Which Colleges Can I Get Into?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

I am currently a junior attending a private boarding school.
-I have about a 4.0 unweighted GPA, and I have maintained this GPA for all three years
-I should be in the top 10% of my grade (if GPA’s were weighted, I would be even higher) and will likely earn cum laude membership
-My ACT score is a 33 (as the best test) and a 34 superscored
-I’ve taken 4 AP’s so far and have taken all honors classes when offered (as a junior, I am taking AP Calc AB, AP Lit, APUSH, Physics Honors, Spanish 4H, and electives). Last year, I took AP Calc A, and I plan to take the AP Physics 1 exam despite my school not offering this class.
-As a senior, I will take 4 or 5 AP’s
-As for EC’s, I have played soccer and squash for all three years but only at the JV level, I have over 100 hours of community service, I am the founder of a peer tutoring program at my school, and I am a tour guide … (this is where I feel like my application is weakest – any advice as to how strong/weak my EC’s are and what I should do in the little time that is left would be very helpful). I am passionate about helping others, and advice on how to bring this out in my application/how to further prove this (I know that a lot of people claim that they are passionate about this too) would be helpful as well.
-I am looking to study either engineering or business, though I am not sure about which specific major. That said, mechanical or, maybe even preferably, aerospace engineering are the fields that interest me most at the moment.

Please give me any schools that you think might match up with my information. Some of the schools that I am considering are UPenn, Rice, Johns Hopkins, Notre Dame, Cal Tech, Georgetown, UCLA, Dartmouth, UCB, UVA, UMich, NYU, Boston College, and Georgia Tech. Thank you!

2

Congrats on your stats!! Your GPA, Course-Rigor, and test scores are great. But, what concerns me, especially for schools like UPenn, Hopkins, Cal Tech, and Dartmouth, are your ECs and lack of leadership opportunity (but hey, don’t worry, this is the easier part to rectify than stats).

Here is what you can do: ALL these recommendations are completely obtainable.

  1. Expand on your peer tutoring program at your school: this could potentially be a great essay topic since it demonstrates your compassion. Expanding your program could mean that you can *start peer tutoring at local middle schools to teach young women STEM, *assist students that aren't on track to graduating with after school tutoring, *create school-wide campaigns to assist struggling students on ways how to gain a stronger understanding of their school materials and asking their teachers for help...etc.
  2. If you aren't the president of a club, create one of your own! It shows initiative and passion. You mentioned that you are interested in engineering or business. Does your school have a robotics club or a FBLA/DECA? If not, you should definitely create one.
  3. START LOOKING for some summer opportunities NOW. The best advice is to get in contact with professors from nearby colleges who could mentor you on research on something like aerospace engineering. This will demonstrate your intellectual curiosity, which is what your reach colleges are looking for in an applicant.
  4. If you can't get in contact with a professor, apply to some competitive pre-college summer programs (of course, if money is not a problem). Since you're interested in business, you can even intern at local organizations to demonstrate your passion.

With these extracurriculars, you will be a more competitive applicant to all your schools. Good luck!

3

Hi bubblepop12444, thank you for your response! As a senior, I hope to get some more leadership positions. Being the leader of my peer tutoring program for the rest of this year and next year should look great, and I will definitely expand on how this affected everyone at my school. I also look to be a table foot at formal dinner, possibly a head tour guide, and one or two of these positions: senior prefect, healthy relations committee, academic honor committee, or rules and discipline committee. Given that I get some of these of these leadership roles, do you think my chances are significantly improved?

My school already has a robotics club, but the problem is that it is so small. I might look to join that, though, and possibly gain a leadership position in the future. That said, I am not so sure if the focus of that club interests me, but I can always try it out.

I don’t know if I want to do a summer research program. My summer is already busy with travel, college visits, and potentially prep for SAT 2 tests and whatnot, so a month long+ commitment like that might not be the best option. That said, I would love to do research with a professor for a month or so since I will be able to stay at home and not be entirely committed to a program. More importantly, the focus would be all on me (not trying to sound selfish, but some research programs involve a lot of people), and I’m sure it would look better for college.
Do you have any advice as to how to approach this? I live in New Jersey, not too far from Princeton, Rutgers, NJIT, etc., and an opportunity like this would be great – I’m just not sure how to get one.

My dad is involved and business, and he could likely help me find a place to be an intern. I don’t know if this would look as good as research, though, and I feel like I would be more interested in working with a professor.

Also, I currently plan on holding a charity event or something of the sort in my hometown. This past summer I went to Africa, and your thoughts on whether or not this looks like another rich kid doing charity to improve his college chances would help a lot. The opportunity actually meant a lot to me, and I did a lot – I helped to build a facility and start a program for freshmen in 12 schools in Zimbabwe to learn about the sciences, where they could learn valuable things and spread that information to their communities. This is going to be an annual thing, and I helped run the first program (though I obviously can’t be there for every year to come).

Sorry this is pretty unorganized, but I wanted to respond to all of your points. Do you think that my chances at schools like Georgetown, Rice, NYU, or Boston College are significantly better? Thank you so much for helping!

4

I like the choice of schools! It’s a good list, definitely a lot of prestigious universities there. I think you have the ability to get into all of them assuming the EC’s improve which I believe will happen. It’s also a good idea to include safety schools just in case but I’m sure you knew that. Penn, JH, and CalTech can be tough for business/engineering so be sure to separate yourself from the crowd or even transfer into your desired major after you’re at the college if you want to get in that bad. Good luck!

5

Bump… any help appreciated

6

Your academic stats definitely won’t keep you out of any college. I agree with everything dani above – make an effort to find some summer internship opportunities and maybe a couple other clubs to join come senior year (although that probably won’t make much difference). Good luck!

7

Thank you, ap012199! You said that it won’t make much difference, though. Which of the schools from the ones I listed do you think are realistic choices, keeping what you said in mind?

8

Also, for the UC schools, my W/C GPA, using their calculator, is a 4.36. Unweighted, it’s a 4.0. Since sophomore year, I have 11 A year grades and 22 A semester grades. Thus far, I have taken 4 AP’s, so I reach their maximum of 8 semesters of AP courses. (I am including the grades I will earn at the end of this year)