Binder20

Asian Male, Cali resident, High School Senior
GPA:3.83 UW-GPA, 4.37 Weighted
rank: 21/657 (top 4%)
ACT:33
SAT 2's : Bio M: 770 US History: 780 Math 2: 750
Major: Undecided, but i want to do a pre med track
Senior year schedule: AP Calc AB, English Lit AP, Enviro AP, Physics C AP, Stats AP, Gov/Econ AP
E.C's: National Honors Society, Prez of FBLA, Best Buddies, Peer Tutoring (CSF), Academic Decathlon
Service hrs: around 250 with 200 of them at the UCLA Santa Monica Medical Center

Essays-good or very good
Teacher Recs: Look good

colleges i hope you can chance me for:
Johns Hopkins
WUSTL
Brown
Columbia
Cornell
Dartmouth
Penn
Amherst
USC
UCLA
UC Berkeley
Emory (oxford too)
Vanderbilt
Georgetown
Stanford
UCSD
University of Chcago
Northwestern
Rice
Duke

I know this is a lot of schools, if you could chance me for any of them i would appreciate it and would be willing to rechance you.

Binder20

Bump 10 char

ab2013

Hi binder20!

I've noticed that CCers have been so cruel as to ignore your chance thread, so here I am to give you a nice full eval.

First, let's look at your GPA. A 3.83 UW GPA is pretty good (that's what I have too!), though it's not an eye-opener. But that's okay. You can make this up by having many APs, but I don't really know that because you only listed your senior year schedule. But I can tell you that balancing a total of 6 APs in one year is very impressive. I'll say that for the top privates the average number of APs is about 7 or 8, based on my experience chancing people for top privates. Some people have fewer APs, but some have more. It just depends.

Now moving on: Your ACT of 33 is great. It puts you in the Top 1% of the people in this country. Your SAT Subjects are also great and they don't warrant and retaking.

Your ECs are good, but they seem to be all over the place and have little to do with you career path, but then again you're an undeclared major, so it could mean you were just exploring, and that's okay. You're not expected to know what you want to do as a HS senior.

Now, just a piece of advice: You have quite a few schools listed there. That's about 20 schools. You may be asking for too much, because keep in mind that good essays take a long time to write --- I personally spent 3 months on my Chicago essays. If you apply to too many schools, you'll be too stretched out and your essays will show that. Take the time with your essays, college admission officers like well-thought out essays, because it shows that you're actually interested in their school. Rushed essays are no good when it comes to college admissions.

Also, I noticed that all the schools you've listed are highly prestigious. Please don't apply to just these schools. You should consider a less selective backup, just in case everything goes wrong. And plus, you never know what that less selective school could offer you, especially in times like these. Both Michigan and Michigan State accepted me, but MSU offered me a $4,000 a year merit scholarship and an opportunity to do research with a prof and get paid. (But I don't plan on going, just giving an example)

Overall, you're a the average "good" student applying to these top schools. Just write really good essays, and have people critique them so that you can get some advice/opinion.

Chances
Safety match: UCSD
Match: WUSTL, USC, Emory, Vanderbilt, Georgetown, UCLA, UCB, NU, Rice
Slight reach: JHU, Amherst, Duke
Reach: Brown, Columbia, UPenn, Stanford

UChicago: Your stats are in line with their average, but keep in mind that your essay will probably be the defining factor in whether you're admitted or denied.

-ab2013

crunkk

ab2013...you say that for the average top tier privates the average APs is 7 or 8, do you mean that in one year, or all 4 years combined?

to binder:
Safety match: UCSD, Emory, Rice
Match: WUSTL, USC, Vanderbilt, UCLA, UCB, NU
Slight reach: JHU, Amherst, Duke, Georgetown
Reach: Brown, Columbia, UPenn, Stanford

ab2013

It's about the average for all 4 years, but this might be a bit high because it's based on what I've seen here on CC ... but everyone here on CC is quite a bit more competitive than what you see in the real applicant pool, so the real average might even be a bit lower.

crunkk

that makes me feel a bit better for taking 15 in all four years. i thought it was in one year, i was about to change my school choices lol