Chance/Match Me [IL resident, 3.98 UW, 1570 SAT for CS or physics or chemistry]

Some universities, MIT comes to mind, will not even let you choose a major until the end of your freshman year. Whatever you put on your application as your intended major is only used to help assign you to a freshman year academic advisor. If you pick a “too popular” major, then you might get a freshman year academic advisor who is not from your major – but you still get to pick any major you want at the end of freshman year.

I would be tempted to add U.Mass Amherst to your list if CS is your most likely major. For universities that admit by major, I might be tempted to put CS as your major on the basis that it will be easier to transfer out into either physics or chemistry than to transfer in. I also would not count on physics as a major until you get through quantum physics (I took this sophomore year of university, and it convinced me to stick with mathematics as my major).

You have a long string of high reaches, and you are doing this without a lot of impressive leadership ECs. I might be tempted to think hard about which of your high reaches are or are not a good fit for you with the intention of trimming the list a bit. Then I might add a few schools that are slightly (and only slightly) easier to get admitted to and that are known for CS. U.Mass would be one example. Purdue might be another.

I do however like your CS research. I do understand that “research” is sometimes less exciting when you do it than it sounds like from a distance. Building tools that are useful for example can include a lot of grunt work but also be very useful to researchers. Part of being involved in research at an early age is to understand the 99% perspiration that goes along with the 1% inspiration, and to also understand that “research” means that you might not always succeed.

UIUC, CMU, UCB, U. Washington, and U.Wisconsin are all very good for computer science. I would probably pick any of them for example over Harvard if accepted to all of the above and if CS is my intended major. I might however first check out how safe the area is where each school is located. The world might not be quite as safe as it was 10 or 15 years ago. Harvard is located in a very attractive location that to me seems to be both relatively safe and very interesting as a place to live for 4 years.

I am not a big fan of taking organic chemistry as a high school student. One daughter referred to organic chemistry as “the most difficult B- that I ever had in my life”. She has since said that the hardest classes in her DVM program are just as hard or harder (and she is mostly doing better than B-'s), but that is not saying much regarding the ease of organic chemistry. I have heard of at least one case of a high school student doing very well in organic chemistry, but have seen a couple of cases (I think here on CC) of students taking it in high school, or as freshmen in university, and suffering. One daughter did not take it until junior year of university and breezed through it. You most likely will be a stronger student as you get through university.

If you get into UIUC as a CS major, it is a very good university with a very, very good CS program and should be a relative bargain for you since you are in-state.

You have a question mark next to the University of Wisconsin. I would keep it on the list. It is very good for CS.

And you should make sure that your parents are okay spending $400,000 over four years before you apply to expensive private schools without first running the NPC.

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