Accepted
Stats:[ul]
[]SAT: M: 800, W: 780, CR: 730
[]SAT II: Physics: 800, Bio M: 780, Bio E 770, Math II: 800, USH: 730
[]GPA: Weighted was around 4.4.
[]Rank: I was ranked 18/(~650) after my 1st semester senior year.
[li]Other Tests (AMC, AP, IB): 10th Grade AMC 10: 117 (Distinguished Honor Roll) AIME: 4 (lol)[/li]
[/ul]Subjective[ul]
[]Essays: I think my essays are what got me in. For my first, I talked about my summer experiences at the Ross Mathematics Camp doing PSets, Science Bowl, and how I got my teacher and classmates to check for Polyphagus Shot Hole Borers in trees. For my second, I also talked about how I like to spend my time working on Rube Goldberg Machines. For the remaining, I talked about how I saw myself at a particular house at Caltech and how my drawing skills would be valued at an engineering school like Caltech. Overall around a 9/10.
[]Teacher Recs: Biology Teacher - Very good relationship with her (10/10). English Teacher - Also a pretty good relationship (9/10).
[]Counselor Rec: Worked with her a lot on HOBY - a leadership seminar - so she knows me quite well (8/10).
[]Supplementary Material: I did send a EA Deferral Update to them even though I never applied as an early applicant. Still that letter basically told them how I really wanted to attend and some awards I’ve gotten recently.
[li]Hook(recruited athlete, legacy, Nobel Prize): Lol nothing much. [/li]
[/ul]Personal[ul]
[]Location: California - white suburban neighborhood
[]High School Type: Pretty underfunded but there is a magnet program within
[]Ethnicity: Asian
[]Gender: Male
[/ul]Other[list]
[]Extracurriculars: Started a club to tutor low income elementary school students in science (10th), Science Bowl (10th), HOBY Ambassador (10th), School on Wheels (9th), Art (7th), etc.
[]Awards: Bio Oly Semis, AIME Qualifier, NMSC Math (2nd) Physics (3rd), Science Bowl winning team this year, random AP awards, Earthwatch Ignite Fellowship Award, Brain Bee 3rd place, National Merit stuff, etc. Usually asian guy award crap
[*]Advice? Commiserations? Feel like bragging?: I think the main thing that future applicants should focus on is what they love to do. This has been repeated multiple times, over and over, but for good reason. I love biology and I love to teach so I decided pretty early on that I would commit myself to these. Granted, I did some things that weren’t so focused on a particular area. I experimented. I joined my school’s newspaper editorial team, did some speech and debate, etc. But at the end of the day, I found out what it is I truly loved to do and did them. Also, don’t get caught up on grades, scores, etc. I was worried for a very long time about the smallest details in my resume but so many people have somewhat similar objective stats that it’s not worth for college admission officers to care too much about them. TL;DR: Essays matter, Do what you love