You are not a first generation college student if you mother has a Masters degree. It does not matter if the Masters is from India
IMO would say it is a high reach for you. Your ECs seems to be unfocused and your GPA is not that great as well (for Dartmouth standards). Don’t forget 90% of the students in Dartmouth are top 10percent in their class but you are ranked 100 out of 300 students. Your AP scores and subject test scores could have been better. I like the fact that you have upward trend for your GPA but still I think it will be a bit hard for you to get into Dartmouth.
There is quite a disconnect between your AP grades and test scores. Why do you think that is?
Have you looked at https://oir.yale.edu/sites/default/files/cds2016-2017.pdf ?
Even for a magnet, your rank seems very low to me. Maybe someone else can chip in? I went to a good magnet and all of the students in the last 10 years who’ve been accepted as undergrads to Yale or similar were (co)valedictorian. Students with much lower ranks are certainty accepted from high schools which have a long tradition of placing a lot of their students - only you will know if this fits your scenario.
Most of your test scores are also low, with a couple of exceptions. From what you’ve said, your profile doesn’t seem competitive, but you’ve only described a fraction of your application, and none of us work in the admissions office anyway.
I plan on not sending ACT to anyone. I just listed it here as Stats.
Was accepted into an out of district Magnet School for Math, Science and Engineering
Took all APs in 11th and 12th grade except gym(too skinny).
9th grade GPA (90)
10th grade GPA (90)
11th grade GPA (96)
Overall GPA 92.1845/100 (weighted)
Rank 100/315
SAT super Score = 1500
SAT math/erw = 710/700 August 2017
SAT math/erw = 800/690 January 2017
SAT Subject Scores
Physics = 510
Chemistry = 620
Math II = 710
US History = 760
ACT 26 (composite)
English 28
Math 26
Reading 25
Science 23
Writing 10
STEM 25
AP
Art History (2)
Calculus AB (4)
Chemistry (2)
English/Comp (5)
Physics 1 (2)
Seminar (3)
US History (3)
Comp Sci A (2)
11th (grades)
AP - Language and Composition (99)
AP - Calculus AB (87)
AP - Chemistry (90)
AP - Physics 1 (97)
AP - Seminar (104)
AP - US History (98)
AP - Art History (103)
Health 11
12th
AP - Physics C
AP - Statistics
AP - Biology
AP - Psychology
AP - Literature and Composition
AP - Research
TV Production 2
Physical Education / Health
EXTRACURRICULAR:
Eagle Scout
Founder of Improv Club
1st ever Lead guitar Jazz Band
NHS member
Volunteer at nursing home, library, Red Cross
Few clubs in school
Few sports
Free time is occupied with Music, Drawing, Politics and Comedy
How are the EC unfocused. That’s my passion. I love being a Boy Scout (achieved Eagle Rank) and I like music (tried my ass of to be first lead guitarist) and I like theater so I started an improv club. I have heard that many admin counselors thinks being in the Boy Scouts and achieving Eagle is not as great as going to a foreign country and helping people build huts. Like many wealthy parents can afford to do that and help their kids have amazing portfolios.
By the time you achieve Eagle Rank you have to go through many years and hours of helping your local community.
GPA is low but I did challenge myself by taking all APs and GPA improved with APs.
US born Indian and that brings my chances down even lower in that aspect.
But I am a son of a US Marine veteran.
Not sure if any school looks at that.
Actually you mentioning Cal States is interesting because I too plan to apply there.
If I missed it sorry, but what is your college budget? Cal states and UC’s are public universities and offer no Financial aid to OOS applicants so you will be full pay. I would look at the private schools in California such as USC, Santa Clara, Occidental, Univ of San Francisco to name a few.
Your interest in theatre and music screams looking at a liberal arts college to me.
You will feel out of place trying to major in physics at a “weed out” tech school.
In addition to Juniata, try Lawrence. You can audition for a non-majors music scholarship that would give you free guitar lessons. They have a supportive-yet-rigorous physics program, but I suspect your true match major might be something else, and there are a lot of arts and humanities majors that are very good there. Their CS program is built around a foundation in applied math, which would fit your math interests and data science is a hot field right now so you wouldn’t be sacrificing employability.
Do you have Yellow Ribbon benefits?
Eagle Scout >>>>> “paid for” volunteering abroad, for sure. For exactly the reason you describe.
Your EC’s are fine. But they don’t jibe with someone applying to CS. If I were you, I’d apply to universities that don’t admit by major and I’d indicate an interest in Humanities/Social science as a first academic interest and an interest in STEM as a second academic interest.
For universities that admit by major (mostly large universities) you’d need to choose your major right away.
Please run the NPC on all the following colleges:
Apply to Muhlenberg for Art AND science.
In California: Chapman, LMU-LA, Oxy (Occidental), Santa Clara… SDSU? It’d really depend on your budget.
Apply to Rowan Honors, TCNJ (Honors), and Rutgers, plus Drew. Not too far, beside Muhlenberg, you have St Lawrence, Skidmore, Hobart&William Smith, Dickinson (match), Wheaton MA (safety).
Apply with your 1500 SAT, very rigorous curriculum, and by the EA deadline.
Penn State has a IST major that may help you combine your interests in CS and Art. Look into it but only if your parents can afford 45K/year. You’d be a match for IST. Apply to Schreyer although it’s a high reach.
Apply to the Midwest, since being Indian is sort of URM in some areas: I’d recommend you apply to Grinnell (reach), Macalester (reach), St Olaf (match), Denison (match), Butler (low match), Drake (low match), Beloit (safety), Truman State (safety).
From your list, apply to Swarthmore and HarveyMudd and Ivies with the same outlook: that you won’t get in.
Juniata doesn’t quite match anything, the above would be better safeties.
Can you borrow a Fiske guide or a Princeton review’s guide to the best colleges, and read up about all of these?
Was accepted into an out of district Magnet School for Math, Science and Engineering
Took all APs in 11th and 12th grade except gym(too skinny).
9th grade GPA (90)
10th grade GPA (90)
11th grade GPA (96)
Overall GPA 92.1845/100 (weighted)
Rank 100/315
SAT super Score = 1500
SAT math/erw = 710/700 August 2017
SAT math/erw = 800/690 January 2017
SAT Subject Scores
Physics = 510
Chemistry = 620
Math II = 710
US History = 760
ACT 26 (composite)
English 28
Math 26
Reading 25
Science 23
Writing 10
STEM 25
AP
Art History (2)
Calculus AB (4)
Chemistry (2)
English/Comp (5)
Physics 1 (2)
Seminar (3)
US History (3)
Comp Sci A (2)
11th (grades)
AP - Language and Composition (99)
AP - Calculus AB (87)
AP - Chemistry (90)
AP - Physics 1 (97)
AP - Seminar (104)
AP - US History (98)
AP - Art History (103)
Health 11
12th
AP - Physics C
AP - Statistics
AP - Biology
AP - Psychology
AP - Literature and Composition
AP - Research
TV Production 2
Physical Education / Health
EXTRACURRICULAR:
Eagle Scout
Founder of Improv Club
1st ever Lead guitar Jazz Band
NHS member
Volunteer at nursing home, library, Red Cross
Few clubs in school
Few sports
Free time is occupied with Music, Drawing, Politics and Comedy
You really don’t need to keep reposting the same info over and over.
You may want to consider RPI for their media arts and entertainment program. They offer plenty of animation and cgi courses for film and video. There aren’t a lot of ugly people at RPI so I’m not sure if you will feel comfortable there, but your math scores might make you bearable.