Can a great application essay make up for some shortcomings in my application?

<p>@International95‌ i know its a pretty long shot…but stanford is my dream college…and i believe you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take…i’ll take that risk if only to know that I tried…also i’ll apply to cheaper public universities like UT Austin …i am not obsessed with the Ivy League,i just obsessed by stanford and mit…as are so many students around the world…on a scale of 1-10 how would you rate my chances for S?..and i know with my school marks I would most probably make it to nanyang,national university of singapore,or hku…but from what i’ve heard the good US universities provide much more to your life than just education…i doubt i would get that in the Asian universities…would a perfect score at sat and the subject tests greatly enhance my application?(i have two months to go,so who knows i might get lucky)…and thank you for your input.</p>