What are some good matches/slight reaches for me?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hey, can anyone tell me a couple of good matches that I should aim for?</p>

<p>Location: Long Island, NY
High School: Public, Very competitive, Top 100 in the Nation
Income: ~100K
Race: Chinese in a mostly Jewish school
First Generation
Top 10%.. 15-20/330</p>

<p>GPA: 97.5+ .. maybe 98, weighted.
AP Classes: World History [3], Biology [?], English Composition[?]
SAT: 2140/2400, 1430/1600. 740 M, 690 CR, 710 W.. will retake.
SAT IIs: Math IIC, Biology, English Literature.. taking next week.
ACT: Taking in June</p>

<p>ECs:
Newspaper 9, 10, 11 [Editor next year]
FBLA 9, 10, 11 [Officer next year, maybe.]
Math Team 9, 11
Art Club 9, 11
Wrestling 11</p>

<p>Other:
Volunteer at Hospital, Emergency Room: 100 hours+
Play Piano and Viola, NYSSMA levels 5 and 3 respectively. Continuing Piano.
Summer 06 - Stanford PreCollege, probably getting 8 credits or so.</p>

<p>I love to write and have a good relationship with my teachers, so I should be getting good to excellent recommendations and essays. </p>

<p>What do yall think? Matches? Reaches? Please, let me know. Here are my dream schools, hah.</p>

<p>Stanford. Hopkins. Duke. Rice.</p>

2

<p>Rice, Hopkins: Slight reach.
Duke, Stanford: Reach.</p>

<p>Outside of your ECs, what are your passions?</p>

<p>[url=<a href="http://www.tumr.com/view/?id=20&app=college%5DNash%5B/url"&gt;http://www.tumr.com/view/?id=20&app=college]Nash[/url&lt;/a&gt;]&lt;/p>

3

<p>I am very creative, and I love to build and create things, you know? I love poetry, art, making websites, music..</p>

4

<p>Chinese in jewish school? I give you no chance for any college.</p>

5

<p>Uh, care to explain why?</p>

6

<p>maverick, ignore that bigoted BS posted by sai. </p>

<p>The reason I asked about your passions is because you can write a great essay by focusing on your passions, or by using your favorite pastimes as lenses through which you examine some aspect of life. Basically, be engaging and talk about things you care about - even if they have no academic relevance whatsoever. These schools want to admit students who love to learn and who want to develop themselves as people.</p>

<p>[url=<a href="http://www.tumr.com/view/?id=20&app=college%5DNash%5B/url"&gt;http://www.tumr.com/view/?id=20&app=college]Nash[/url&lt;/a&gt;]&lt;/p>

7

<p>Thanks, I recognize that. Does anyone have any more suggestions for schools I should apply to besides my 4? Here are some other schools I've been looking at..</p>

<p>Cornell
Columbia
U Chicago
Michigan
Lehigh
Tufts</p>

<p>Any other suggestions? I plan to major in bio/premed by the way. Thanks for all your help!</p>

8

<p>With your four choices, I suspected you were premed. With your interests, you might look into LACs (any of them, really) or universities with few or no requirements (like Brown). Most of the universities outside the top 10-15 would be good matches.</p>

9

<p>raise ur sat 1 a little more and jhu would be a close match</p>

10

<p>Thank you all a lot. I'm not really interested in any LACs,.. I'm kind of hoping to attend a college of more prestige, like in the top 20 or something, you know?</p>

11

<p>Luckily for you, most parents don't read WAMC threads. I'll be a lot nicer than they would be. Many LACs are as prestigious IF NOT MORE SO than top 20 universities. Discounting them based on prestige is, to be blunt, foolish.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.classroomedition.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.classroomedition.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

12

<p>You know what? You're right. I have been very closeminded about LACs, especially since I know nothing about them. Can someone please enlighten me on what the biggest difference between a LAC and a University is? I just know that most LACs are rather small, right?</p>

13

<p>Universities offer graduate degrees. LACs only have undergraduates. As a result, LACs usually have more of a focus on their students than universities, although some universities are very LAC-like (Princeton, Dartmouth, Brown, Rice, etc.). LACs usually have extremely high graduate school and medical school placement rates because that's often how people measure their prestige. LACs range from extremely science/math oriented (Harvard Mudd) to arts and humanities (Oberlin), with many good mixes in between. LACs traditionally have higher numbers of female applicants, so males get a slight boost in admissions.</p>

14

<p>A mostly Jewish school in LI? Whooda thunk it? :P</p>

<p>You'll be fine.</p>

15

<p>reasons simple:</p>

<ol>
<li>low sat scores</li>
<li>unless you are officers in those clubs, I am frankly not very surprised</li>
<li>your activities are somewhat mediocre and appear to be the average rich kid activities. piano, stanford summer session. bourgeios.</li>
</ol>

16

<p>btw if your school are ranked within the top 100 by newsweek, that is not exactly so competitive. My school used to be in the top 100 a few years back, but as a result of budget cuts we dropped to around 500. And my school is hardly competitive at all. Sure a few dozen make it into HYPMS, but the rest just go to junk schools like berkeley, ucla, and swarthmore.</p>

17

<p>^Yep...for sure....berkeley, ucla and swarthmore are junk schools. I hope you are kidding, if not, please go shoot yourself. Btw its if your school IS ranked...not are.</p>

18

<p>Sai, I hope you're getting to freaking every college if you are giving me your trash advice. I understand constructive criticism, but yours is almost like flaming. Remember, colleges select on personality too, not just on your resume. Based on your attitude, you'd be lucky to get into those "junk" schools.</p>

<p>I said I would be an officer next year, and I'm retaking the SATs. Don't judge me because you don't have as much money or whatever - you don't know me.</p>

19

<p>I was accepted into the University of Chicago, so I can help you out with your doubts! I hope my advice serves you in some way. I was also accepted into Yale University and Boston, so I hope my experiences of the admission's process will be of some benefit for you.</p>

<p>So, with what you shared with us, I will make my estimates:</p>

<ol>
<li>Cornell - I have a very good feeling, 88% chance of getting in. You and my friend share the same statistics and she got in.</li>
<li>Columbia - Okay, here comes the tricky part, as each year progresses, Columbia becomes more and more competitive. With what you've shown, and that's assuming you have a strong essay, recommendations, and stats for your SAT II's, then you have a 68% of making it, but without the strong essays and recommendations, then I know for a fact you will be wait-listed, without the good SAT II's and strong extracurricular activities, you will indeed be rejected. This is the hardest school on your list. This is your ultimate reach. Work hard and be yourself.</li>
<li>U Chicago - OKAY! My specialty! Let's see...have very strong essay's and several fantastic recommendations that illustrate your potential and unique nature, and basically you're in, but just to be safe, raise your SAT scores to around 2200, and bring your rank up to the 5%. Remember to be yourself, U of C is a great school!</li>
<li>Michigan - I have a friend who auditioned into the School of Music there, but she wasn't in the top 10%, and so, I guarantee that you will into this school. 94% sure!</li>
<li>Lehigh - Not sure. I won't even go here. But I'm sure 96%.</li>
<li>Tufts - Not sure. 83%.</li>
</ol>

20

<p>Thank you WMF so much, your post helped a lot. Do you have any ideas about my dream schools in the first post though? Duke/Rice/Hopkins/Stanford?</p>