Chance/Match Me: Virginia, 3.99 UW, 1550 SAT, 13 APs, No "Spike" [$250k total, linguistics and chemistry]

Chance Me / Match Me
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1

Demographics

  • US domestic
  • State/Location of residency: Virginia
  • Gender: Male
  • Income: Upper Middle Class
  • Type of high school: Large public
  • Other special factors: N/A

Cost Constraints / Budget
Highly likely I receive 0 financial aid.

Intended Major(s)
Linguistics, Chem

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 3.99
  • Weighted HS GPA: 4.65 (+1.0 for AP/AV/DE, +0.5 for HN)
  • Class Rank: School does not rank
  • ACT/SAT Scores: 1550 SAT (770 M/780 EBRW)

HS Coursework

  • English: Eng 9 HN, Eng 10 HN, Eng 11 DE, Eng 12 Lit DE
  • Math: A1 HN, Geo HN, A2 HN, AP Precalc (5), AP Calc BC (Highest)
  • Science: Bio HN, Chem HN, AP Chem (5) AP Phys 1 (5), AP Phys C: M/EM, DE Bio
  • History and social studies: Hist HN 1, Hist DE 2, AP Mic/Mac (5,5), APUSH (5), AP US/Comp Gov (5,5)
  • Language other than English: Sp1, Sp2, Sp3, Sp4 HN, AP Spanish Lang (5), AP Spanish Lit (Final)
  • Visual or performing arts: Music In Society (CC Class)
  • Other academic courses: AP CSP (4), AP CSA, (4) CS Data Structures AV (Post AP, Final), Entrepreneurship DE, Sociology (CC Class), Religion (CC Class), Psych (CC Class)

Awards
Chem Olympiad National Qualifier
NMSC Semi-Finalist
Scholastic Bowl 3rd Place @ Regionals
AP Scholar w/Distinction
Tennis 3rd Place @ Regionals

Extracurriculars

  1. High School Diplomats Program: (H.S.D) Full scholarship to promote diplomacy/foster cultural exchange with Japanese high schoolers @ UVA/Kyoto, Japan; 1/20 in my cohort.
  2. Aspiring Scientists Summer Research Program (ASSIP): Worked with George Mason Faculty to use Natural Language Processing to solve problems for the US Dept of Def; published abstract (maybe conferences)
  3. Varsity Scholastic: (Quiz) Bowl Captain Created first ever school invitational w/ 30+ players, fundraised 500+ dollars, It’s Academic (TV Show) Semi-Final
  4. Varsity Tennis Captain: (Not recruited), Led warmups 15+ teammates, strung rackets for team; started No. 1
  5. Chess Club President: Created 7 monthly tourneys/yr w/20 entries; taught weekly lessons to 10+ members
  6. Chemistry Olympiad Officer: Got Natl qualifying bid from school test; led weekly meetings
  7. Varsity Volleyball Captain: (Not recruited) Led off-season practices w/20+ players; managed team social media
  8. Work (Tutoring/Tennis Lessons): Tutored 4+ hrs/wk, Lessons 6 hrs/wk year round
  9. Language Learning: Self studied Japanese and Korean 7 hrs/wk year round
  10. Volunteering: Collected and delivered 100+ lbs/food/month to a local highschool to combat food insecurity

Essays/LORs/Other
About language connecting people (experience from Japan)

Had my two recommenders for 3/4 high school years. I think 9.5/10 counselor rec, and 9.5/10 from Teacher 1, and 9/10 from Teacher 2 (Might get one from my research professor)

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

  • Assured: George Mason (EA) /VCU (Auto admission via GPA in VA)
  • Extremely Likely: Mary Washington
  • Likely: VTech (EA)
  • Toss-up: UVA (EA, William & Mary
  • Lower Probability: Georgia Tech, UCLA/UCB/UCSD,
  • Low Probability: Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Stanford, Columbia, UPenn, Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell
2

As suggestions for schools to consider, look into Swarthmore and Haverford.

3

In which case, what is your budget?
How much can your parents comfortably pay?

If your budget is less than $95k/year, some of the schools on your list will need to be eliminated.

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If UVA is a Toss Up for you, then that’s where you need to concentrate. Your Low Probabilities are anyone’s guess. I would load up on interesting, undergraduate focused schools like Harvey Mudd, Rochester, Brandeis even Wesleyan at this point. I’m sure there are others that would occupy a niche below your Low Probabilities.

5

I agree it comes down to budget - having no aid doesn’t mean you have 100K a year to spent.

I’d argue your list is a bit over labeled - meaning, I don’t see UVA as a toss up but likely. And W&M as highly likely. Just my opinion.

Ga Tech is $50K-ish and all others are very pricey.

If you want a safety, you might look at U Del for its strength in Chem.

6

Budget would probably be ~250k (without scholarship money), so since my brothers with worse stats got more than 160k combined i think i can get around ~350k for a budget.

7

I agree, I don’t really see UVA as a toss up, but I saw some other post where this guy was getting grilled for having a 4.3 and having uva in his likely

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Kinda want to avoid SLACs, more of a stem kid.

9

Agree with W&M being likely.

What kind of school do you want? These schools have very different sizes, cultures, etc.

Lastly, a pedantic note, VT people typically use “VT or Virginia Tech” - Vtech is an electronics company.

10

However, chemistry represents a core liberal arts field, of course. Along these lines, Haverford and Swarthmore ultimately produce more chemistry PhDs when adjusted for enrollment than any school on your current list.

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I don’t know what you mean by the money (you are 250K I get) but not sure I understand the math with the brother.

Have your parents run the NPC but if this is your budget, and you don’t qualify for aid, then you should take off the UCs and every single low probability - because you’d have zero way to hit cost. The low probability - none give merit aid and the UCs are highly unlikely to and are $80k-ish a year.

There are tons of flagships where you’d go cheap - Alabama and Miss State being the lowest - $20K-ish a year - so yep, even cheaper than in state.

But you’d be better to, as an example, a U Del I mentioned, an Ohio State, an Arizona / Arizona State, instead of the UCs, etc. or name your flagship short of a few (like Michigan). Like Delaware, UMN is a chemistry stalwart and you’d easily be under budget. UCONN is too. Purdue is another.

As for your low probability, they’d still be unlikely to hit budget but if you subbed in a Vandy, Rice, Wash U, Miami, Emory - there’d be a sliver of a chance that you’d get outstanding merit…because they have merit whereas the Ivys don’t. Rochester, Brandeis, Case Western, U Denver would be the type of schools that give you a much better chance. U Denver for sure - would come in under cost.

Linguistics is interesting - check the curriculum at schools of interest because it seems the curriculum can run from techy to not and you want to fit. RPI is an interesting school - has a linguistics minor only though. But it’d be strong in chem and with great merit to hit your budget.

Applying to schools you can’t afford is pointless - but - until your family fills out the NPC, you don’t know that you can’t afford them.

I suspect with your current list, you’ll end up in state - and that’s not a bad thing.

12

This is why I included HMC and Wesleyan. Both are technically SLACs but with impeccable STEM credentials. I don’t know if you’ve visited Wes recently, but one of the first things you’ll notice is they have an entire city block devoted to physics, life sciences and math facilities:

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1 Like
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Sorry let me be more clear: Our family doesn’t qualify for aid based on income 350k+.

The amount that could be put toward college w/o loans is ~250k, scholarships could bring that total coverage to ~325k

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I didn’t know about that, thank you.

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As others have mentioned, SLACs have strong STEM programs. If that’s your first priority, you would be missing out on some great opportunities—including lots of chances to participate in research, which is a real benefit of SLACs—by not opening the aperture a bit.

But if you are more interested in larger universities because of lifestyle, sports, etc., then not adding SLACs to your list makes sense.

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But many of your low probability schools don’t give any merit, only financial aid.

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I’m talking about scholarship money from outside funds that aren’t from the university; for example, there’s a scholarship locally that gives 10k/yr.

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Yeah I already go to a large public HS ~4500 kids, so I think transitioning to a college with the same/smaller size isn’t ideal, unless it’s T20.

19

Public, stem focused, near a city OR prestige.

20

Yes, I understood - $250K.

With scholarships, you don’t know what it could be - because you don’t know how much in scholarships you get. Most scholarships come from the schools themselves - in the form of discounts.

For example, at Alabama, the tuition, room and board is $50,458 per year. But based on your GPA and SAT, you automatically qualify for $28,000 in merit. So your net cost is $22,458 a year. In that case, you are earning $112,000 in scholarships over 4 years.

In the end, you don’t need loans - period, end of story - especially given the majors, neither of which will be highly paid.

A UVM chem major from 22/23, according to school data, earns $44,386 on average. Linguistics was actually more than double that but very few respondents. Of course, many go to school or do other things - but given your stats, there’s no need for loans and you have a ton of schools with your stats.

But even at $325K (do you have $75K in outside scholarships)?, your low reaches still need to be gone but your UCs would potentially just meet cost.

So everything I stated above stands - and yes, use a $250K budget.

That you have UVA, W&M, Va Tech, and you didn’t even list CNU - Virginia offers you a bevvy or riches.