Hello guyz!
I am new to this discussion and excited to meet you. Anw, I wanna apply to Yale this Fall 2020.
I am an international student from Rwanda (Africa).
@chellex I’m actually applying RD, but I totally understand why you would think I would apply SCEA. Good luck to you when you apply!
@Gakwandi Welcome to the discussion, and it’s nice to meet you! It’s so cool to see you living in Africa, as I have lived in the U.S. my whole life and haven’t visited many countries. How is it over there?
Have a nice day.
Hi, I am from India and I am planning to apply in SCEA in Biological sciences. As I will applying in STEM want to check how important is English R&W section score at Yale, because I believe Yale is famous for Economics, Political sciences, Literature and No of students for Biological sciences are lesser at Yale. I have 1420 in SAT 1, 790 in SAT Biology, 720 in SAT Chemistry, my English R&W score is 680, Maths 740, I have very strong academic record and I am in IB, completed a Cancer research project in 11 th grdae. My question is will 1420 SAT score will be a damper at Yale while I am. Working on other parts of my application ? Also anyone in this group applying for Biological sciences? Thanks
@TANVI2002 - I don’t want to be discouraging, but a 1420 is a very low SAT score for Yale. The competition to get into Yale as an international student is particularly tough (look at the Common Data Set for Yale, as well as the Yale Admissions website), and there’s no shortage of applicants from South Asia who excel at both the humanities and the sciences.
In fact, that is the case with everyone I know who is admitted to Yale. It is a myth that the sciences are weaker at Yale than the humanities, and Biology is one of the most crowded majors on campus. Many students double major in a science and a humanities subject, and all students are expected to do well in both areas, regardless of their major. Extend your search to make sure you have some match and safety schools on your list. Best of luck!
Hi @TANVI2002!
Welcome to the Yalie support group chat! Though @zoebrittany has a point (on Yale’s website they say the average SAT score is around a 1450/1460. On other college sites they say it’s a 1510. I wouldn’t be surprised if the latter is right but there are many people who get in with 1450’s so I’m assuming they don’t mind that score too much), I think it’s still worth a shot at applying. Of course, being an international student makes the competition more difficult when applying to top tier schools, if anything it’s more difficult for international students to get into top tier schools, hence the bar of expectations is set a bit higher for you guys but it’s definietly not impossible. Sure a higher standardized score can help you but as the years progress standardized testing is starting to mean a lot less in the college application process. In fact, top tier schools like Yale state that when they ask students what the most important part of the application is, a lot of students say it’s standardized testing when, in truth, that’s the least important. The only purpose testing serves as is as a threshold period. So if you have the opportunity to retake the SAT, I recommend you should go for it in order to try and boost your score to get more into the benchmark but if you can’t it’s not the end of the world. Like I said earlier, there are people, including international students, with perfect scores that don’t get in: the transcript is the MOST important part of your application, testscores do come second but only in regards to the threshold. Because Yale is a hoslitic school, even if you score below the range they’ll still continue to FULLY EVALUATE your application. Which comes to say that, teacher recommendations and essays and Extracurriculars are the main second place holder in terms of importance in the application.
@zoeybrittany is also right in regards to major. Yale actually has very good STEM programs. Sure it’s known for its humanities more but their medical and engineering schools are phenomenal. Similar to Harvard, they’re a well rounded school. It is expected that students do well overall but that mainly applies to the transcript in order to see that you can handle any material. In terms of testscores, there are a lot of STEM majors who apply with weak humanities scores just like there are a lot of humanities majors who have weak STEM scores. Those are mainly the spikey students and it sure as heck won’t kill you if you’re one of those applicants. I took the ACT and my math and science scores aren’t all that great, regardless of my composite meanwhile my English and reading score are high because I’m more into humanities; it’s also my spike afterall and if that’s the case it defineitly won’t kill you. Yale will be able to see that applicants like that are human because we can’t be good at everything. We have our strengths and weaknesses and so (even in the information session) they say that it’s fine to be better at one subject over the other because it does happen. If your humanities scores aren’t entirely strong it definietly won’t hurt as much than if you were applying as someone who’s interested in humanities.
Hopefully that helps 
@Lunarlitgend - A R&W SAT score of 680 puts @TANVI2002 below the 25th percentile, which is 710. Clearly the application will be strengthened if that score can be raised to put the applicant into the 50th percentile. That score is great - especially for a foreign student - and will open doors at lots of US universities, but it very low for Yale.
You are right that other factors - an applicant’s SES, letters of recommendation, essays, EC’s and possible “hooks” - also influence the admissions decision. And the Yale AOs will absolutely care about this applicant’s story and academic potential. But Yale is academically challenging - even for students, like my classmates, who had perfect standardized test scores and high GPAs coming out of high school. But the SCEA round at Yale is not like the ED round at other schools. The SCEA admissions process is tougher because of the number of spaces that are allocated to recruited athletes, legacies, etc., which reduce the number of “chairs” for other applicants. And only the students who have their applications completed, including test scores, letters, etc., should apply, because everyone wants to put their “best foot forward” by presenting the strongest profile they can. All others should keep working on their applications and submit them during the RD round. That’s my advice as someone who went through this a few years ago.
Congratulations on your SAT Subject Test scores and your SAT Math score! Those are really strong!
In terms of your question, because I’m not an AO and merely a high schooler, I can’t really say too much, but if you check out the Common Data Set, you ideally want to be in the 50th percentile or higher with your SAT/ACT scores.
Have a nice day.
Hey everyone,
Just wanted to let everyone know that the Common App is now open for this year’s application cycle.
@Bippitybopity Thank you for the notification! 
For some reason, though, Yale’s application doesn’t seem to be updated yet so we still have to wait a while for that one to come out.
The Common App is open. That does not mean that every university’s specific prompts are updated. There are a few every cycle that are not finalized until later.
@Lunarlitgend - Not sure if this is what you are asking about, but Yale Admissions has posted the supplementary short answer and essay questions here: https://admissions.yale.edu/essay-topics. Best of luck!
@skieurope Yeah that makes sense. I just checked on the website and they said they’re supplements don’t refresh until September 1st 
@worriestoomuch Yeah! Thanks so much but don’t worry though I saw it on them website awhile ago so all’s good.
Hey guys, I have a pretty specific question, and any advice would be much appreciated Sooo… two kids from my school already got recruited by Yale (athletes). I’m very happy for them but am worried that this will lower my probably slim chances even further, since Yale only takes one (maybe two) students from my school each year, if any, and I feel like colleges might have an unofficial quota on the num. of kids they accept from a certain school. I’m considering EDing to a different school, esp. since I heard Yale REA doesn’t help that much compared to ED. Even though Yale is my first choice, would applying ED to, say, Brown make more sense? Thanks for any insight
Yale (and its peers) have no min/max/quota per HS. And recruited athletes are operating in a totally different pool. Apply to the school you want.
@beautifulchaos
I second @skieurope
If Yale is still your top choice, though, I don’t think it’s wise to ED to Brown because, remember, ED is binding. If you happen to be accepted into Brown ED you legally have to attend and you’ll have to withdraw all your other applications that you sent out to other schools. The only exception is if you can’t financially afford to go the school. I’d recommend applying EA or REA elsewhere rather than ED because it could take away your chances to attend Yale if accepted.
That’s just my suggestion though. Otherwise it’s 100% up to you. It’s your application afterall
Hopefully that helps
@beautifulchaos Yale doesn’t have quotas on the number of kids that get accepted per school. As a school, they want the most qualified candidates they can get, so whether they come from the same high school or not has no weight in the admissions process. Even though two kids from your school have already been accepted to Yale, it doesn’t mean that they won’t accept more. Best of Luck!
Does anyone know when Yale’s application will be open on the Common App?
@Lunarlitgend , I am not sure about your source for the 1450/1460 SAT avg SAT score. The website provides the 25th to 75th percentile by the 2 components:
"No Score Cutoffs
There are no score cutoffs for standardized tests, and successful candidates present a wide range of test results. During the most recent year, test score ranges (25th to 75th percentiles) for enrolled first-years were:
SAT-Evidence-Based Reading and Writing: 720-770
SAT-Math: 740-790
ACT Composite: 33-35"
You also cannot simply add 720 and 740. It is more than likely that someone at the bottom end of either the reading or math score had a higher score in the other section. Looking at the Class of 2022 profile page, we see that only 13.3% of the members of the Class of 2022 had a reading score of between 600-690. https://admissions.yale.edu/sites/default/files/class_profile_2022_fall.pdf. What would be closer to an avg combined score is to look at what a 34 ACT concords to, which is ±1500.
It is also not correct to believe that the “threshhold” where scores don’t matter anymore is at/around the 25th percentile. In fact, the high likelihood is that a majority of the students at or below the 25th percentile have the benefit of one or more strong hooks, like athletic recruit, development child, URM. I do believe there is a threshold, but IMO it is 34+/1500+. @zoebrittany was just trying to be helpful and realistic. Of course ultimately the decision is holistic and your chances are 0 if you don’t apply, but you must have realistic matches and safeties, and realize that international acceptances are even more competitive.
@Bippitybopity September 1st
@BKSquared Thanks for the clarification. I appreciate the statistics and everything. I’m very aware that @zoebrittany was being helpful which is why when they replied to me I liked their comment because I realized that they were right. If my answer to them beforehand posed as though they weren’t being helpful I apologise for that. I was just trying to put in my own thoughts and opinions that’s all. Again thank you for the clarification. 