dreamlittle

What do you think my chances are at: Pomona, Brown, Yale, Stanford, Tufts (legacy), Amherst, Haverford, etc? I'm thinking of a major in creative writing.

(I'm Cuban-American, for what it's worth.)

Grades:
-GPA not calculated by school, A/A- average in all honors/AP classes
-no class rankings calculated either.
-Prep school, 22nd in nation according to Worth.com rankings, highly challenging

Scores:

SAT: 2220, will retake October, WILL improve. (780 CR, 760 W, 680 Math BUT SEE BELOW*)

SAT II's:
-770 Spanish
-770 US Hist
-790 Lit
-*800 Math II (what the hellskies? I suck at math!)

APs (school doesn't offer a ton):
-English Lit: 5
-Spanish Lang: 5
-US Hist: 5

EC's- school keeps us until 6 pm every day, mind you:

- Co-founder, LD debate team, 3 yrs: now ranked 1st in state (VA). Made it to elimination rounds at several National tournaments including Princeton and Hen Hud. 8th in state individual debater. Takes TONS of time; I was accepted into/attended Yale's Ivy Scholars summer debate program and the team went to 7 national tournaments on top of junior yr courseload. All started by a friend and me!

- School lit mag, 4 yrs: now editor-in-chief

- Senior tutor in school writing center, invitation-only, 3hrs (ish)/week

- Tutor, 3 yrs: help with homework with "at-risk" kids from low-income families weekly, 3 hrs/week

- Student Conservation Association crewmember: 2 summers for a month each, get to live outside for FREE in the backcountry in exchange for trailwork and park maintenance. More of a treat than a college booster.

- Track, 4yrs, capitain: Hurdler! 3rd and 5th in state in various events, 3rd in league for a couple seasons. Nowhere near D1 material, but coaches from amazing LACs like Haverford and Amherst (and hopefully Pomona soon!) have been responsive enough to write handwritten letters, etc.

- NAIS 20/20 Project Coordinator, 2yrs: collaborated to write a report for an annual NAIS convention to end poverty and other world problems.

- Teen Court, 2 yrs, juror. quit.
...So, what you think?

dreamlittle

(And I'm basically fluent in Spanish.. heard it from birth, have spent months in Spain over the course of high school, etc)

ava.k

Pomona slight reach
Brown reach
Yale super reach
Stanford reach
Tufts (legacy) slight reach
Amherst match
Haverford no idea

You have good standardized testing scores and ECs. I think it'll depend on your essays..

dreamlittle

You think Amherst is a match but Pomona a reach? How come? Ha, I would have thought it'd be the other way.

Rferns

To tell you the truth I wouldn't retake SAT. The fact that you're a URM with substantially higher stats than most other accepted Latin American/Hispanic applicants from this year, I would say you have about a 60-70% chance at all those schools including Yale etc. If you want to see for yourself go to mychances.net and look at the applicant profiles for your colleges. The only real concern I have with you is EC's, but race will be an amazing hook.

Rferns

Actually scratch the part about not retaking. The order of your scores confused me. If you get math to 700+ you're golden. Good luck.

cosine45

dreamlittle: Good GPA, Good SAT, Good EC's, URM

Pomona - Match
Brown - Low Reach
Yale - Reach
Stanford - Reach
Tufts (legacy) - Low Match/Safety
Amherst - Match
Haverford - Safety

My chances are quite accurate.

dreamlittle

God, you think my chances are really that good? I've got such a pessimistic outlook on this whole thing.

Any other opinions?

cosine45

You're well rounded plus you're an URM(an amazing hook). Pretty good combination.

radionowhere

youre a great applicant! ivies are reaches for everybody. you should add another safety, just because small schools like haverford and tufts are just too small to be safeties for sure.

dreamlittle

anybody else? pleeease?

Hunt

Relax. You're going to do very well.