Semi-Ivy Leagues... do I have a good chance?

Domnu · 07-30-2007, 08:25 PM

What would you say my chances of getting into the following colleges are?

- Princeton
- CalTech
- Stanford
- Duke
- Georgia Tech
- MIT

Here are my credentials:

- Rank: 9th... top 2% in class
- SAT Math: 800, Critical Reading: 710, Writing: 760
- Honors Student from 9th - 12th grade (90+ GPA... 100.74, to be exact)
- Principal's List - 9th - 12th grade

Other stuff:

- President of Math Team
- Treasurer of School Beta Club
- President of Physics Club (and founder)
- Ranked top 15 in Georgia in Mathematics; ARML participant
- Ranked 2nd in National Beta Convention (Mathematics)
- 8th place in FBLA National Leadership Conference (Java)
- Placed in over 10 local mathematics competitions (including Georgia Tech Math Competition, where I won a $750 scholarship to Tech)
- FBLA: > 3rd in Business Math in State (9th), 2nd in Business Math in State (10th), 1st in Java Programming in state (11th), 1st in Business Calculations in district (11th), 6th in Business Calculations in state (11th)
- National Honor Society member
- Over 40 hours for Beta Club Service
- Internship at Merial Limited... built a local website

Music:

- Piano : 10 years (participated in many local competitions, achieved superior rating in festivals for 8 years)
- Indian Carnatic Violin : 7 years (played in numerous concerts)

APs:

5's - World History, Statistics, Physics B, Computer Science A, Calculus BC
4's - Language and Composition

Math II: 800
Physics: 800

AMC: 124.5
AIME: 7

This year, I was 2.5 points away from the USAMO.

Also, here are the courses I've taken so far (High school):

9th, 10th Honors Language Arts, AP Language and Composition
Honors Biology
Honors Chemistry
AP Physics
French 2 (Honors isn't possible)
Honors French 3, 4
Honors Algebra
Honors Geometry
Honors Algebra II
Honors Precalculus
AP Calculus
IT Foundations
Political Science
Health
AP World History
AP Statistics
AP Computer Science A

Science Olympiad:

10th grade: 1st place regional - Experimental Design
2nd place regional - Compute This
3rd place regional - Remote Sensing
2nd place state - Compute This
2nd place state - Fermi Questions
11th grade: 1st place state - Fermi Questions

UCLAri · 07-30-2007, 08:35 PM

Princeton...is part of the Ivy League...

Oh, and you're in good shape for all of them.

ses · 07-30-2007, 08:56 PM

The good news is that everything is a high match/low reach instead of a huge reach.

But Stanford, Princeton, and MIT are still reaches.

UCLAri · 07-30-2007, 08:58 PM

Actually, I'd say everything is a match, if you consider match to just be the median admit. The OP is clearly in the median range for every school on the list.

collegekid100 · 07-30-2007, 09:24 PM

But the average applicant with median scores is not accepted at top private colleges. Not even close. That formula may work with publics, I'm not sure.

UCLAri · 07-30-2007, 09:40 PM

That doesn't mean that someone isn't a "match."

A "match" shouldn't mean anything other than "median admit." Otherwise, it's a silly formula that really means little. Especially when we're trying to deal with probabilities.

Domnu · 07-30-2007, 10:00 PM

I'm sorry, but what's OP and what formula are you talking about?

collegekid100 · 07-30-2007, 10:04 PM

OP is you, the Original Poster and the formula is that a match is a school where you fall into their 50% numbers. That is the case at some state schools, maybe most, but is NOT true of top c20 colleges where they could fill several classes each year with kids with perfect stats.

Next yoear will be the hardest year in history to get into a top American college. Ivy schools will turn down the vast majority of qualified applicants.

A 710 SAT score will put an applicant out way sooner that it would have even 5 years ago.

For an ivy I would say a match is a val with 2300 plus and a national level talent. Of course there are athletes, urms and others who will be matches IMO.

frutiaspice · 07-30-2007, 10:05 PM

Good chance at all.

UCLAri · 07-30-2007, 10:21 PM

collegekid100,

Even Harvard has a median admit. And that is not a 2300 SAT...yet.

Harvard
Top 10% of high school students: 95%

SAT score (25/75 percentile): 2080-2370

ACT score (25/75 percentile): 31-34

collegekid100 · 07-30-2007, 10:47 PM

OK UCLA, iof you are to believe the numbers in the WSJ, something like 60% of the class has a hook. That would leave the match point darn high.

cellardweller · 07-30-2007, 10:48 PM

A match should be a school where you have at least a 50/50 chance of admission. SAT stats at the median of admits at MIT or Princeton would give a candidate no greater than a 15-20 % chance of admission. You need to be well over the 75th percentile to have a 50/50 chance. Even a perfect score at MIT is not a 50/50 chance.

Asian male, strong in math with music as an EC ... unfortunately a very common profile. Your score of 7 on the AIME is still considered excellent. Again, there are now 500 USAMO qualifiers, so the competiton is ferocious.

The top schools will want to see something that makes you stand out. MIT specifically looks for creative types with a passion beyond academics. You don't have to have filed a patent but if you wrote your own music or worked on some insanely difficult project (even if you failed) make sure to mention it. It shows that you are not just a drone.

Physics08 · 07-30-2007, 11:18 PM

Quote:

Actually, I'd say everything is a match, if you consider match to just be the median admit. The OP is clearly in the median range for every school on the list.

Absolutely not. George Tech is probably a match but Princeton, Caltech, MIT, Duke and Stanford are some of the most competitive schools in the nation filled with applicants who are in the median range for test scores. Literally, thousands of applicants have the numbers but realistically a small percentage of them will actually get admitted. To base admissions purely on numbers is really skimming the surface. Plus, UCLAri, you are kinda analyzing the data wrong. It's pointless to compare your SAT scores to the "median" admit and predict your chances. The students admitted to Harvard or any other top school are admitted because they can contribute to the academic and student life, not solely because they scored high on the SAT.

Physics08 · 07-30-2007, 11:22 PM

Oh Domnu:

Is the AMC 12 score with the new scoring or old scoring?

UCLAri · 07-31-2007, 12:44 AM

Guys, you're missing my point.

When we're dealing with probabilities, we don't always want to concern ourselves with "50/50" or the percent chance of admission. For one, that's almost impossible to figure out. What's more useful is to look at distributions of admits and attempt to see where someone fits within a standard deviations of the median.

And really, I'm well aware of how competitive Princeton, et. al. are. I've been around the block with this stuff, guys. I just believe in a different approach to "chancing" because I believe that the percentage chance approach is not as useful as comparing yourself to the distribution of admits.

Quote:

OK UCLA, iof you are to believe the numbers in the WSJ, something like 60% of the class has a hook. That would leave the match point darn high.

You're missing my point. I'm dealing with distributions. The OP clearly meets the profile of the average admit to every school on the list-- believe me, I've watched three years of this go on on this site, and I know what the average admits look like.