Chance Me and Match a Rising Junior in NJ with a spike/good ECs but 3.62 GPA

Chance Me / Match Me
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Demographics

  • US Citizen
  • New Jersey
  • Private High school, small graduating class of less than ~100 kids

Cost Constraints / Budget

  • There actually is none haha, don’t worry about that

Intended Major(s)
Still deciding on specifics, but generally stuff in the “creative side of business” along with writing. Think English, Marketing, Media Studies, Communications, HCD, etc

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

No class rank
33 ACT Superscore (35E32M34R32S), 33 Composite but retaking for a 34 superscore

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 3.62 (not official)
  • Weighted HS GPA: 3.77 (not official, taking hardest classes possible but no AP until junior year)
  • Class Rank: n/a
  • ACT Score: 33 Superscore (35E32M34R32S), 33 Composite —retaking for 34 Superscore

HS coursework

No APs until Junior Year, 5 courses per year, hardest classes offered

  • English: English 9, English 10.
    • Will take: Honors English 11, AP Lit, AP Lang (self-study)
  • Math: Honors Geometry, Honors Precalculus.
    • Will take: AP Calc AB, AP Calc BC (or Stat)
  • Science: Honors Physics 1, Honors Chemistry 1.
    • Will take: AP Bio
  • History and social studies: History 9, History 10.
    • Will take: AP World, AP US History
  • Spanish: Spanish 2, Honors Spanish 3.
    • Will take: Honors Spanish 4, AP Spanish

Awards

  • Scholastic Gold Key in Critical Essay, Honorable Mention in Poetry
  • School Annual Poetry Prize
  • Couple literary magazine publications (nothing too selective —focus is on developing the portfolio right now)

Extracurriculars
This isn’t a curated, optimized, nor ordered list —it’s just everything I’m doing right now haha

  • EXECUTIVE EDITOR
    Polyphony Lit | Grades 9–10+
    I manage editing teams, write commentary on submissions, and vote in final rounds. I give feedback to teen writers and sometimes do in-house edits on pieces that are getting published. 150+ hours and 66+ submissions.
  • FOUNDER & CEO
    Spike-Related Startup | Grade 10+
    Intentionally keeping it vague but a spike/creative-focused startup/company focused on helping young writers with sharing and promoting their work. Still growing, but currently partnered with 5+ writers with 1.5+ million impressions and 5k+ followers across socials. Big focus on writing, marketing/promotion, and general media + communications, aiming for it to be high impact with clear metrics.
  • CO-CHAIR & GENERAL/SPECIALIZED DELEGATE
    Model UN | Grades 9–10+
    I co-chaired two committees for a regional conference hosted at my school. I wrote background guides, gave feedback on delegates’ position papers, and helped with planning and logistics.
  • PERSONAL WRITING & AUTHORSHIP
    Myself | Grades 9-10+
    I dedicate time to writing in various types of genres, including poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. I am currently developing an absurdist poetry portfolio, which will be submitted to literary magazines, journals, contests, and also later be self-published as a poetry book.
  • SPEAKER
    TEDx | Grade 11
    I am a speaker at my school’s TEDx conference hosted in November 2025, which will be officiated by TEDx and recorded and posted to the TEDxYouth Youtube channels. My topic is related to my work at my startup and things related to that.
  • CALLIGRAPHY & HAND LETTERING
    Myself | Grades 9-10+
    I set aside time each week to develop and master my skills in various fonts. I am currently developing a portfolio of works using various mediums and methods.
  • GRAPHIC DESIGN
    Myself | Grades 10+
    Learned how to use Adobe InDesign and learning both Photoshop and Illustrator.
  • COPYWRITING
    Myself | Grades 10+
    Soaking up skills in copywriting to eventually develop a portfolio of various works and connect with industry professionals. Using insights to help support startup and land internships, gigs, and placement programs.

Schools
I know my GPA is pretty low, but I have a good amount of confidence in my ECs and narrative so I hope :pray:. I also have 1.5 years left

I’d also love any of your guys recommendations for schools with strong programs in my interests (storytelling, marketing/brand communication, etc.) since it’s very interdisciplinary. No NYU though —both me and my parents hate that school.

Schools below are the ones I have interest in (all reaches), top ones being Brown and Northwestern.

I haven’t thought much about targets or safeties because I’m still early haha

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You are very impressive - congrats. Your private school counselors would be best to assess you based on others from the past.

One thing to figure out is - do you want marketing or not ? If you do, your list would look vastly different.

Let me tell you something - Stanford and Northwestern aren’t the most important schools on your list.

Rutgers or Indiana or U Denver or wherever are - the safeties - because you need one that you’ll love - just in case.

So when I see your desires, in addition to Northwestern, I think Syracuse (target) or SMU (light target). Full pay will help. Safety - Ithaca or Elon. A less teacher reach - W&M - - might be another to consider.

Amherst sticks out as odd on this list. I suspect it would be your best odds of the list you presented but maybe a Richmond or Bucknell would fit better for your desires.

If I were to guess, I’d say no to all on your list but you go to a private school so that’s not fair to you.

Talk to your counselor. You have an awesome record and will end up somewhere great.

But work from the bottom up and not top down.

Best of luck.

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Don’t self study, it won’t help with anything. Since you’re attending a good private school it’s likely a “known quantity” along the Eastern Seaboard. That will help you. It also means you don’t need to self study AP English Lang since your school’s English courses will be known for their rigor.

Look into Denison and Kenyon (reaches) - lots of majors of interest.
If they look interesting, see if you could get into Kenyon’s Young Writers Workshop (highly selective) for a boost.
Note that nowadays Marketing requires a solid background in stats/applied math.

I assume you’ll apply to Rutgers.
For a target, some programs of interest at Penn State, to get you thinking about what’s out there.

For a safety

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You have some interesting ECs and interests, and it sounds like you will be well-prepared for college. Are you interested in continuing to do Model UN in college?

As others have mentioned, you started your research at the opposite end from where I recommend (i.e. schools with lowest admit rates rather than higher ones), but since you do have schools of interest, what is it that attracts you to these particular schools?

For the schools on your current list, they would expect four years of science, assuming your high school offers a sufficient number of classes (which, if there are no budget constraints, is likely to be true).

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As an example of looking for schools that have similarities with your current list, here are three schools that I think would be likely or extremely likely admits that I suggest you investigate:

Loyola Chicago (IL): About 12k undergrads at this Jesuit school. It has its own student-run communication agency that has had clients like United Airlines. Within its School of Communication it offers majors like Advertising Creative, Film and Digital Media, and Multimedia Journalism. The Advertising Creative one sounds like it might be particularly good for you as its coursework includes graphic design and branding classes.

Ithaca (NY): This school of about 4400 undergrads has already been mentioned and is another one that I think is well worth investigating. Even the landing page for the business school seems great for you…“Make Business Your Creative Outlet.”

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But the Park School of Communications (which is more selective than the general college, I believe) has some majors that might be of particular interest, such as Advertising, Public Relations and Marketing Communications, or Communication Strategy and Design, Television, Photography, & Digital Media. Its writing major may also be of interest, which allows students to specialize (or not) in creative writing, nonfiction, feature writing, or professional writing. Additionally, students at Ithaca can cross-register for classes at Cornell which is a little over a mile away.

Drexel (PA ): About 13k undergrads at this Philadelphia school that places a heavy focus on co-ops. I’d take an especially close look at the Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design which is well respected and seems to have much that could be of interest to you. Some of those majors include Digital Media & Virtual Production, Entertainment and Arts Management, Graphic Design, Product Design, and others. And you can also apply as Undeclared – Design & Media for the Westphal College.

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Like others, I think your HS-provided college counselors will likely be your best source of information on where people with your grades and test scores from your high school are actually realistically competitive for admissions. I assume they will likely tell you it is a bit premature to assess that, however, as the details will likely depend on how your classes go this upcoming year. So I would suggest a top priority for you is to do your reasonable best in your classes.

Then also like others, I think it is far more helpful to start on the most likely end, not the least likely, in terms of identifying great colleges for you. At least with your sort of budget, you are going to have many, many different options. So, you are going to need to reflect on what you really want in a four-year college experience, both academically and non-academically.

And this can be what I would call an iterative process. You can start with some promising leads, and investigate them more closely. If you can do some visits, that would be great. Even if not, there are all sorts of different ways of taking a look at colleges. As you do that, you will start getting a better sense of different sorts of pros and cons, and you might start getting a better sense of things that actually matter to you more, and things that matter to you less.

OK, so you finally identify at least a couple Likely/Foundation colleges that really seem like great fits to you. Now that you have gone through that process, you can turn to Target/Match colleges, armed with all you have learned. Like, what would actually make a college an even better choice for you than your Likelies? If you did a good job with them, they might be harder to beat than you would originally expect! But you may also have some pretty clear ideas on what could be even better, and you can go through a similar process of figuring out something like 3-5 Target/Match colleges that would be even better in the ways you care about.

OK, then finally you can turn to Reaches, and at this point–it can be almost kinda boring, actually. Like maybe you did all the fun work already, and now it is relatively easy to identify 3-5 Reaches that are even better than your Target/Match colleges in ways you care about. Or sometimes not, actually–some people choose Target offers over Reach offers in the end for a variety of reasons, or indeed sometimes Likely offers. But point is, you know at this stage what you are looking for, and finding suitable Reaches (again without budget constraints) may not be much more work.

Edit: OK, so some leads I would suggest.

First, I just want to double down on Penn State. The sort of things you are talking about are definitely a focus there. I could easily see Penn State being one of those colleges which in a good way helps you refine your sense of what is possible, and then raises the bar for other colleges to actually beat.

If you are interested in looking farther away, Michigan State is another along the same lines in my view.

Or if you are more into the idea of a college in a bigger metro area, Minnesota.

By the way, Minnesota has early rolling admissions, and Penn State goes rolling after the EA deadline of Nov 1. Very handy to have a college like that on your list.

Then you might be interested in checking out the College of Business at Bryant University. Again they have a lot of programs in your sort of area. Maybe you will decide they are TOO focused, but it could be interesting to look and sort of see what you think.

I’d again double down on Drexel. Very much makes sense for what you described.

For a smaller college, you might check out Susquehanna. Quite a different approach from a Penn State, say, but you might find it appealing. If not, could still help you refine your priorities.

Again there are so many. But this is at least one set of very different colleges you could explore in an early phase.

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Brown, Northwestern, Stanford, Penn, and Amherst reject almost everyone who applies. As an example, a student whom I know had a perfect 36 on her ACT, had straight A’s in the classroom at a prestigious private prep school, and had a number of very good EC’s. She was rejected at Brown, Stanford, and Amherst. So, why bother?

Here are some very good alternatives which should match your interests and where you’d be a strong candidate. These schools have programs and faculty as strong as the ones you’ve listed but aren’t impossible challenges for admissions. In Pennsylvania, Dickinson and Franklin & Marshall are both unusual in that they are small liberal arts colleges with a business major available. You could create some interesting combinations of major/minor there. In Connecticut, Conn College and Trinity are 2 liberal arts colleges where you would be a strong candidate. Trinity has a very good writing program. Conn has excellent advising with the opportunity to develop an interdisciplinary course of study.

Was it the open curriculum approach which attracted you to Brown and Amherst? If so, you might look at Rochester, which is about the same size as Brown, Oberlin, St. Olaf, and Wesleyan, which at 3000 students is bigger than most small LACs and therefore not quite as daunting for admissions. All employ an open curriculum although some with distribution requirements with you to choose the courses and all are excellent for writing. Rochester also has a business school, Oberlin has a brand new business major, and St. Olaf has a business minor.

Finally, you could approach your interests from a different direction and try a business school. Babson College is different in that it is a business college which incorporates a lot of liberal arts into its curriculum, including a major in Literary & Visual Arts. Moreover, Babson students can supplement their course selection by taking courses at Wellesley College, a consortium partner, just 2 miles away across town. There is a regular shuttle between the 2 schools or you can ride a bike over. Babson is also a place where it is an advantage to be a female applicant applying to a very selective school. Last year women were admitted at a rate of 22.2% as compared with the rate of 13.8% for men.

New Jersey has very good state schools, so I assume that Rutgers and The College of New Jersey will be making it to your list?

Admissions chances will be hard to predict for next year both because the number of high school graduates will decline from last year’s all time high and because the number of international students is also likely to decline. Further enhancing your chances is the fact that full pay students will likely be at in demand at need aware schools.

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Wait what you do you mean by “you go to a private school so that’s not fair…” sorry :sob:

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If you had these #s at a public, I don’t think you’d get in anywhere.

But a private - you may be tops in class with that GPA or that GPA may regularly place folks in those schools. Hence the need to ask the school their opinion.

Hope that makes sense.

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My suggestion is that you find some sure things and targets…first. It’s very easy to find reach schools…but finding those sure things and targets can be more challenging. So…start there.

Plus…looks like you have your reaches anyway.

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