**Decision: Rejected **
Objective:
SAT I (breakdown): 1520 (Math 800, R&W 720, Essay 17) (One sitting)
ACT (breakdown): Didn’t take
SAT II: 780 Math II, 710 & 760 Chem (I took it again in November so I had to report both)
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): My school doesn’t report GPA, we do percentage so my average was 88% ish
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): My school doesn’t report rank but my GPA wasn’t that great so I’m guessing it was pretty low
AP (place score in parenthesis): Stats, Calc AB, Chem all 4
IB (place score in parenthesis):
Senior Year Course Load: AP Lang, AP Calc BC, AP Psych, AP Bio, AP Micro and Macro
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): Australian Math Competition Distinction winner for two years, The Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (Violin) – Grade 5 level
Subjective:
Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): I received a patent for an invention I made, First violinist in school orchestra for 6 years, member of Intercultural Council, Academic Council for 2 years, Varsity Field Hockey team, Link Leader
Job/Work Experience: Intern at a non-profit organization that financially supports cancer patients, Journalist at a local student-run journal group
Volunteer/Community service: I have like 70 hours ish
Summer Activities:
Essays (rating 1-10, details): 9/10 for Common App essay; I actually put in a lot of effort and a lot of people helped me edit it and 9/10 for Supplement too; I worked on both of them for over a month
Recommendations (rating 1-10, details):
Teacher Rec #1: 9/10 My junior and senior yr Bio teacher; she seems to like me a lot
Teacher Rec #2: 9/10 My junior year English teacher she liked me a lot too but we weren’t that close; I just needed another rec and it was really last minute
Counselor Rec: 8/10 I don’t think my counselor likes me since I was really indecisive of my college list and bothered her a lot but I think she wrote pretty good rec letters for all of her students for the sake of getting into uni ngl
Additional Rec:
Interview: It was really casual, and the lady seemed really nice we didn’t talk that much about Cornell at the end of the day
Other
Applied for Financial Aid?: No
Intended Major and College: Chemistry and Chemical Biology in CAS
State (if domestic applicant):
Country (if international applicant): Canada, but I’m a US citizen
School Type: Top 5 private school in Canada
Ethnicity: Asian
Gender: Female
Income Bracket: –
Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): None
Reflection
Strengths: Standardized test scores, pretty good essays
Weaknesses: GRADES GRADES GRADES I didn’t try that hard in school lol
Why you think you were accepted/deferred/rejected: I don’t think I stood out that much from the other applicants and my school grades weren’t good at all
Where else were you accepted/deferred/rejected:
General Comments: Honestly I thought I had a pretty good chance since I had good standardized test scores and put a lot of work into my essays but I don’t think my rec letters weren’t that outstanding and my grades were below average. Little bummed out that I got straight up rejected but hopefully it’s a good lesson and hope this helps future prospective students! And to everyone who got accepted, have fun at Cornell 