find schools that you won’t cry or feel like a failure if they are your only choice. That is hard to do!! it takes work. There are a lot of good suggestions in this post- spend time over the summer learning about them, looking for something that you could say ‘oooh- they have this specific thing that I would genuinely like to have/do’. Once you have 3-5 safeties and likelies, do the same possible matches. Once you have 3-5 matches, then look for 3-5 reaches.
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I want to emphasize this. A safety doesn’t have to be a school you tolerate. In a perfect world it’s a school that excites you. In that case, you could conceivably do as I did…apply to only one school. That’s the perfect safety.
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