What are my chances

Student Lounge African-American Students
1

I am a junior and i have: a 29 ACT (but im going to take it again), a 3.8 gpa unweighted (not sure what it is weighted), full IB program and 2 AP classes, student council VP, Beta Club, Science Honors Society, National Honors Society, Spanish Honors Society, Boy’s State Alternate, I’m in the gifted program at my school, and I plan on joining Math and Art Honors Society and doing a ton of volunteering this summer.

What are my chances of getting into:
Vanderbilt
Washington University in St. Louis
Rice
Emory
Duke
John Hopkins
The Ivies

2

Spend less time on the volunteering and more time with ACT or SAT prep. The 29 is low given the very high caliber of AA applicants at the schools you’ve listed. “a ton of volunteering” won’t count for as much as you think. Knock out a 32 and the no. of doors opened to you will be many.

3

Ditto to T264. Bring up that ACT.

4

thanks for the advice. I took the SAT recently and I’m pretty confident the score is going to be higher than my act. The science section was holding me back and there was no science on the SAT @learninginprog @T26E4

5

Not that I’m bad at REAL science. Just ACT science.

6

Are you just trying to get in or trying to get in and get merit scholarships?

I am asking because those are the schools that come up in the Merit scholarship discussions.

7

@nw2this Ivies don’t give merit scholarships

8

@Gatortristan

Yes, I know, but the rest on his list do. The list is almost identical to the one I am putting together for my D to apply to. The ivies are on it because they give might give need based aid even though we wouldn’t qualify for Pell.

9

Agree that a 29 ACT is going to make for an uphill battle. Have you retaken it yet? In terms of college admissions your summer will be much better spent prepping than volunteering.

Another great use of your summer time is to apply to as many fall fly-in programs as you can. If you are accepted and attend a program it greatly increases the chances of admission. There are dozens of them, but going off of your original list there are programs at WashU, JHU, Cornell, Dartmouth, Columbia, Penn, Emory, and Rice that I know of. Some are open application, others are by invite, so make sure you are on the radar of the schools you are interested in.

10

You will need to be at the top of the applicant pool to get merit scholarships from the schools on your list that give merit. It sounds like your expected EFC is high and might be hard for your parents to cover. As others have said work on either the ACT or SAT. You won’t get in to these schools with your current ACT. I recommend adding some schools that are step down from this list. You also need a safety or two. Keep working hard as you have done a great job so far.

11

@txtstella yeah im applying to local schools as well and I took the SAT and my scores, I think, will be higher. Also i don’t think my efc will be high. My sister is attending a $60,000 tuition school (Notre Dame) for about $4000 because of financial aid.

12

In that case, you have to score very well on the SAT/ACT. Check over the list of colleges that meet-full-need. Some of these are on your list already. Good luck!

13

I agree that a higher score could help you be more competitive. But if you don’t score higher than a 29, I would absolutely still apply to all of the schools on your list. It’s certainly not impossible, as I got a 29 on the ACT (and the equivalent on the SAT) and fared pretty well in the admissions process.