Chance a VERY DESPERATE BOY for Top Colleges [3.98 GPA, 3/660 rank, 1480 SAT, industrial engineering or math, music minor]

Chance Me / Match Me
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Demographics - Asian
US domestic - US citizen
State/Location of residency: South region of USA
Type of high school (or current college for transfers): Public
Other special factors: (first generation to college, legacy, recruitable athlete, etc.) N/A

Family income 100k+ but less than 200k

Intended Major(s)

Industrial Engineering but Math and Music minor for almost every T20

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores
GPA rank: 3 out of 660 ish (UW: 3.98/4.0, W: 4.78/5.0)
Took 25 APs 4s and 5s on 20 AP exams and 3s on 5 exams
SAT: 800 math and 680 reading (I didnt submit to most t20 schools cuz school average is kinda high.

List your HS coursework
25 AP Classes (basically all of them), 8 Dual enrollments(including Diff Eq, Calc 3, etc), and 12 honor courses

Awards and Activities
4 time AIME qual: 3 time with distinction and 1 time with DHR (10 points from USAMO cutoff) AMC: 140+ AIME: 10+ (Highest scores but diff years)
Top Scholar STEM Award in State
Allstate Orchestra 3 years
International Music Competition Placement
Concerto Competition Finalist
Solo on Carnegie Hall and famous stages across US
Violin Section leader for various orchestra
USACO Gold
Princeton Book Award

I submitted art supplements for the colleges that allowed me to submit.

(Include leadership, summer activities, competitions, volunteering, and work experience)
Solo Violinists and Orchestra
President of Math Club
Help write a Prep Book
Went to some music summer camp, not that prestigious
130 hours tutoring math at my local high school
Exploring art museums and performing card tricks(I performed for various crowds)
Internship at my local university

Essays/LORs/Other
(Optionally, guess how strong these are and include any other relevant information or circumstances.)

Essays and supps: imo not outstanding but clear and gets to the point. 6-7/10
Stats teacher: 9.5/10 (One of the best students he had and we talked a lot)
Calc Teacher: 9/10 (Prolly really good)
Lang teacher 7/10 (I got a 3 on the ap lang exam but the teacher was nice, but i got good grades and was involved in the class)
Orchestra Teacher: 10/10 (I was one of the best students he ever seen)

Schools
(List of colleges by your initial chance estimate; designate if applying ED/EA/RD; if unsure, leave them unclassified)

Schools(Just shotgunning): I didn’t apply to any safeties :frowning:

Princeton REA Deferred
UMich Engineering Deferred
UNC Waitlisted
Johns Hopkins
Cornell
Brown
Caltech
MIT
UCs (Berkeley, LA, San Diego)
UPenn
UChicago
Northwestern
Yale
CMU
Emory
Rice
Stanford

Please let me know what colleges I will get in!!!

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Please apply to some safeties now! Did you apply to your state flagship? Also, the schools that you applied to mainly DO NOT give merit aid. Given your family income - there is a very strong chance if you do get in - it could be financially a huge burden. Please look for some schools that will give merit aid. Given that you have applied test optional - this can be a detriment to your acceptance at these schools (which are all highly rejective even with a top SAT score). Please apply to at least 2-3 safeties TODAY! School ranking does not mean as much as it has in the past, and certainly not enough to put all your eggs in the T20 basket!

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NONE? You need to read this thread I’m going to link. It’s not too late to find a sure thing…unless you are OK with a gap year if needed.

The student in this thread was a tippy top student. He did land on his feet after a gap year. But he got accepted no place as a HS senior. His senior year was…awful.

Read this whole thread…the whole thing. This was a tippy top student, and admissions have only become more competitive since.

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So what is the plan if things go south? With this list, I can definitely see you getting into a few schools, or I can see you getting into none. You are an excellent, competitive candidate for any school, but that gives no guarantees when it comes to schools with low acceptance rates, and some of the schools on your list have VERY low acceptance rates. Your lack of targets/safeties worries me.

Did you check that these will be affordable to you as an OOS student?

I wish you luck. I do think you have a good shot at a few acceptances here and hope you end up somewhere great. But I also hope you have a solid backup plan. Just in case.

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And read this one… because a number of your college require submission of test scores!

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Your default safety is starting at community college.

Did you check the net price calculator at each school?

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Why are you worried or desperate ? You have a great background.

You also have little idea how to build a list.

Your family income is great but that doesn’t say what they’re willing to spend on a school. What’s your budget ? And will any of these schools meet that budget ?

Secondly, why apply to schools without your major ?? Emory and UNC, for example.

So you picked a major where pedigree, short of a few schools, doesn’t matter and you’ve yet to bomb because you’ve not gotten all decisions. But you very well could strike out. But you may not. But why wait to find out ?

So list building 101. Ensure you have an affordable and assured admission.

Now many deadlines have passed but you have great IE Schools like Arizona and many more still taking apps. And guess what - at a school like that and I can name more - you won’t be close to the most accomplished. Sorry but it’s true.

My son was a MECHE but his job is manufacturing and mainly IE. He went to a lesser ranked SEC and yet works with kids from Michigan, Ga Tech, Case Western and more. They also have Akron, W Michigan, Buffalo, etc. he also interned elsewhere with Ga Tech kids and also LSU, Ole Miss, and Ms State. You got suckered into marketing as did I - he turned down a top engineering school for his lowly one and said rank is to sell magazines. He’s not wrong.

Heck you applied to schools that don’t even offer engineering.

So you are not desperate. You are simply and unnecessarily prestige hungry, to the point you’ll cause yourself a gap year or community college entry.

Step 1 - talk to your folks about your budget. You can be as low as $18k a year or up to let’s say $90k.

Step 2 - there’s 120 ABET IE schools and surely some will be taking apps. And they’ll likely place you in a similar role as most of your list.

When people say admissions are unpredictable, they are not.

You are a case of user error but there is still time to be saved !!

Let me or us know if you want help.

.

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You have a chance at Rice. But really I agree with what others have said.

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Who crafted your list of colleges? Is there some reason for shot gunning…as you say.

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This is a very tough list and I’d suggest adding a safety or two or you risk being shut out. Your best chance of an acceptance would probably be one of the UC’s (but still a reach) since they are test blind, but they are going to be expensive as an OOS student ($75k+) and they don’t offer any financial aid to out of state students.

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Several things stand out in your post.

The first is that you are an exceptional student. You have clearly worked very hard in high school and done very well. You appear to be very well prepared to do well at a very good university.

The second thing that comes to mind is that I wonder whether you are in-state for UNC. If so, then I wonder whether your guidance counselor would consider it to be a safety. The latter seems very unlikely since you say that you were waitlisted there. UNC is a very good university and if you were accepted there in-state then you would know that you have a good university to attend in September. In this case having your other applications be reaches would be okay.

Otherwise… Unfortunately with this list it is not clear that you will get accepted to any university, nor whether it will be affordable.

I am worried about the “donut hole” issue. You have applied to multiple schools that are expensive and that have no merit based aid. You could end up spending something close to $400,000 over four years, which is tough given your family income. You might end up with a huge debt, and this really is unnecessary and something that you should try to avoid.

Looking at US News rankings, or any other rankings, is a bad way to decide which universities to apply to. One issue is that a university that is highly ranked overall is not necessarily good for your particular major. Also, just because someone working for a magazine thinks that a university is very good, even if they are in general correct, does not necessarily mean that it is a good fit for you. A university that is a good fit for you and a university that is a good fit for me are two entirely different things.

And as others have said this is a HUGE mistake.

You need to get your application into at least one and preferably two safeties immediately. You should at a minimum get applications in to an in-state public university right now. Do it today or tomorrow. I am hoping that the application deadline for your in-state public flagship has not passed already.

Otherwise start thinking about what you intend to do during a gap year.

I think that there is a significantly better than 50/50 chance that you will be accepted somewhere. You might for example get accepted to UC San Diego, and be able to get an education that is just as good as your in-state public university at only twice the price (or maybe a bit more than twice the price).

To be fair, you are competitive at every university that you have applied to. One problem is that so are the vast majority of other applicants, and you have applied to a lot of schools that have very low acceptance rates.

You have also applied to a few schools that are not known for engineering. I am wondering to what extent some of these schools might be better for industrial engineering than they are for engineering in general.

Certainly some of the schools that you have applied to are very good for math and for industrial engineering. Stanford and MIT are excellent for example if you get in and if you can afford one of them. These are two very big “if”'s.

My recommendation is that you get an application in to your in-state flagship today or tomorrow, and then let us know. Our various cardiologists will be much happier.

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Since you are applying for engineering, I would have seriously considered submitting your perfect math SAT score, despite the total being below the average of most of these schools. Not applying to any safeties hints of some hubris - hopefully that did not make its way into the essays or the LOR’s.

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Look at Villanova and Boston College. Two elite schools but maybe a slight click down in acceptance rates from these others.

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The application deadline has passed for both these schools.

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But when?? This student is a senior. BC’s deadline was January 2nd; Villanova’s was January 15th.

OP, you might check this thread from 2022: What colleges are still accepting applications?

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I did test optional to all the colleges that offered test optional

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Yeah I should. I am applying to some safeties right now.

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Thanks for your comments. I will submit my application to in-state school asap.

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Yeah you are right. I will apply to some safeties ASAP. I have no idea what I’m doing but I just do my best. Thanks for your suggestions!

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Any chance you can meet with your school counselor tomorrow…get a couple of ideas that might work? It sounds like you would benefit from this guidance.

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