<p>SO I’m an upcoming Junior and my dream school is Carleton College. Part of this is wondering if I can get in and part is what I should work on and be sure to do my junior/senior years.</p>
<p>-GPA 3.8
-invited to be in National honor Society
-5 years being a 4th chair clarinet
-7 years of softball
-youth service member (volunteering club)
-hospital volunteer
-yearbook comittee (soon to be editor)
-Medical Exploring Post/Shadow program
-I’ve taken every AP class offered at my school
-summer job (next year I’ll be a staff lead)
-one act play director
-haven’t taken the act or sat yet, what scores should I be aiming for??</p>
<p>I play on applying EDI, but would FA need hurt my chances?
Also, woul it help if I was a first generation college student and a female? </p>
<p>Keep up the good work (and the grades), and study for the act/sat. Don’t focus on a score number at this point, just on doing well. First gen college student should help. I don’t have much insight on FA hurting your chances for EDI, but I would think it’s not a big issue.</p>
<p>^Agreed. Where are you from? Unless you’re an international applicant, Carleton is need-blind, so FA won’t affect your chances. First gen helps; being female actually hurts chances a tiny bit because Carleton gets more female applicants than male ones (but I wouldn’t lose sleep over it–because it really is only a tiny bit). By all means apply ED if you can.</p>
<p>Really? Every time I’ve heard it mentioned, the consensus seems to have been that Carleton is need-blind for domestic students, but not international ones. According to the link, “so far, fewer than ten percent of any incoming class has been admitted on a need-sensitive basis.” With international students making up about 9% of each class, it sounds like that could still be the case. But to be sure, the best approach would be asking admissions directly.</p>
<p>I got a 2200 on my SAT1 and that was what I was shooting for with Carleton as my first choice (I’m female and need financial aid, too). Would people agree with me that 2200ish seems like a pretty safe score for ED?</p>
<p>powell: I got a 32 on my ACT and got in (incoming freshman), and that’s a little below 2200 converted I think. Scores are not scrutinized so much, it’s more of an indicator – if you’re above a certain level, you’ll be fine, and 2200 is definitely above that level. Carleton will look much closer at your essay, course load, and what you do with your free time.</p>
<p>Drought, can you elaborate? Should people like “Carleton” (bahahaha) or myself be very score-focused then in your opinion? Or should we just not feel “safe” if we have pretty good scores?</p>
Just to be clear, I have asked them directly. They are not need-blind.</p>
<p>But also to be clear, being need-sensitive is not a reason for anyone not to apply. All it means is that they consider need in some situations, usually as a kind of tie-breaker. It does not come close to meaning need = rejection, as some seem to think. It is still the case that if they like you enough they will admit you, and because they are a 100%-need school, will give you the aid you need (or at least they think you need) This includes international students.</p>
<p>Definitely keep up the good work in terms of the grades and scores! But keep in mind that high scores are not a guarantee of anything; you can check the old decision results threads where a number of people with very high scores were rejected/waitlisted, and people with scores below the median were accepted. It looks like it’s really the whole package that plays the role. :)</p>
<p>I’m an incoming sophomore, and I was wondering which direction my extracurriculars were going. I am currently holding an executive position in student government (as of 10th). I do community service though there and my guesstimate is 200 hours of service by the time I graduate, hopefully more though. I’m also in art/art club/will stick with art and take AP studio art, band/pep band, and quizbowl (will be president senior year (hopefully)). I doubt I’ll have time to be more involved in others because I’m pretty heavily involved in all of these, especially student gov. I’m a notoriously slow worker and I’m going to be extremely overwhelmed by my sophomore schedule/workload. My concern is that none of these are spectacular sounding on paper, plus I’m not in sports. Feedback?</p>
<p>Sorry for hogging your thread by the way, making threads is such an awkward task for me, heh.</p>
<p>MusingStudent–are you asking how you should concentrate your extracurriculars? If so, I suggest you worry less about what “sounds good” and more on where your passions lie. If you enjoy the extracurriculars you are involved in, stick with them and try to continue to grow and challenge yourself. I have heard admissions people say that “depth” is more important than “breadth”–in other words, choosing a few extracurriculars and really pursuing them to the best of your ability is more important than taking on too many of them.</p>
<p>Don’t worry about not being in sports. No one has the time/ability to do everything well.</p>
<p>goods: I wrote mediocre essays and spent most of my time playing video games when I wasn’t at school during high school, and I got in. I also got a 2300 on my SAT.</p>
<p>that’s just not the point…we’re talking about generalities here, carleton generally doesn’t care as much about test scores as they do about course load, grades, and fit.</p>
<p>Just to chime in here…Carleton is not need blind (at least for domestic students). The poster who said this is correct. As is the case at most top schools, a student who applies ED and doesn’t ask for FA has a slight edge</p>
<p>I think it’s very hard to predict what Carleton likes/dislikes, I get the feeling they admit a bunch of students on an academic basis and another bunch on a extracurricular basis. This is my experience anyway. My ACT score was 29, yet I had a pretty extensive amount of extracurriculars and decent essays too. I’m a rising sophomore.</p>
<p>Each year will be somewhat different as well, depending on the applicant pool. My #2 son was rejected from Carleton with a 33 ACT, substantial ECs, a older sibling enrolled at Carleton and solidly written essays. His GPA was a lacklustre 3.65. There is no magic safe criteria. Do your best but always have some back up plans in mind that will also make you happy and satisfied in your educational quests.</p>