Chance Me: Dartmouth College for Physics [International, (Turkey) 4.0 GPA (Unweighted), Rank 4, 1560 SAT, no parent contribution]

Chance Me / Match Me
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Hello! I attend a private high school as a junior in Turkey. I intend to pursue physics. I’m strictly forbidden from costing my family any amount of money regarding college, so it’s either bullseye or i’ll pursue a domestic career.

I have a 1560 on my SAT,
4.0 unweighted GPA, (98.7/100)
4th in my class. (school’s arguably competitive)

We don’t really get to choose the classes we take here, but overall I took,

AP Physics C, Mechanics and Electromagnetism
College-level Calculus
Math, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Social Studies, English
Thermodynamics
Optics

I won’t be able to specify which competitions I’m mentioning as they wouldn’t make much sense, feel free to ask follow-up questions for clarification.)
Physics Olympiad National Finalist (top %10)
1st Place, Regional Science Competition
Regional Math Competition Finalist Award
+10 Best Delegate Awards and +3 Best Delegation Awards in Model United Nations

My extracurriculars include,

Multiple papers on FRBs (Fast Radio Bursts) that will be presented and published at the International Physics Congress of the Turkish Physical Society.
Self-funded astronomical data analysis platform, helping both scientists visualize datasets more easily and less fortunate citizens to step in astronomy through a simplified gateway.
Hand-picked for a nationally renowned conservatory course, gave +5 concerts in multiple intruments, played as the 1st clarinet in my school orchestra, and certain regional orchestras, organized courses teaching children to play the piano and the clarinet from an early age,
Chosen for an internship at an internationally renowned university in Turkey (National Top 3), joined project groups and will conduct research regarding piezoelectricity. (ongoing)
Conducted an outreach project, working with various NGOs, to help raise funds for less fortunate children build their first library at their school, amongst other needs.
Selected as Secreteary General for my schools MUN, selected in Under Secretary General and President Chair positions across multiple confrences, both national and international.
Licensed Karate athlete for +10 years, attended multiple tournaments, achieved black belt and dan 2 status, selected as an instructor in my regional club.
Gave speeches at my school regarding exam stress and college admissions abroad.
Plan to spend my remaining 8 months crafting more projects regarding quantum physics, and more volunteer work.

For schools,

Likely: ?
Lower probability: NYU, UC Davis, Amherst (EA)
Low probability: Dartmouth (ED), Brown (EA), Cornell (RD), Columbia, UPenn, and all the other need-blind universities, considering my situation. (p.s: i qualify for aid)

Please let me know what my overall chances are of getting in, as I’m not a domestic student, I usually lack a perspective about whether I can get into these schools or not.
Thank you in advance!

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The UCs do not give aid to out of state students, so I think you need to remove UC Davis from consideration. @Gumbymom

The other need blind and also meet full need for all international students…Washington and Lee, University of Notre Dame, Bowdoin…in addition to what you have listed.

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Thank you, I’ve started to go deep on actually which schools are available only recently, will remove UCs.

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@MYOS1634 may have more insight…

Do you need 100% of expenses covered by the university? Will your parents contribute anything?
Have you run the Net Price Calculator (NPC) for any of the universities you are considering? If not, that should be your first task to see if the schools agree your family’s need is sufficient to make it affordable for you.

Once you identify the schools that have the potential to be affordable, we can help you with a list that are a good fit in other areas.

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So since your parents won’t pay, you need to apply to schools that meet need - and then you have to hope they determine you have need.

This might give you a further list to look into - to ensure the info is correct. I can’t say it is.

Also, I see some missing - Washington & Lee now meets need and even if not, has the Johnson Scholarship (full ride) - so it should be on your list. And F&M also meets need for international - need aware - so add them. Dartmouth is another one not listed.

But again, validate the list - but it might give you more options - and whether you have need or not, make sure to include W&L.

Best of luck.

Amherst - blind
Bowdoin - blind
Cal Tech - aware
Colgate - aware
Columbia - blind
Davidson - aware
Duke - aware
Harvard - blind
Middlebury - aware
MIT - blind
Princeton - blind
Swarthmore - aware
Trinity - aware
Richmond - aware
Vassar - aware
Williams - blind
Yale - blind

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They would be able to provide for other nececcisites like clothes, food, housing, travel etc. but not the actual price of the university.
I’ll that the net price calculator right now, to this point, I simply compared my situation with some friends that got into ivies on financial aid on previous years.

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Thank you for the list, this clarified things a lot more, I’m now seeing I had more options that I thought I had.

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But validate - some may be off - i put what the list shows need blind or aware.

But if don’t have full need - and the schools decide that - not you - it won’t matter.

If the schools say you can pay and your parents won’t - then you are good for nowhere, unfortunately.

The other scary thing today is - reading the news - we seem to be expelling a lot of students out of the country - and that list seems to grow daily.

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So one big issue I see at the top–even if your family is refusing to contribute for a US college’s tuition and fees, that does not mean a US college will agree that your family couldn’t contribute if they wanted to. And you are already attending a private high school, which is not definitive but also suggests to me it is at least possible a US college will see some ability to pay.

So I think you need to make sure that your colleges which only provide need-based aid would actually provide you with the full amount of aid you truly need, as opposed to some lower amount they would think you need.

Assuming you do that–admissions to need-blind for Internationals colleges has recently been extremely competitive. Like as in on the order of 2% acceptance rates, give or take. It is just incredibly hard to get such an offer. That list has been expanding and maybe it will be a little better at some when the statistics come out, but I don’t know–it seems to me as soon as US college goes need blind for Internationals, the news is spread, and they will get so many highly qualified but needy Internationals applying that they will converge toward those low acceptance rates.

Then some need aware for International colleges have a decent budget for International aid, but they might still not give out many (or any) really big aid offers, they may instead prefer to spread it around.

And then if you do identify need aware for Internationals colleges that at least give out some such offers, it appears to me they mostly are at best back into that 2ish% range for such big offers, and possibly less.

So yes, there are other colleges besides the need blind for Internationals colleges which might give out some offers like you would need–IF they agree with you about what you need. But I would assume absent evidence to the contrary that they are all going to be incredibly competitive to get.

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I note many colleges warn their NPC might not be accurate for Internationals.

I have heard, though, that the Harvard NPC might more often be at least roughly accurate for Internationals. And they are among the most generous colleges for Internationals generally. So you could try checking their NPC. If Harvard says it would give you enough aid, that is promising (albeit not definitive). If Harvard says it would not give you enough aid–that’s a serious problem.

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Just checked NPC on Dartmouth, I seem to qualify for aid, total showed up as 3.040$
I seemed to have misspoke in the first part of the thread, it’s not that they have money and are refusing to pay, but rather don’t have any money in the first place.

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Checked Harvard NPC (estimated numbers though.) I still qualify. Also for future perspective in this thread, our net combined household income is 12000$ yearly.

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yep, i’ve been watching anxiously, and will try to prepare myself to the worst case scenario.

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And assuming I qualify for aid, will my extracurriculars be enough? As that’s what my current biggest worry. Since I don’t have many people around my preparing for us college admissions with me it’s hard to tell what’s enough.

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I don’t think anyone can prepare - other than locking themselves in their rooms when they’re not in class…unfortunately.

ECs are a part of an app - not necessarily a huge part.

They look find except everything is serious - nothing is fun.

But honestly, all you can do is apply and see what happens.

Best of luck.

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View them as an estimate only as an international student.

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Right.

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It’s in the subject title of this thread.

I usually don’t repeat myself, but here are the additional colleges that (added to what the OP put) are both need blind and meet full need for all international students.

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Found out the fact that they weren’t fun the hard way in 9th grade.

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No, on the list I provided - it doesn’t show Dartmouth as a meets need / need blind or aware - I believe blind now.