4.0 small town chances for Brown, Pomona, Occidental

Chance Me / Match Me
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Demographics

  • US Citizen
  • Small town Washington state
  • Large public high school

Cost Constraints / Budget
Likely none (thank you Grandma)

Intended Major(s)
political studies, pre-law, policy, music minor

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 4.0
  • Weighted HS GPA:
  • ACT/SAT Scores: hasn’t taken yet but practice testing at 1300ish - studying!!

List your HS coursework

(Indicate advanced level, such as AP, IB, AICE, A-level, or college, courses as well as specifics in each subject)

  • English: AP Lit 1+ course at running start
  • Math: on track for calculus senior year
  • Science: AP bio (but didn’t test), 1 semester chem, planning on physics senior year
  • History and social studies: AP human geo, AP History (tested 5), AP comp gov senior year
  • Language other than English: Spanish 3
  • Visual or performing arts: Local symphony, first chair violin high school orchestra and local youth orchestra, chamber choir, jazz choir, jazz band (violin),
  • Other academic courses: junior year mostly through Running Start at local community college

College Coursework (Transfer Applicants)
(Include college courses taken while in high school if not included above.)

  • General education course work: Spanish, pre-calc, English
  • Major preparation course work:

Awards

Winner Young Musicians Concerto Competition

Extracurriculars
Theater and musical theater(leading roles in school and community productions), ski instructor, junior advisory committee to city council, organizing youth wellness club, DECA, Hi-tones (women’s a capella quartert)

Essays/LORs/Other
*(Optionally, guess how strong these are and include any other relevant information or circumstances.)
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Notes: interested in social justice, environment, liberal Christian, natural leader, wants to do good in the world, but not set on one career path yet. Dedicated violinist, wants to continue to pursue music and theater, but probably not as a career focus. Wants to be somewhere welcoming, friendly, supportive, and ideally warm!

Schools
*(List of colleges by your initial chance estimate; designate if applying ED/EA/RD; if unsure, leave them unclassified)

Brown
Columbia
Pomona
Occidental
Pitzer
Scripps
Whitman
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Writing on behalf of my daughter - she’s afraid she’s not compettive at even Pitzer and Oxy, but I think she is?

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Curious as to why only 2 1/2 years of science. This will hinder her chances at most of these schools. Most want at least three and ideally 4 years of science. As an example, here is a direct quote from Pomona’s admission page:

“We recommend students complete four to five academic courses each term of high school, with four years of English, natural science and mathematics. We recommend two of those science courses are lab science and that students interested in STEM majors complete calculus. Additionally, we recommend three years each of foreign language and social science. However, these are not admission requirements but recommendations for the best preparation for Pomona’s curriculum.”

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So please understand we are all good citizens giving our best thoughts but we are not the decision makers for the schools:

Thanks for writing in. I’m more in line with your daughter - but a few thoughts/questions:

  1. Why no test in AB bio? If you have a low SAT, you want a test.
  2. Why one and not two semesters of Chem or why only 2.5 years of science (how many lab)

So a few things can hurt:

  1. The SAT Test
  2. Only Spanish 3

It’s too early to know but based on what you wrote and you can apply anywhere, I’d say:

No to Brown - test required - if she gets over 1500, then it opens more. From what I’m reading, she will lack in language and science, unless I’m mis interpreting what you wrote.

No to Columbia - where 61% submitted a test and is still TO I believe which helps. They recommend four years of science and language; require three. Will you have three years of science?

No to Pomona - better odds but if a school admits under 10%.

If she gets her testing up, then 1 or 2 of 3 of Occidental, Pitzer and Scripps becomes realistic.

Scripps had 40% submit tests with a 1450 at the 25th percentile.

Pitzer is test free.

Occidental had 28% submit and a 1400.

I’d guess Oxy would be an in - but let’s call it a target. They money helps but if you apply for aid, they won’t know about grandma - and yes you should apply for aid.

I think Whitman is safe. Their acceptance rate looks low but that’s because they only let in 247 of 3259 international. The domestic rate is quite high.

So let’s talk about law school. Any plan for it needs to include another $300K for budget. Does it?

If not, you need to find less expensive schools.

So here’s the thing about law school - look at Harvard, more than 160 colleges are represented in under 600 students. UVA has 309 students from 131 schools.

Yale more than 200 law schools in it’s last 5 first year classes of about 1K total. Penn over 200 in its law school.

The point - it doesn’t matter if it’s Brown or Boise State, Columbia or Central Washington, Pomona or U Portland - you can get to top law schools from all. Your GPA, your LSAT (so you need to be a strong test taker), what you do in school and for top schools today, what you do after school because fewer are going right away - that’s what matters, not where you go.

The stats belie this.

So why grandma is paying for school, who is for law school - because today, kids can spend $100K on college or spend $20-50K and get the same result.

Now it’s hard to say at 17, yes they will go to law school but at the same time, you have to prep for the possibilities.

Whitman will actually give you a pre-read. They will tell you before you apply what type of aid you will get.

But there are tons of LACs - great LACs - and tons that give lots and lots of merit because the world is competitive, and they need butts in seat.

If you like Brown for the more open curriculum, there are LACs that might be similar but not have merit (like Brown) - Amherst, Hamilton, Vassar, Smith (some merit), Grinnell (some merit) and perennial favorite Kalamazoo - fantastic merit - and so many more that aren’t open (like most your list).

Political Science and Public Policy are different in some ways and less schools have public policy so if you see the curriculum of both and like Policy over Poli Sci, that might help direct your list.

And most will have a DC semester, either on their own or through American U, and you might want to check your school’s potential offerings as well.

Just some things to noodle on.

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Congrats to your daughter for what seems like a terrific high school career. The music and theater activities look excellent!

Regarding the chances of getting into the schools on her list, to be blunt, with an SAT score of 1300ish it’s not going to happen anywhere that doesn’t allow TO. So the other possible weaknesses (number of years of science, Spanish, etc.) aren’t really going to even come into play because the SAT will be determinative. If she raises her SAT by 200 points, then some of those schools could become options, and you’ll want to think more about the mentioned weaknesses.

That said, she has clearly had a very successful high school career, and she sounds like a really cool kid. There will be many, many amazing options for her - you just need to look a tier or so lower in the rankings (or get her SAT score up by at least 200 points or more). Good luck!

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Thanks, these are good things for us to think about! She actually will have 3.5 or 4 years science. She did intro to chem/physics freshman year and I believe her senior physics will be a full year. She may be able to get through Spanish 4 with community college credits. Her high school does a terrible job advising college bound kids (most don’t try for schools like this) and then her school switched from a block schedule to a regular schedule and then we’ve been trying to combine running start with regular high school and yeah it sounds like I’m making excuses!

Appreciate your thoughts on the costs of law school as well.

Wondering if we should be looking at some less selective schools?