Chance an Indian-American [US citizen] business/economics kid for HYPSM [3.85 GPA, 1600 SAT, 36 ACT]

Chance Me / Match Me
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Chance an Indian business/economics kid for HYPSM

Demographics: indian male, , Top 3 private school in very competitive region, no hooks

Intended major(s): business/economics

Academics:

  • GPA: 3.85 unweighted (probably the weakest part of app), school doesn’t weight GPA (two Bs in high school, not really an upward trend throughout, one of the Bs was in AP Chem 11th grade) - Also did a summer program at a t10 for econ and got a A-

  • Class rank: no rank, but def not at the top of the class

  • Standardized Testing: 1600 SAT - 36 ACT (36 on all subsections also, including optional science section) - planning on submitting both tests everywhere

  • AP Scores: got all 5s and one 4.

  • Coursework: Max course rigor, school caps APs to 4 per year for junior and senior year, 0 for underclassmen. Senior year course load - Calc BC, Linear Algebra, APES, AP European History, AP Latin

  • Awards:

    • Wrote and won a >$50,000 national grant for a tech startup that I am working for as the Executive Director of Research and Financial Strategy

    • >$8K GRANT funding for npo I cofounded and mentorship earned from local VC pitch comp; org. featured on local Morning News

    • PVSA Silver (11th grade)

    • AP Scholar

    • NMSQT commended

  • LORs: I believe they are great (two from teachers with good relations and one from Indiana Kelley prof. and one from CEO of tech/consulting firm)

Extracurriculars:
1. Director of Research & Financial Strategy of Multimillion Dollar Tech/Consulting Firm: Secured $50k National grant; Developed time-series model; Increased budgeting 15%; Led strategic forecasting and connected clients to employees. was an intern for this company from middle school up until 10th grade, and then assumed a smaller scale managing role, and then was able to secure youngest executive role. Easily my most time-consuming EC, and I conduct significant research for this company, which resulted in a 50-page financial strategy report analyzing potential M&A targets in the ~$4 million revenue range and presented it to the executive committee

2. Co-Founder & Vice President of [501(c)(3)] with major impact - Delivered 1K+ resources to via donation partners; secured >$8K funding through Shark tank style pitch comp and built continuation roadmap

3. Researcher & Author with local university, - Analyzed student performance incentives; applied regression & econometrics techniques on natl. public datasets; presented paper to global repository.

4. Founder & Owner, Custom Business - Built hybrid merch business serving over 100 customers and having charitable business model

5. President, Investment Committee - Manage $200K+ student investment portfolio; produce monthly reports for large scale companies

6. Intern @ Indiana Kelley School of Business - Analyzed financial research and explored applications in business decisions

7. Basketball, Captain - Led team to regional conf. title and competed in national showcases.

8. Intern for School’s Development office - Raised over $15K+ for athletics expansion project and met with board chairs and staff to further strategize advancement.

9. Fundraiser and service leader - 200+ hours for established NPO; led 60 volunteers in campaigns; raised $4K+ for shelter construction in India

10. Basketball, Team Leader - 4-year Varsity starter; team-leader in points;

Schools:

Reaches:

  • Harvard

  • Princeton

  • Yale

  • Northwestern

  • Columbia

  • Cornell Dyson

  • Stanford

  • Brown

  • UPenn Wharton

  • Duke

  • Dartmouth

Targets:

  • UMiami

  • University of Wisconsin-Madison

  • UIUC

  • UC Irvine

Safeties:

  • Indiana University

  • ASU

  • SMU

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Are you a U.S. citizen or are you an Indian citizen ?

Have you talked to your private school counselor to see where kids with your stats end up ?

What is your budget ?

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US citizen, kids with my stats usually end up at t20s, he said i have a fairly decent shot at all my schools, its just my school has a lot of grade inflation and many kids have 4.0s with easier courses, so the grade distribution is a little skewed. It’s a bit rare for under a 3.9 to go to a top school though, but it has been done, especially with test scores around my range.

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Do you have cost constraints? If so, have you and your parents run the net price calculator on each college of interest?

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Yes, there’s a lot of grade inflation in society.

Do you have a budget? You need to run the NPCs unless your parents are willing to pay near $400K a year.

Assuming good essays and LORs, I would agree - but I would figure out what I want to study.

What in business? Business isn’t econ…I’m assume finance or IB?

I agree your reaches are that - but no reason why you wouldn’t get into one or more?

Targets - I agree. Well UCI is unknown because they won’t see the test.

Safeties - I agree.

I think your categorization is fine - and IU, ASU, and SMU are all great.

If IB is on your list, I assume you know about ASU IBIS?

I don’t know IB is - just wondering.

As long as you’re ok with your safeties and targets (which at least the first three, I’m guessing you’d get into 2-3), then your list is great.

Just throwing out another - you might look at Babson given your background - it too is an IB feeder.

I think your GPA is fine - so you got a few Bs…no big deal.

The biggest concerns would be budget - if there is one - and the amount of reaches. It’s fine - but you’re talking about a lot of essays…I mean, a lot of essays to write - so you might want to cull all but a few.

Either way, you’re in good shape.

Best of luck.

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Yeah thanks for your feedback. We did run the net price calculator on all the colleges and cost is not really an issue for us at this time, and yes I agree that it’s a lot of essays, but I think it might be worth it considering I don’t really want to lose my chance at one of the schools just because it’s an extra few essays.

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also yes, IB is definitely the main consideration for the business schools, trying to go down the finance route

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That’s the only thing - Finance, which you can study at some, isn’t Econ, etc. So which do you want to study? Obviously, many of the top don’t have finance - but you will be studying four years so you want to study something you’d enjoy more.

You say you ran the NPCs so are you expecting need aid? If so, UCI will be $80K+ so just know that. And the UC application is pretty long - it’s not on common and has multiple essays - so if you think you’d go to ASU or IU or wherever over UCI, that would be an easy one to drop that would ave you a lot of work.

I do think your classification, etc. are fine though and you’ll have plenty of opportunities.

Best of luck.

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Yes I am expecting need aid, and also my family really liked UCI when we toured the school, but yeah I agree with what you’re saying about the UC application being really long and the school being very expensive. I think culling the list is definitely strategic in what you’re saying, even cutting one or two reaches too along with UCI. But that’s a conversation with my parents.

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Well if you are expecting need aid, look at this:

UCI for tuition room and board - not books, transport, pizza at night etc. this year are - $76,523 - and there will be no aid. So if you can’t afford to pay that - counting books, expenses and more, you are over $80K. Cut it now. Getting an acceptance you can’t afford or need loans for is wasting time.

Same with IU - even with merit, you’ll be $50-55K. Is that within budget, if not, you need to cut it out.

So figure out your budget and let’s find you public schools that work - even if they don’t have quite the oomph.

Wisconsin is $60K, etc - again no merit.

So you need to have a budget.

What is that figure?

You can find public schools, with your stats, in the low 20s, etc. Or a UF in the mid 40s, etc.

No matter your goals, you can’t go where you can’t afford.

So find that # from your family…without loans.

Regardless of what your parents (you, not they are going to school) think about UCI or anywhere else - applying to a school you can’t afford is wasting time.

So even if you expect need aid, you need to run the NPCs. What if Duke is $50K for you but your budget is $30K?

You can’t afford it - that school can’t make your list.

So let’s figure that out now so you have an appropriate list. Kids at targets often don’t find jobs and kids at non-targets do find jobs - so while odds are higher, they’re not high anywhere and you don’t need to be strangling with debt for a doubtful job.

So you have work to do vs. just creating a list with big names. You may have to sub in schools like Alabama ($25K for you) vs. a $60K school - and yes, kids get IB jobs (maybe not in the #s) but still a good school. There will be others.

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The UCs are also test-blind, so they will not see your test scores. I would agree that there are probably better schools for your target category.

I will just add that if you are considering adding other OOS public schools to your target list, at many of them it’s important to apply EA for the best access to opportunities (not just admission, but also direct admit to business, merit, honors, etc). EA deadlines are coming up soon. Don’t delay :slight_smile:

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Closing thread.

Terms of Service prohibits multiple accounts. Since you’ve twice posted Chance Me threads under your original account, there is no need to repost.

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