A&M is not a safety because of the secondary process. I would add a university that provides answers “rolling” - the Midwest has lots of strong Land Grant universities with solid Engineering -Michigan State, Iowa/State, UMN, etc.)
Overall, this is a reasonable list that you’ll certainly cut as you start getting acceptances.
For the UK, I suggest looking into Imperial, Bath, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow.
I think you have a good, balanced list and properly categorized for the most part (I think a couple of your reaches might actually be targets, but ok to be conservative). Remember to apply to all the public flagships in EA.
What about Cooper Union attracts you? It’s not particularly well known for Mech E.
Please ask your parents for a firm budget and post it here. That is a critical factor in determining your college list. If unsure about aid eligibility, have your parents run the net price calculators to see if you would qualify for any need based aid.
Perhaps you might be misunderstanding what a hook is? It’s a (typically inherent) quality of an applicant that makes them particularly attractive to schools. Examples are: first generation to college, low income, underrepresented demographic, athlete, child of faculty/mega donor/international celebrity, etc.
Being of mixed race is not a hook. Prior to last year’s supreme court decision, being of a certain race was a hook - but it never included being white or asian.
With regard to your chances at Purdue, you might want to look at the Purdue Data Digest, here: https://www.purdue.edu/datadigest/; and specifically at the links to “Applications, Admits, and Matriculations” and “New First-Time Beginner Profile”, where there should be some useful information available for comparing your stats to those provided by Purdue.
The University of Michigan recomputes your high school GPA by disregarding all plusses and minuses, so a B+ is considered a B, an A- is considered an A, etc.
Also, you might want to look at the Common Data Sets for your schools of interest, specifically Sections C7 and Sections C9-C11. Section C7 tells you how each school weighs both academic and non-academic admissions factors; they are not weighed equally by different schools. For example, Georgia Tech gives more emphasis to GPA than to standardized test scores (they seem to like senior class valedictorians/salutatorians for admission).
Some of the non-California state universities have secondary admission to major after enrolling in the engineering division. If A&M is the one in Texas, the secondary admission can be highly competitive for some majors, including ME.
Just a quick note, but if you have carefully chosen your Likelies (which I prefer to Safeties), you don’t necessarily need a super long Target or Reach list. Like as few as 2 of each (Likelies, Targets, and Reaches) can be fine, or in some circumstances even less.
TAMU should be target, because you are OOS and ENG major. Maybe you want to add tOSU to target, they offered S24 $14.5K merit/yr OOS. What about SDSU, CPP, UCR as target? Good deal in CA.
Some colleges with pre announced automatic admission criteria that the applicant meets are 100% sure thing safeties (as opposed to 95+% likelies) if they are affordable.
Just clarifying, GaTech guarantees admission to GA resident vals/sals (with some requirements). To my knowledge there is no bump for OOS val/sal, but since GPA is important for all applicants it may seem that way.
I note the point of the terminology preference is not to scare people into thinking they might not be admitted. The issue is the connotation of “Safety” seems to often be that you should only want to attend that college if all else fails. The intent of “Likely” is the term is supposed to be more neutral in terms of preferences, and leave open room for things like actually choosing a Likely over a Target or Reach as a result of things like merit and honors offers, post-offer revisits, just evolutions in priorities, and so on.
If ASU is Arizona State University, then it is automatic frosh admit (including to the ME major) with a 3.0 HS GPA with the specified high school course work.
https://scholarships.asu.edu/estimator estimates that, with a 3.7 HS GPA and 1540 SAT, you will get a $16,500 scholarship off of the $51,514 list price, for a net price of $35,014. Is this affordable? If so, then you have a 100% sure thing safety here. Note that renewing the scholarship requires 30 credits at ASU each year and maintain a 3.00 college GPA in ASU courses: https://tuition.asu.edu/scholarship-renewal-guide
Do costs matter to your family? If so, then factor that into what is considered a likely vs low probability admission when applying OOS public and private. If costs matter, getting admitted to low probability OOS publics or private schools may only be half the cake, you will need discounts off the sticker price to make it work.
Also you can use your stats to figure out if you are competitve for SJSU, for mechanical, it might not be considered a safety. Other great schools to consider/research: oregon st., utah, iowa st., WPI, CalPoly-Pomona and some of the other CSU campuses. After my kid’s visits he ranked Iowa St. engineering fairly even or perhaps slightly ahead of both Davis and Irvine-- much to his surprise.
I have observed over the past few years that the OOS applicants who have gotten into Georgia Tech have been either valedictorians or salutatorians of their respective high school classes. Not all valedictorians/salutatorians who I know applied were admitted; but those who were admitted were vals/sals. I am not suggesting that Georgia Tech is specifically looking to admit them (unlike instate applicants, which the OP is not); there is just that correlation that I have seen.
There’s not a strict budget, under $60,000 is preferred but my parents are willing to pay up to $90,000 for colleges such as NEU or BU if it comes down to that.
I like Cooper’s size as it’s really small and easy to get support from professors. The engineering program is also very hands on like Calpoly’s and internships are easy to get in New York (from what I’ve heard). I also love the location. Do you think it would be best to apply RD instead?
I was considering writing about my mixed race upbringing and how it led me to join music to find a place to fit in, but I’m not sure how effective this would be. It’s for the culture question on the personal statement.
For SJSU did you calculate your impaction index? Also you said Bay area are you local to SJSU (That is are you in Santa Clara county).
Your EC’s are great and related to your field and SAT is also great so my feeling is you may do better out of state than the State flagships. And if these state flagships are UC’s then since they don’t look at SAT make sure you focus on great PIQ’s. Also I would not put many UC’s in Target list for Mech engineering with your GPA. UCR can be a safety/target. UCSC does not have mech. But if you are looking at the other Higher ranked UC’s they would be reaches not targets.
If costs don’t matter, how much better would my chances be? I would prefer to get some scholarships or chance at aid but if it increases my chances, I’d apply for no aid (instead of some aid).
