Can I get into my top school?

Chance Me / Match Me
1

I am posting because I would like an honest answer. When I ask the people I know, they tell me that I can but I am convinced it is because they feel they need to.

I will be applying to all of the ivies, CalTech, MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, and some safeties.

I have a 1560 SAT, 4.6 GPA (weighted), 780 Spanish Subject Test, 790 Math 2 Subject Test, 760 Bio Subject Test

I have taken AP: World History, Environmental Science, U.S. History, Language and Composition, and Psychology. I am currently taking AP: Calculous AB and BC, Literature and Composition, Biology, and US. Government and Politics.

I go to a very small Catholic High School in Salinas and there are not a lot of AP classes offered. I have taken all of them and have run out of AP and honors courses to take.

Extra:
I am the president of : Women in STEM club, Book Club, and Debate Club. I am in NHS and CSF. I hold a part-time job. I played volleyball for three years and have done musical theatre for 3 years, as well.

I am a minority student who was and is raised in poverty and my culture has affected my success. I wish to study math in college with a minor in politics/ business.

I have done the most with what I could, but because there weren’t a lot of options provided to me, I am worried about my chances.

2

UC GPA unweighted, capped weighted and fully weighted?
https://rogerhub.com/gpa-calculator-uc/

3

It sounds like money is a concern. You need to scrap the list because you’re not going to be able to afford any of these schools. All of these schools are either private or out of state. It’s fine to apply to a few, you might get lucky with a financial aid package.

The focus really should be scholarships, which you could easily get with your grades and SAT scores. You’ll need to apply school-by-school and your home state is a great place to start. A few great places are University of Alabama and University of Arizona. There’s also Baylor and TCU (full tuition scholarship).

4

Disagree with the above post in that many of the schools listed by the OP meet full need and may well be affordable. However they are all super competitive in terms of admission.

I do agree that the OP should seek out less competitive in state public’s and colleges that offer big merit scholarships.

5

Agree with @happy1 - the reaches are generally need blind and meet full need, but they’re still reaches. The type of student that has a shot at these reaches (and I do think OP does) can likely get very handsome merit elsewhere.

6

OP: This is a very well written and constructed post which started this thread–appears to be of near professional quality (other than the slight shown to the “ivies”).

Having hit all of the relevant points in your initial post in this thread suggests that your application will be very well focused on the key points needed to impress admissions officers.

7

@dzamora2020 Don’t worry about things you can’t control. Although you have a very good shot being a URM, limit the number of apps. Presuming Cal State and UC schools are included. Too many essays to write will cause time management difficulties. Make sure to proofread. Typos, spelling, and grammatical errors don’t help your cause. Are you a National Merit Semifinalist?

8

@dzamora2020 Can you? Your standardized test scores are certainly well in the range of kids accepted to those schools, if your unweighted GPA is also competitive, then you definitely “can” get accepted.

That being stated, the real question is “will you” be accepted? The answer to that is: nobody knows. Plenty of kids with top stats get rejected.

The best way to help your chances at this point is to write outstanding essays, and get extremely enthusiastic recommendations.

9

I think that you are competitive at any school, including the ones on your list. These are of course the most competitive schools in the US, and possibly in the world.

Usually I am concerned when someone is going to apply to “all the Ivy’s” because they are quite different from each other. However, as far as I know every school on your list is very good at math (I was a math major and have degrees from two of the schools on your list). With the exception of Berkeley for OOS students, they also meet full need, but for their definition of “need”.

Are you in-state in California? If not I would drop Berkeley because of its likely cost.

I also would think a bit regarding whether you are equally interested in all of the Ivy League schools, and at least focus on first getting in solid and well thought through applications for the ones that you are most interested in (for me this would probably have been Harvard, Princeton, Dartmouth, and Cornell, but of course what is a good fit for you and what is a good fit for me might be completely different).

And of course your safeties matter quite a bit. You cannot count on being accepted to any of the schools that you mentioned in the original post.

10

Any math/sci activities, beyond running a hs club?

Because WIS, book, debate, vball and musicals are nice ECs. But where are the math/science activities? How did you test your interest and skills and contribute, in stem ways?

That’s not just about what the hs offers. And, any comm service?

11

Here’s some inspiration from another Salinas student who got a full scholarship to Stanford last year:
https://www.thecalifornian.com/story/news/2018/06/26/salinas-teen-attend-stanford-free/734928002/