<p>So, I am applying to colleges in USA for a major in physics and astronomy. </p>
<p>I've already passed out of high school - I've taken a gap year. I'm doing volunteer work at animal shelters, working with special need kids and volunteering at fun raisers (overall, 135 hours in the last three months). I've also tutored a ninth grader and his brother (who is autistic) for about 2 months. I'm going for driving classes and I learnt ancient Greek and hieroglyphs (I know these are dead languages but I'm good with learning how to read and write new languages). I'm multilingual - English, Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil and Arabic. I'm planning to take a French course next month. I'm also currently learning college level physics and calculus from various sources. </p>
<p>CBSE (Indian) boards: 86.4% - which doesn't look very good but I got A+ in maths, physics and English. I lost out because I got B's in Chem and Computer science. </p>
<p>I wrote SAT 1 today. I think it went pretty well. <em>Fingers crossed</em></p>
<p>I'm rather good with remembering numbers. I've memorized up to 160 digits of pi after the decimal point. Working my way up to 314.</p>
<p>I swim, I play throwball and basketball, I've learnt Indian classical music and I play the keyboard. </p>
<p>I'm shooting the dark here. It doesn't really matter to me if I don't get in. I have normal Indian colleges for back up. I'm applying to MIT, Harvard, University of Chicago and Georgia tech. Please let me know my chances and suggest other colleges that I can apply to. </p>
<p>–How much can you afford per year? (You’re looking at $60K+ Cost of Attendance.)
–What does it cost to attend school at your backups?
–What did you score on that SAT?
–How good is that 86.4% relative to other top students in your school/region?</p>
<p>The cost of attendance isn’t really a problem. </p>
<p>I’m applying at MIT, University of Chicago, Georgia Tech, University of Michigan, Boston University, University of Washington. </p>
<p>I scored 2030 on SAT. 740 in Math, 630 in Reading and 660 in writing. I’m writing it again on december 6th.</p>
<p>I guess I was somewhere around 70-80 percentile. I should explain, I went to a school which doubled as a coaching institute for IIT entrance exams - one of the toughest examinations written by around 1.4 million people write the
examination each year. So, I was in a highly competitive atmosphere. My GPA would be around 3.6/4. In 10th, my GPA was around 3.9. Yeah, downward trend. :/</p>
<p>EC’s as in extra curricular, right?
I was on my school throw ball team 2 years and we came runners up both years at the regional inter school competition.
I know all 4 strokes of swimming and I’ve taught about 20 or so people (mostly kids and middle aged women) how to swim.
Me and friend of mine started a literary club in our school in the 11th grade. We met up every two weeks and discussed books. We also scripted and put up drama performances for the school on independence day. Our school wouldn’t allow us to continue during 12th because of the schedule.
I’ve learnt classical music for about 9 years now and I’ve put up a dozen or so performances.</p>
<p>I do love music but I’ve never competed. Just performances at events etc.
I can act pretty well but I usually write scripts, cast people and organize the play. I’m really good at organizing events, getting people together and getting the job done. I usually take up responsibility when these sort of events come up. </p>
<p>The problem is that you want to major in Physics and astronomy but your ECs are not related to your interest at all…that will be negative in your application.</p>
<p>Oh right. Well, I’m not one of those people who can pull apart computers or program robots. I’m more of a thought experiment sort of a person. I fell in love with physics and astronomy by reading about it. I used to read a lot of encyclopedias as a child. I teach myself topics that we don’t learn in school through books or online - stuff like Khan academy, coursera etc. And I keep this notebook full of ideas and theories my teachers couldn’t really explain. I also spend a hell of a lot of time watching shows on the discovery channel. </p>
<p>Most of your list is reachy. BU and U Wash are better targets with your stats. A top public like U Mich is probably a reach for an international with your SAT/GPA.</p>
<p>It’s highly competitive for internationals, but if you can pay close to the full price tag, you suddenly become more attractive. That doesn’t mean you’ll ever have great odds at schools like MIT and Chicago. </p>
<p>A huge factor, at least for me, would be the cost difference between IIT and an American school at, say, $50,000. It’s usually not a bad idea to save a bundle and put it toward grad school, where you might realize more of an advantage for your career. </p>
<p>Also, I’d consider how much more appealing a US school at a Boston University type of selectivity really is for you, above IIT. The better IITs are quite reputable, aren’t they, even to employers in Europe? </p>
<p>If you’re committed to attending school in the US, I’d be inclined to swap one of your highest reaches for U Rochester. And have a look at U Richmond. U Rich is a smaller Liberal Arts College (LAC). It sounds like you have a broad range of interests, though, besides math/physics, so LACs should be ok for you.</p>
<p>I might have suggested UC San Diego/Santa Barbara/Davis, but the deadline was Nov 30.</p>
<p>Even I am from India, in a similar predicament( I’m still in 12th though). I would have included University of Texas, Austin also to my list( better than most of the normal Indian colleges), but the deadline was today. I think you should apply to Cornell and University of Michigan also. All the best.</p>
<p>My list keeps changing. I’m definitely applying to MIT.
I’ve taken uChicago out. I’m planning on applying to Purdue. What do you think my chances are for that?</p>
<p>I didn’t apply to IIT because I’m interested in pure physics, not engineering. IIT does have engineering physics but I would probably get admitted at MIT before engineering physics. Then, again, not interested. </p>
<p>I’m applying to US because I want at least a minor in astronomy. For example, Purdue has astrophysics concentration. I really want that. In India, I only have the option of IISc and IIST (both crazy tough to get into). </p>
<p>Hi
I know a couple of Indians who got into universities here, and the main point for them was that they were all from rich families and could pay their way through college.
You have interesting ECs etc. but I would still say that Uchicago, MIT, and Harvard a bit of a reach…try easier schools like BU, or University of Texas</p>
