Chance me for CMU, Cornell, UW Madison, UMichigan, GeorgiaTech, and UIUC?

Chance Me / Match Me
1

Ethnicity: Indian
State: Wisconsin

ACT (breakdown):
1st: 26
2nd: 31
3rd: I am waiting for scores from Sep 12 and am expecting a 33 or 34
SAT II (subject, score): Taking on Oct 3rd (Math I, Math II, Chemistry)
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 3.818
Weighted GPA: School doesn’t do Weighted GPA
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): Somewhere in the top 20%

APs:
10th Grade: AP World History
11th Grade: AP United States History, AP Chemistry, AP English Language and Composition
12th Grade: AP Biology, AP Calculus AB, CAPP Spanish 204 (Dual Credit), AP English Literature, AP Psychology, PLTW/AP Computer Science Principles

I’ve also taken all the hardest (advanced/rigorous) courses that my school has offered

AP Tests:
APUSH: 5
AP Chemistry: 4
AP English Language and Composition: 3

Senior Year Course Load:
PLTW/AP Computer Science Principles
CAPP Spanish 204 (Dual Credit)
AP Psychology
AP Biology
AP English Literature
AP Calculus AB
AP Biology
Advanced Marketing (Dual Credit)

Major Awards (USAMO, Intel, etc.): 3rd in DECA Regionals for Marketing, JA Career Certificate, JA Company Certificate (I don’t know if the JA things would be considered awards)
Common Awards (AP Scholar, honor roll, NM things, etc.): AP Scholar, Academic Excellence Award

Extracurriculars (name, grade levels, leadership, description):

DECA (member, 9-12, Business club)
Marketing Internship (Student Intern, 12, work with real business clients for a real marketing firm, 10hr/week)
Indian Club (member, 11-12, learn about Indian things or in my case just be Indian)
International Club (member, 12, learn about cultures through international exchange students)
Chinese American Club (member, 12, Learn about Chinese culture)
Key Club (member, 12, volunteer and stuff)
School Store Worker (worker, 9-10, work in the school store)
and possibly an IT internship at a national Shipping company this year (paid internship, 450+ hours)

Essays & Recs:
Teacher Recs: Pretty confident about these
Counselor Rec: Not sure how good it will be
Essay: 6-8/10

Schools I’m Applying to (Computer Engineering or Computer Science):

Cornell | College of Engineering (ED for this or CMU)
Carnegie Mellon | College of Engineering (ED for this or Cornell)
University of Michigan | College of Engineering (EA)
Georgia Tech (EA)
UW Madison (Normal)
University of Illinois Urbana Champaign | Computer Engineering (Normal)

What do you think? Do I have a chance at these universities? Could you guys tell me my chances with the 31 ACT and the 33 ACT so that I know if I already have a good shot or not and if I what I can expect if I get my expected score? Thanks!

2

Why not applying to UWI EA? That is your match school and you may want to have it in your pocket as early as possible. For UIUC, it would be a reach for you. Computer engineering there is super competitive and even ACT 33 is below admission average. More important, make sure you can afford it as you will not get any aid from them. For UMich CoE, your GPA is below their admission average (3.9) while your ACT is at (or below in the latest admission stat) the 25th percentile. So it would be a reach for you from OOS. The admission average last year was 33 for 2014. So even with that would be a mid reach for you. I know an in state student got rejected from UMich CoE this year with ACT 33 and GPA like you.

3

UWI EA? Do you mean apply to UW Madison for Early Admission? If so, there is no early admission I think. There are only the deadlines for the first notification (Nov 2) and the second notification (Feb 1). I will apply for the Nov 2 deadline but there isn’t really an early admission. Also I know I will have an extremely good chance at Madison but I want to see if it’s possible to get accepted into the other competitive colleges too, and money isn’t too much of a problem.

4

Go to your guidance department and ask them for your high school’s acceptance history at these schools. Don’t ask them for their OPINION, ask for the data (like if you have Naviance data, otherwise they keep it all in their school databases). That will tell you with much greater certainty what your chances are.

5

CMU and Cornell will be a large reach, also considering that you are Indian, and that is a very competitive group from which you will be considered and judged against.

6

@Liod23 UWI may call their EA (Early Action, not early admission) a different name, it is still the same thing except that it is a kind of rolling. If you apply early, you may get the admission notice earlier. When you call it “normal”, it sounds like the Feb deadline as most other schools do. My D submitted her application in October and get the admission in November. You just want to pocket that admission as a safety backup. Your chance for the other schools on the list are not high. You may want to add Purdue to the list which should be a match for you.