<p>Hi</p>
<p>I am a freshman, and I am very serious about having a future at Princeton. To give you some more info to work off of, here...</p>
<p>Freshman year:</p>
<p>Advanced English (honors not avail) - A
Advanced English (honors not avail) - A
Honors Geometry - B
Honors Bio- A
French 3 (honors not available for French studies who came from my middle school) - A+
Italian 1 (skipping to level 3 next yr)- A</p>
<p>For next year, I am scheduled in...</p>
<p>Honors English
AP US history
Honors Algebra 2
Honors Chem
Honors French 4
Italian 3
Student leadership (elective)</p>
<p>As far as extra curriculars, I volunteer at the local museum and I am a junior educator. I also study Arabic. I am a Muslim, but I converted by my own choice. I am very passionate about womens rights particularly in the Middle east (I was inspired after reading The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, and I am searching for an organization in relation to this to join. I am a member of the Model UN club, and I plan on staying all through HS. I pitch/play softball in a travel league outside of school. (I quit the school team- it was crazily demanding and none of the coached understood the importance of my academics bc most of the team is...different...)</p>
<p>My GPA (weighted) this is about a 4.2 ish...I think this is due to the lack of honors available to freshmen and the issue of Spanish students being able to take honors before French students (I have no idea why...we study the different languages for the same amount of time ,but when entering HS, Spanish students have an honors class available to them, but French students dont.) So I think my GPA is skewed this year. </p>
<p>So, basically I am wondering if I am on the right track and what else I can do to improve my chances. I know it is way too soon to tell if I will get in, I am more concerned as to if I am going in the right direction. Any advice would mean the world to me!</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>It’s great that you have aspirations to attend Princeton early-on. Like you, I always wanted to go to Princeton (and I’ll be matriculating there in the Fall, yay!) </p>
<p>As far as grades go, I think you’re doing just fine. Get a head-start on SAT IIs and studying the SAT, but I think that Princeton really cares about your passions more than your scores. But I might offer the advice of taking AP tests (even if your school doesn’t offer them) your sophomore or junior year (I did, and I think that helped :D)</p>
<p>If I were you, I’d focus on your interest in Middle Eastern studies / rights for women abroad. Have you ever read “Half the Sky” by Nicholas Kristof, or “3 Cups of Tea” by Greg Mortenson? If not, you should check them out! They deal significantly with gender issues in Africa and the Middle East, and offer several organizations which you can become a part of (and possibly start at your own school!) This demonstrates community service & leadership, which is great for Princeton.</p>
<p>Overall, start to think about the person you want the college admissions officers to see when you apply. This person is made of experiences, not test scores! </p>
<p>As far as athletics go, Princeton does like to see well-rounded applicants, but if its too demanding, don’t worry about it. Maybe try joining a recreational league in which you can coach younger kids on the side or something–that might take less of your time! (I row crew, so I can understand how it’s hard to juggle a bunch of different things.)</p>
<p>You’re definitely on the right track 
Don’t get discouraged by silly posts on collegeconfidential! Another great post is “The Choice,” which is published by the NYTimes, more often than not, college admissions officers post replies on that site.</p>
<p>Good luck :)</p>
<p>its proved very difficult to get into the gender equality kind of field, but for volunteering, Ive started this thing where I have a penpal/ phone pal (haha) and I aid them with their English. Since this post, I won an award from the World Language committee at my school and my friends and I are going to start a tutoring business, and I was going to focus on foreign language. Good?</p>
<p>Its great that youre going there, what kind of things did you do in HS?</p>
<p>Well, luckily you’re a freshman, so you have a lot of time.</p>
<p>Over the past four years, I did a lot of different things, haha. You know how they always say to stick to 3-4 main activities? Well, I didn’t quite follow that rule :P. Although crew and marching/concert band outside of school took a lot of my time, I was really committed to student government, Model UN and independent scientific research. I think having a lot of different experiences with environmental science research (and winning nat’l awards / published papers, etc.) helped out. Honestly, I just started to become really interested in the applications that environmental science has within developing nations…and took that passion from there. Starting an educational outreach program probably helped as well. </p>
<p>I think, though, its a combination of the things you do. Princeton, in my opinion, likes to see students interested in serving others while pursuing their own passions. If your application demonstrates this, then you’re golden :)</p>
<p>haha how did you start your outreach program?</p>
<p>and also, you know all about the demonstrated interest thing, so I was wondering if attending the Harvard summer program would hurt my chances bc I want to go to Princeton, not harvard…or does it not matter?</p>