But this is the potential problem with the UCs: there is no need-based financial aid for out of state students, so you’d be looking at around $80K/year. There are some merit scholarships that out of state students can qualify for, but they are quite competitive (usually only about 100 entering students are offered these), and they are usually pretty small. So if you apply to the UCs, you need to be OK paying full out of state costs. Maybe you are and, if so, great. But find this out for sure before you invest the time in putting together the UC application.
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Why only two year of foreign language? This may be problematic at some of the reachier schools on your list. Other than that, you have a great profile and I suspect you’ll have lots of great schools to choose from in the spring.
I think this is college-semesters so should probably be fine.
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yes, 4 college semesters and a 6 week study abroad in kazakhstan through nsli-y. considering the selectiveness of that, i think i’ll be okay with foreign language.
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Caltech and Swarthmore are both definitely “fit” schools but I get the sense you might like them .
Yes, semester 4 of college foreign language should be equivalent to at least year 4 (perhaps more) of high school foreign language (often at or beyond AP 5 level in languages with AP tests).
Bonus is that Russian is one of the preferred foreign languages for math majors going on to graduate study in math, due to math research papers being written in it (other preferred languages for this purpose include French and German).
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caltech D: i’m scared to even bother applying because i’m like… 100% sure i wouldn’t get in anyways
You have a shot at any school in the country. Don’t sell yourself short! I know a student at Caltech. Her resume wasn’t nearly as impressive as yours. Yes, it is a fit school. But you can apply and see!
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This is an interesting point. I don’t know if OP has interest in further Russian study but if they do, there are four Russian flagship programs. These are supported by the Feds, have scholarships and likely a job after. You still choose a major of your choice.
The four schools are U Georgia, Indiana, Portland State, and Wisconsin.
First, kudos on garnering such an impressive academic record. You would be a competitive applicant at just about any school in the US. The problem is that top schools like MIT or Stanford turn away 8-10 extremely well qualified applicants for every one they accept. It really gets down to what they are looking for to build the incoming class in terms of background. Being from rural KY may help you here; every top student in CA wants to attend Stanford and the AO there may give the nod to a student from your hometown over yet another kid with similar stats from Palo Alto. Being a woman helps too as some schools have official goals of 50/50 male/female classes in STEM fields (Carnegie Mellon), and those that do not have a public parity policy likely give preferential treatment to women in admissions.
I think you should do some soul searching and homework. First, what is the profile of your perfect school - public v private, large v small, nerdy v social, etc., etc. What, if any schools, have you visited, and what were your impressions? Second, do some homework on career paths for math, ME, and AeroE majors. Are there jobs in private industry for math majors? Do you need an advanced degree to really do anything with math? If you decide you really want AeroE that narrows the list of schools down a good bit (I agree with others here who recommend Purdue).
After you go through these exercises revise your list and visit as many as you can. If you cannot visit the schools try to talk to alumni or current students. My son visited every school on his list before applying, and then revisited the top contenders after being accepted. Surprisingly, the school he ultimately selected was not high on his list early in the process. If they meet your criteria, do not hesitate to apply to the top schools. You are competitive, and if MIT, for example, does not accept you it was not because you were not an amazing applicant; it was because they had too many math gods who speak Russian already, or the AO had their car breakdown in Louisville.
Good luck!
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I think you have a chance at CalTech and the other highly-rejective colleges, both on your own merit with likely a small bump for being female from a rural area/state. With the standard caveat that of course they are reaches for everyone.
You could also look at Harvey Mudd which is part of the Claremont/Pomona consortium and where you can cross-register at any of the 5 consortium schools and they all share a campus and a library etc.
Brown has a very well-regarded applied math program if applied math is of interest.
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Try to submit your application for UK early to be competitive for scholarships, they say they have run out of funds before the Dec 1 deadline.
If you’re great at math and want strong job options, consider the ORFE major at Princeton - their graduates do very well in finance.
You definitely have a great shot at Caltech, but the academics are obscenely hard, probably excessively so unless a PhD is your #1 goal.
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A question for CC members on this thread: Would an engineering/math double major, or major/minor be a viable option for the OP? I am guessing “yes”, since I know a ME major/physics minor grad.
It would be a lot of work, but potentially doable since they already have a lot of DE credit.
Yes, if of interest. My son got a different minor (geography) but was one class from a math minor and if he didn’t do a geography minor, he could have done a double.
Some will do with how many credits the student is walking in with - I’m assuming many - and whether they want to spend a full four years? This student may not need to spend four years - but if they want to and already have required engineering credits done, it opens room for more.
While engineering is typically a longer major regardless of what you bring in (on occasion you hear of a 3 or 3.5 year student) - but I have a feeling some of the required classes in the flow chart have already been done by OP.
i’ve talked to professors and they say the double major is common. If I get into a top school none of my credits (other than AP, which is like calc bc, lit, and physics c mech lmao) are transferring over as real classes anyways, so i don’t think that affects anything. i’ll probably have to spend as much time as anyone else.
i should have around 75 or so credits when i come in. some college admissions dude told me that dual credit stuff just gets counted as elective credits if the university doesn’t accept it as the actual class? but where does that all go? i’m not really sure what he meant.
i assume the overall quality of classes i’ve had is lower anyways. even a marginally bigger college will likely up the difficulty, so i don’t mind retaking math classes like multi, ode, and linear again. engineering classes are a given: they will definitely be harder at other universities.
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Two majors where one is an engineering major may be hard to fit into a four year schedule without either overloading or lots of incoming credit in lower level courses. An engineering major consumes at least 62.5% of the usual amount of courses, and most ME majors consume more. If another 20% are taken by general education requirements, that leaves only about 17.5% for second major courses that do not overlap with ME or general education requirements.
How doable a minor is depends on the college’s definition of a minor, which varies considerably.
It also depends on how flexible and supportive of minors/double majors the school is. My son’s school is letting him fulfill his humanities requirements with business courses so he can have a business minor without additional classes.
My S24 is a math/physics double major at Williams and absolutely loves it. However, you should look very carefully at the math courses offered since there may be very few you have taken and you will “run out” of classes to take. An option for you if you are still interested is the junior year program at Oxford Exeter where you take classes at Oxford for one year and can include math classes. And there is no engineering at Williams.
As others are suggesting as well, I think this all depends on how that college’s curriculum functions overall.
Engineering most places is an intense major in terms of required credits and sequences. However, when it comes to double majors, colleges vary in terms of their gen ed requirements (which are a factor in how many other credits you have in total, and possibly also what sequences you can follow concurrently) and allowance of overlap of credits between majors. Then minors depend on availability, credit intensity, and again overlap allowances.
So I personally think this really can only be answered securely by actually sitting down with the college’s information and mapping out a four-year plan that works. You don’t need to specify exactly every course, but you need to make sure you have followed all the requirements for each major or minor and the college’s general education requirements, including any required sequencing and in light of any overlap policies.
As a final thought, I have seen a few kids claim to have confirmed this is possible before choosing a college, and then it turns out they are planning on doing some serious overloads in some terms. And of course some kids do actually pull that off, but other kids try and end up actually suffering from the overload.
So personally, I would never choose a college actually planning on doing that.
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