ilovemycoffee

Hi! I visited Amherst this summer and loved it there! I have the grades and extras however I know my SATs will hold me back. I have a learning disability (phonical dyslexia). I would appreciate someone chancing me considering Im an unusal case.

GPA: 4.4
Rank: 8/317
SAT:
1st time:
Verbal:470
Writing:500
Math:450
(I took SAT prep over the summer so its expected to improve)
*planning to take SAT II's in E/Biology, Literature, and U.S History

Courses: My school only has a four block schedule.(im only including AP's and honors)

Senior Year:
AP Literature- estimated B/B+
AP Biology- estimated A-
Pre-Calc Honors- estimated B

Junior Year final grades:
AP Language/Composition- B
World History II Honors- A-
Chemistry Honors- B-

Sophomore Year final grades:
English 10 honors- A
Biology honors- A
U.S History II honors- A

DUAL ENROLLMENT:
Semester 1: Psychology 101- C+
Semester 2: English 111- A
Semester 3: English 112-A-
Semester 4: U.S. History 151 (estimated -A)

Clubs:
National Honors Society(11,12)- Vice President
Gay-Straight Alliance(10,11,12)- President (11th,12th)
Key Club(10,11,12)- Editor (12th)
Drama Society(12th)- Assistant to director/ actress

Student Council- 10th, 11th, 12th
Mentoring freshman- 11th, 12th
Girls mentoring group- 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th
GREEN(Environment) Club- 12th

Sports:
JV volleyball- 9th

Volunteering:
Peer mediator to middle school students (10th, 11th)
Help teach journalism class to 7th graders (9th)
regularly assist in my community whenever asked

Work experience:
Public library- aid (Sept 2007-Nov 2008)
Tutor at local school (Dec 2008- present)
Massachusetts General Hospital intern-Research assistant (summer intern 2009)
Research water quality in community- (September 2009-present)

Recommendations:
Teacher 1: Praises me.. Im close with her (AP SCIENCE TEACHER)
Teacher 2: Really good
Guidance Counselor:Excellent

How do I stand out:
-Taking two math courses senior year so Im totally prepared=160 minutes of math (first in my school's history)
-IEP
-raised by single parent who is disabled
-low income
-once was homeless
-selected to study AP Biology labs after school at Harvard Medical School

'rentof2

Chance threads are pretty speculative, but have you considered applying to some SAT-optional schools?

ilovemycoffee

All the SAT optional schools do not catch my eye. I also have not seen a SAT optional school that is really strong... I like being in a competitive atmosphere

wtidad

ilovemycoffee, you need to be realistic. You will not get into Amherst with scores like that. Look at their Common Data Set and other published admission statistics https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/8...0122%20SSR.pdf
and you will see that the chance of admission with numbers like those approaches 0%
There are several excellent LACs, very similar to Amherst, with SAT-optional policies. These include Bowdoin, Bates, Middlebury, and Hamilton. Those are all top-tier, competitive schools. But you need to accept the fact that for admission at Amherst, unless your SAT scores were to increase remarkably, you are not competitive.

poetgrl

You should pm shawbridge. He knows a lot about this subject.

shawbridge

I love my coffee too. I'm just having my caffe latte.

I do know a fair bit about dealing with dyslexia and about having a son applying to college with dyslexia. He is going to Amherst and so far the administration has been as supportive as they promised -- no complaints.

Test scores are a real issue. He was able to raise his standardized test scores from mid-40's percentile without accommodations in middle school to 98th percentile with accommodations when he took the SSATs to 99+ percentile (on every sub-test) when he applied to college. [I was amazed that they improved that much, but he knew that he needed to deliver on standardized tests to get in to colleges that he wanted to go to]. For him, the accommodations make a huge difference. Do you have appropriate accommodations?

Grades seem less of an issue. Yours look pretty good.

I don't know how Amherst would look at much lower scores, but I would guess that if they were too low, an applicant would not be seriously considered. But, let me be clear that I really don't know anything about how Amherst (or any other school) really uses SAT scores when combined with their knowledge of an applicants LD's. It is such a highly competitive arena out there. I would guess that they could find another kid with LD's who had higher scores. Who knows?

Because my son did not take a foreign language and because he had an unusual high school set-up (partial homeschooling designed to help him learn to read and write better), his application disclosed his learning disabilities. I suspect that a couple of schools rejected him because they were concerned that even with terrific grades and SATs, he couldn't handle the work intensity, and they may very well have been correct in doing so as they had relatively strenuous distribution requirements.

Good luck. Incidentally, my son has a friend at Bowdoin who is very happy there (and they apparently have the best food of any college various kids have come across).