If the parents have earned income outside of the United States the NPC might not be accurate. Nevermind that the NPCs have not been updated for the 2024-2025 academic year…yet. And this could take a while due to the changes in the FAFSA that are being put in place. @Mwfan1921
So please use the NPCs right now with caution.
As noted. You are an American citizen living abroad, and that brings its own level of diversity. Do not apply as an Austrian citizen only. Really…you are a U.S. citizen and that brings some benefits when applying to colleges in the U.S.
Ok will do so, thank you for letting me know
So I can apply as both US and Austrian?
Im going into 11th, so I can change it. Do you recommend HL chem and History SL instead of Design and Business?
I was always going with the mindset of loving and have a firey passion for what I’m doing, I never wanted to go to these schools for easy mode. I more wanted to go to them if they offer more jobs or funding etc… But I was wrong, I would not be doing engineering for easy mode in that sense.
As a U.S. citizen applying to U.S. colleges…apply as a U.S. citizen. That you hold another citizenship isn’t important for this.
The IB does four years of each luckily, just I read you also need laboratory experience and tests which is hard to consider what is and isn’t. I don’t think I have done that necessarily, but Ill further investigate.
If you really strongly recommend it, Ill study for the SAT and ACT but I saw some want it and don’t, but it is really worth studying and taking the time out of extracurriculars?
I will pay for the cost of school, food and health (additional supplies).
So just stating Im Austrian is enough, thus they can add that to their diversity list.
So your family can do this?
I never said that! @MYOS1634 gave you an excellent reply about this above.
You apply as a US citizen; they will have your address and your school so they will see you live in Austria.
“Do you recommend HL chem and History SL instead of Design and Business?”
I would keep Design Tech bc it offers you several opportunities for independent projects, research, etc., and if your GC can include a brief syllabus it’ll prove the course is solid academically.
But I suppose you could take Chemistry, especially if you want to study ChemE. I don’t think it’s necessary if you have taken 1 or 2 years of chemistry already.
I would, however, switch out Business Management and replace it with another social science (history, probably, or geography, or economics).
To be fair, you’re right that top colleges have more resources and funding for their students. Grinnell, Wiliams, HarveyMudd, Princeton… are known for their amazing resources for undergrads. (Grinnell and Williams do not have Engineering but students can/must do research.)
Look into Penn State Schreyer, USC Columbia Honors, ASU Barrett: these students also have access to research labs etc.
Yes, that’s true lots of projects and schools resources to make lots of projects on the side.
Ok, will do so, thank you for the recommendations and the advice, greatly appreciated.
That’s what I meant, but I phrased it wrong. The more up you go the better funding etc.
Thank you again 
Most of the biographical forms ask if you hold dual citizenship.
Endowment per student can be a good proxy for resources.
Because these colleges don’t have any specific “cut-off” requirement for grades (GPA), AP scores/IB points, or SAT/ACT results. There isn’t even a hard rule which groups absolutely must be HL vs. SL.
Colleges will publish policies, how many HL IB scores can be credited in total (it only matters, if/after you’ve been accepted), and which minimal scores in each subject will be accepted for credit. If you scroll down on this page:
https://barnard.edu/apscores
there’ll be a detailed breakdown of how many credits each IB course is “worth”.
As far as your admission chances to elite U.S. universities, you will find that most admitted students will be in the top 10% of their class, and almost everyone has test scores in the top 7% (for those students that have that data available).
As far as which subjects to take for how many years, many colleges will publish a “Common Data Set”, and there is a section “C5” that lists what subject areas are important to that college, e.g., here from Columbia College & SEAS:
So given those facts, you can assess your own standing in your school, how excellent your IB predicted scores are, and whether the classes you are taking are covering the necessary subjects. The further away you are from the profile of the typically admitted student, the drastically lesser your chances are.
And if you fit all the criteria - then there is a >90% chance that you still won’t be admitted, because there are ten times more highly qualified applicants than these colleges can house or can fit into their first-year classes.
So it’s perfectly fine to “aim” for the sky, but it can’t become an obsession. Instead most of your effort should be spent on identifying colleges where a good student would have a reasonable chance of being admitted!
Okay, now that we know your cultural background:
You need to immediately lose the Central European mindset of “I need to find out the requirements, fulfil them, and then I’m in”.
Seriously, think of it like dating. You will stand a chance if you can show you’ve got a good education, have serious prospects, are a hard worker, of good character…but you’ll never know whether it’s good enough until you’ve applied and been accepted, and you can have done everything right and will be rejected and you’ll never know why.
The lack of transparency and predictability in how and why top US universities admit their students (called “holistic admission”) may seem, at first, almost incomprehensible.
If applying to these universities is what you really want to do, you need to immerse yourself in the process.
Read threads! Especially on the international students forum.
The one almost hard and fast requirement (and even that can be mitigated for foreign students who may be unable to fulfil them in exactly the way US students can fulfil them) is the table in the PP just above:
4 years of English. (check)
4 years of maths (check)
4 years of a foreign language (sort of…clearly English is your foreign language and German your native language but that is a way the requirement may be adapted for foreign students)
4 years sciences (doesn’t have to be the same all four years): check
4 years of history: yes, you should switch business management for history if at all possible, and that actually goes for admissions in Europe and the UK as well, and I am assuming you’ll want to keep your options open.
It’s okay if only three of those five are at HL, because US universities are familiar with the IB and realise that you may be constrained by the diploma scheduling requirements which may not allow for deviation from the standard 3 HL 3 S L structure.
These requirements refer to your high school years. It may be possible to add 8th grade classes to fulfil the four year requirement, because the IB is considered to be a year ahead of a regular US high school curriculum, but you will not find good info about this on the websites. They may tell you if you ask.
So, what to do for your sixth subject? As mentioned, top universities in the US (and the UK and Europe too, actually) don’t ike seeing pre professional subjects, but rather another hard science or social science. However, if you feel you can show that DT isn’t a “soft option” or not mostly practical but also academically rigorous, cool projects might help with admission for engineering.
Grades? Your mindset shouldn’t be “oh no, I need at least 42 points” but “great, I want to be surrounded by students for whom getting 42 points or better is normal and cool, like it’s for me!”
Also, US universities don’t go in for effortless brilliance (that’s the UK). They don’t care for “meeting a standard” (even a high swndard). They want to see you are a hard worker, that you’re ready to do more and more, that you’ll kill yourself for what you want. The mindset they want to see is “bring it!” (US posters, hold your guns, yes, that is what it’s like from an outside perspective. The competitiveness is barely comprehensible for a European student.)
That goes for the SAT/ACT as well. It’s not a requirement…but submitting an excellent score is another data point for them to assemble into a whole.
Same goes for extracurriculars…they’ll want tangible evidence of excellence, of leadership. Not just that you did them.
And it doesn’t really make sense to go to the trouble of assembling a US application just for the ivies and Ivy+ colleges. If you really want to go to the US, find engineering schools with better chances of admission.
Note that, in comparison to highly desired universities in many other countries, the Ivy League schools are relatively small compared to the (large) US population, which drives up the level of competitiveness for admission.
To be clear, the colleges posted are those for one of two categories for which U.S. News posts undergraduate engineering rankings, and therefore can be considered “the top 20” only within their category. Colleges with a greater or exclusive focus on undergraduates, such as Harvey Mudd (which I’d place above at least six of the Ivies for undergraduate engineering), appear in a parallel category.
This student is a U.S. citizen living abroad.
Totally agree!