Application questions, Nerves, and Other Universities to Consider?

Applying to College
1

Hello! This is my first actual post on CC. I’ve certainly done my fair share of stalking the forums this past year, but as it’s now college application time for me, I’ve decided that it’s time I officially join. At the moment, I’m planning on applying to Cornell CHE for nutritional sciences and public health. I have relatively strong test scores and GPA, but I’m definitely concerned about ECs, especially the lack of ECs in my future field of study. That, and I’m just really nervous about applying. I tend to babble (sorry), so I have included side notes and questions, but I’ll just repeat the main questions at the bottom if you don’t want to read through all of this, and extra info will just be around just in case.

Stats:
SAT: N/A
SAT II: N/A
ACT: 34 Composite, 35 Reading, 32 Math, 35 English, 35 Science
I’m wondering if it’s okay if I don’t take anything with the ACT. Michigan just changed their test of choice to the SAT, so my grade was the last year to take the mandated ACT. I don’t have any plans to take SAT tests, especially since CHE doesn’t require them, but I don’t know if that’s a negative thing.

Unweighted GPA: 4.0
Weighted GPA: Somewhere like 4.27 ?
Rank: I think I might be first, but definitely top 5%.
APs (6 so far): World History (5), U.S Government (5), APUSH (5), Calc AB (5), Lit (4), Studio Art: Drawing (3). My freshman year, they only offered 6 APs, and I believe they’re up to around 14 this year.
Senior Year Classes: (All AP) Lang, Spanish, Chemistry, Physics, Calculus 2 (dual enrollment), and Psych
Awards: Magnum Cum Laude (9,10,11), and then some kind of Spanish Excellence award Freshman year? I also won a local poetry contest and I had some of my poems featured in a nationally published poetry magazine, but that was pre-high school so I’m not sure if it’s something to include.

ECs:
Varsity Volleyball (9, 10, 11 (captain), 12 (captain)), Varsity Basketball (9, 10, 11 (captain), 12 (captain)), Drama Department (9,10,11, 12), Softball (10 years, three years being elected to the All-Star team and was district runner up), Piano/accompanied the choir (9 years), 3rd 90 Project (It’s an environmental science program) (10, 11),Sunday School Teacher at my church (9, 10, 11, 12), National Honors Society (10, 11, 12) (President), Helped coach JV volleyball (11), Organized and taught a summer art camp for middle school (11), Health and Nutrition Club (10),
Job/Work Experience: Worked for a bridal shop (9), Jimmy Johns (11,12), and I’m hoping to intern with a Holistic Health place this summer as well
Summer Activities: Work, Sports Camps, Personal fitness reading, 2 week study abroad in Spain
Essays: Meh, unfinished.
Recs: Should hopefully be pretty solid. The only thing I’m worried about is I don’t even know who the college counselor is at my school. I think it’s this one woman. She doesn’t know me very personally but we’ve talked college and schedules before, which is more than most at my school I think?

Financial Aid: Definitely (potential reason not to apply ED? Did the cost calculator and that was great, but I don’t know if I’ll get the same amount, obviously. Anyone who has thoughts on this?)
Intended Major: Nutritional Sciences or Human Biology, Health and Society
State: Michigan
School Type: Medium-sized College Prep Charter School. We have about 75 in my class, more in lower grades. It’s ranked top 5 in Michigan, top 150 in the Nation
Ethnicity: Asian
Sex: Female
Income Bracket: 45,000ish
Hooks: Personal story about nutrition and society (I was an extremely chubby child pre-high school athletics)

Strengths: I’d say class load relative to what’s offered at my school (class conflicts make it hard to get a good schedule), Dedication to ECs
Weaknesses: Lack of degree-focused ECs, Lack of other volunteering events, potentially lack of SAT tests, ACT math score (CHE really likes Math/science…)

So to recap:

*Should I take the SAT/SAT II?/Will having only the ACT/APs make my application look worse?

  • If something occurred pre-high school but helps to round out my application, is it something I should include?
  • Is it going to be a negative thing that I don’t have more ECs in the nutritional field (unless athletics count maybe?)
  • ED and financial aid? Definitely a bad idea? I heard from an admissions office at Cornell that ED can help, just because if person A applies ED and person B applies RD and they’re almost the same, then person B might not get accepted because person A was already accepted.

Other Universities I’m looking at:
Syracuse, Purdue, Michigan State (If anyone has any recommendations for a really good nutrition/public health program, I’d love to look into it! Ivies/Ivy equivalents don’t seem to have much at the undergrad level, unless I’ve overlooked it. Also, many of the listing sites will put universities that have something slightly similar but not quite). I’ve considered UC Berkeley, but I’m not sure I want to go as far away as California.

Thank you so much for reading this!

2
  1. If you are satisfied with your ACT, then the SAT is not needed. Reputable schools accept either.
  2. Something that occurred pre-high school is generally not included. You can work it into an essay, along the lines of "ever since I did x in 8th grade, I’ve been planning to study y at college.’ You get the idea.
  3. No one expects you to have ECs in the nutritional field - and yes, attention to diet as an athlete counts if you want to talk about it in an essay
  4. If you apply ED, you can always turn down the offer if the financial aid isn’t sufficient. However, by applying ED, you do give up the ability to negotiate your financial aid package - which is usually done by presenting a better off from a comparable school. If you apply ED, you have no leverage. However, it depends on how cost sensitive you actually are as to whether it’s worth it.
  5. No, most top schools do not offer majors Nutrition or public health, although they certainly have opportunities to get more focus in those areas - specific courses, programs, research, etc…I wouldn’t rule them out on that basis. You can always do a graduate program (in fact, you will probably need to do graduate work) in those areas to be attractive to employers.
3

Thanks so much for such a detailed response! I definitely don’t want to rule any potential schools out, but when I met with the admissions office at Syracuse, I was told that for my particular field, I would need to be a registered dietician, and thus attend a university with an accredited program. HYP/Columbia all have masters in that area, but nothing undergrad that would come with accreditation.

As for the SAT subject tests, there are a couple of schools that “recommend” submitting them. Should I look into taking some of the tests in case I choose to apply to those schools? One of the that comes to mind is UC Berkeley.

Also, I have decided to wait for RD, mostly because of the financial aspects. My mother has really been pushing me to do that and to compare financial aid packages because even though she won’t come outright and say it, I know there’s very little money saved for college. Also, due to the way Cornell does their FA, my dad is factored in, despite the fact he’s been absent since the divorce. Plus, my mother is getting married next summer, and obviously that factors in, but it’s a factor that I won’t know the FA consequences of until sophomore year. If anyone’s had any experience with either circumstance and FA, I’d love to hear how it turned out.

4

Check with Berkeley about whether they recommend subject tests with the ACT s/ Writing. It used to be that if you did the ACT w/ Writing you didn’t need subject tests. But UCB’s web-site is unclear on this point. An email to admissions should get you clarification and save you the trouble of studying for/sitting for tests you don’t actually need. (Or perhaps if you post on the forum for that school on CC, someone can give you the answer.)

5

Although UC Berkeley has a fabulous program, as an out of state student your costs would make attending unrealistic, since the only aid you would qualify for would be Federal, that’s with or without your non-custodial parent information.

Have you looked at other accredited programs if you’re looking for undergrad and dietetics?
http://www.nutritioned.org/registered-dietitian-schools.html

6

@hop oh wow, okay. Thanks for the heads up now! I’ve been looking over a similar list, although yours seems much more comprehensive and from a more reliable source.