Williams and Amherst chances

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hi! I was ready to submit and be done with my college apps until I took a second look at the LACs, specifically Williams. After reading into the college and its curriculum, I grew in love with it and Amherst! So, please, I’d love some input on where my chances lie at either college.

SAT I:
1410/2130
-Critical Reading: 800
-Math: 610 (working on getting it up)
-Writing: 720

SAT II:
-World History: 780
-United States History: 770
(I love, love, love history)

Class Rank:
-25 out of 222

GPA:
-Weighted: 4.67
-Unweighted: 3.79

Extracurriculars:
-Beta Club (President)
-Key Club (President) (Founder)
-Dungeons and Dragons Club (President) (Founder)
-Cross-Country (Team Captain)
-Track and Field (Team Captain)
-AFJROTC (Deputy Corps Commander)
-Palmetto Boys’ State
-Interact Club (Historian)
(One of my other passions is community service, which stems from my poor past/background and desire to give back to the community.)

APs:
-AP US History: 5
-AP Human Geography: 4
-AP Psychology: 5
-AP World History (self-studied): 5
-AP Art History (self-studied): 5
-AP European History (self-studied): 5
(Through my love for history, I tried to take AP’s in my high school related to it. Sadly, they only offered one history course. So as a result, I embraced independency and self-studied every other history AP the CB offered and got 5’s on all of them.)

Awards:
-West Point Leadership Award.
-Academic Gold Medalist.
-Cross-Country Rookie of the Year.
-AP Scholar with distinction.
-Cross-Country all-Region athlete.
-Cross-Country County Champion
-Cross-Country Rookie of the Year.

Hooks:
-First generation college student

-Ward of the state during my middle school year due to my family neglecting me and creating an unsafe home environment (poverty, drugs etc).

-Homeless for a couple months before moving into a foster home in the summer before my ninth grade year.

-Currently in a foster home.

Income: 28,000.
State: South Carolina.
Intended major: History.
Recommendations: Probably all 8/10 or 9/10.
Financial Aid: Due to being a Foster kid, and not living with my biological mother, I qualify for full aid.

2

Are both schools deadline Jan. 1st?

3

Excellent ECs and you’re in range score wise. If you can bump at the SAT math score, you’re a shoe-in.

4

@NYDad513 Yeah… It is. I put in my app two days late because I JUST discovered how awesome both schools are since I was so busy with Cornell, Dartmouth etc. :frowning: I emailed the admissions officers and apologized and asked if they’ll still accept my app. I won’t even be able to find out until Monday when their offices open up again.

@jamessteele Thanks a lot!!

5

best of luck- you have a good chance if they’ll accept your late application.

6

No one is a shoe in at those 2 schools, esp. in regular decision.

First things first, it would appear the application deadline has passed. Not sure how you get around that.

The ECs are average-ish for those schools.

The academic stats are below average, esp. for RD.

BUT, your hooks are very strong at those schools. What you’ve overcome makes your academic stats more impressive.

With those hooks, you have an above average chance, IMO. But the RD round is tough. Half the spots are already gone. Numerically/statistically, the odds are long.

But williams and Amherst will love those hooks. Hopefully they are prominently displayed in your application:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-OLlJUXwKU

7

@8bagels Ooooh I love the video. Reason my GPA isn’t that high is because my Freshman year I was struggling transitioning from a children’s home to foster care. My GC explained it in her rec for me. Thanks though!!

8

@ASJU9511 These schools are only going to accept a few hundred boys and a few hundred girls out six or seven thousand applications and you are below average. Unless you are a recruit which is done in early decision I would say your odds are very low at this point. Keep in mind the class size is about 500 students and over 100 seats are already taken.

You would have a good chance at Lafayette, Connecticut College or Trinity College.

9

I believe your story is compelling enough, and you’ve overcome serious adversity, that you will get a significant boost-especially as it is being confirmed by your GC.

Please let us know if they accept your late app- I’m truly curious.

By the way, it’s worth reaching out to the Track/XCountry coach even if you aren’t “recruitable material”. If you tell the coaches that you’ve applied, and if admitted you’d love to participate by trying to walk on the team, they may give you a tip. Never know…it can’t hurt. My daughter did just that and I suspect it helped a bit.

But again…the tardiness of the applications is worrisome. Not sure “just discovering” the schools will be a strong enough excuse…as I said before, Best Wishes & Good Luck!

10

I wish you luck but it’s too bad you missed the deadlines. I hope you applied to some other good colleges by their deadlines because you should get into someplace great with that life story.

11

FWIW, if history is your passion and you think that graduate school might be a possibility, you’d probably be better served in a somewhat larger school with more diverse faculty and course offerings. That you would get at Amherst with the 5 colleges consortium, but Williams is a bit more limited, while nonetheless a superb school overall.

Do let us know if they accepted your late application. I am curious.

12

UPDATE: I contacted Williams and Amherst this morning and they said they’ll accept my late application without fault. They totally understand and are happy I’m so interested!!! :smiley:

So what do you guys think now??

13

@bsalum I’ll definitely do that.

@delurk1 fortunately I did apply to the rest of my other colleges early, so I’m good there. The only reason I applied late to Williams and Amherst was because I only recently discovered how awesome they are and decided to apply late.

@mamaedefamilia I am seriously considering grad school. But I’m also thinking about minoring in Economics or even majoring in it if worst comes to worst.

14

Did you apply anywhere early? I think you have compelling life story that hopefully will offset your grades and SAT l scores.

15

You have a fair shot. At schools that selective and that small, that’s all you can ask for. Both Williams and Amherst regularly turn down thousands of applicants with incredible credentials. But they accept some too. Good luck.

16

“FWIW, if history is your passion and you think that graduate school might be a possibility, you’d probably be better served in a somewhat larger school with more diverse faculty and course offerings. That you would get at Amherst with the 5 colleges consortium, but Williams is a bit more limited, while nonetheless a superb school overall.”

I totally disagree. When you are an undergrad, there are only so many classes you can take. At Amherst and Williams, you would take your history classes with excellent professors who are there to teach, in small seminar classes. It is no exaggeration to say that as history major at those schools, virtually every history professor would know you personally and take an interest in your education.

That is why those schools (and other top LACs like Swarthmore, Pomona, Reed, Carleton etc) produce so many more PhDs as a percentage of their class than do larger schools.

17

^^ Totally agree. The teaching at a school like Williams is phenomenal and the professors are there in that remote location mainly because of their love of teaching. The same applies to other top LACs in terms of professors interacting with students and having their main focus teaching instead of research and publishing which you find at major research universities. If you want to go to grad school in your field, your recommendations will play a large role in where you will be accepted. Close interaction with a professor at a Williams type school will mean a lot more than attending a larger school where you might get a more generic rec.

18

I agree - if grad school is the goal, you can’t beat Amherst, Williams and other top LACs.

They are ideal, as the % of students from those school who go on to the top grad schools proves.

19

That’s totally awesome. Man, the more I hear about W&A the more I want to go!! I really hope I’m fortunate enough to get accepted.

20

I did want to ask again. Did you apply anywhere early? If so, what was the result?