Chance me for Columbia ED plus others

Chance Me / Match Me
1

Demographics

  • US citizen (green card)
  • State/Location of residency: New York
  • Type of high school: highly competitive public high school
  • Other special factors: Prolly non, first to go to a US college i guess

Cost Constraints / Budget
Full Pay

Intended Major(s): Operations Research: Engineering Management Systems
or Financial Economics

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 3.65/4.4
  • Weighted HS GPA: 4.05/4.4, +.5 honors, +1 for APs
  • Class Rank: Doesn’t rank
  • ACT/SAT Scores: ACT:36 (36 on all subjects including science), SAT: 1580 (800 Math and 780 Eng)

List your HS coursework

(Indicate advanced level, such as AP, IB, AICE, A-level, or college, courses as well as specifics in each subject)

  • English: English 9 H, English 10 H, AP Seminar, AP Research
  • Math: (including highest level course(s) completed): Geometry H, Algebra 1 &2 H, Intro to Calc H, AP Calc AB, AP Calc BC
  • Science: (including which ones, such as biology, chemistry, physics) Bio H, Earth Science H, AP Bio, AP Physics 1, AP Physics C
  • History and social studies: Global history 9 H, AP World, AP USH, AP Cogo
  • Language other than English: (including highest level completed) Spanish 1-3
  • Visual or performing arts: Studio in Art
  • Other academic courses: AP Pysch, AP Stats, AP Personal Biz

Awards
Accepted into YC AI Startup School (not a full batch) its a startup school consisting of 2 days in SF. Its pretty decently competitive to get picked they base it on ur tech profile and what you have built. So it ranges from highschool kids to like stanford kids and like some phds. (I dont know if this counts)

AP Scholar

Math Honor Society

Seal of Civic Award

Extracurriculars
Activity 1: Startup (could be called passion project ig)

  • Position/Leadership Description: Co-Founder and main technical head

  • Description: Developed a desktop where designers can connect all their creative apps and have AI natively draw on each app with shared context from different apps (if there was a thread where your PM asked for something in Jira or anywhere we can get that context and natively update ur figma file etc). Product got noticed by a startup enthusiast with 216 followers on a live stream when he was hunting startups and got interest from Tier 1 VC, and took 3.5 months to build, generated 29k in a 4 month window. Had Stanford alumni as our COO and a few tech roles from students studying at Virginia Tech

Activity 2: Another startup product I pivoted from my first activity to make

  • Position/Leadership Description: Co-Founder and main technical head

  • Description: Built a canvas where as designers shape and build interfaces with their hands like they do in Figma; real time React code is generated on the side. This was a deep browsing rendering pipeline we built and modified where it let anyone ship interfaces faster without turning it to code, and also add motion to their components so they can build the motion aspects of their components too. Currently pre-beta had 100+ designers worldwide including few designers from Wells Fargo be our earliest users.

Activity 3: Research

  1. co-authorship on which will prolly get published in Q1

  2. and currently is under mentorship from a professor at NUS ranked #8 worldwide and arguably the best in the world for AI ML research.

Only concern is the paper might not get published by tmlr before nov 1st.

Activity 4: Multi agent pipeline to predict low float stocks 24 hrs before

  • Position/Leadership Description: Independent Machine Learning Researcher

  • Description (149 characters): Fine-tuned Chinese SLM with custom weights/agents for low-float stock forecasting. Led to 140%+ portfolio growth; sold pipeline code for $25K

Activity 5: Internship at an early stage VC backed Startup

It was a startup related with training models on predicting how human consumers will react to advertisements and content. Getting a LOR from the founder since I worked my ass.

Activity 6: Currently building an SDK where its a new integration layer for mobile apps where they can make extra money by adding this SDK into their app where we collect data, clean it, and see if labs or companies would pay for it and make a legal contract towards it. In talks with angel investor might raise before ED1 deadline

Activity 7: Varsity Badminton all 4 yrs

Essays/LORs/Other

Personal Essay: My AP research teacher glazed it. (9/10) But I might switch it up since it was my first draft maybe towards my external circumstances but I dont know if I wanna write about it, i feel scared it might come off as a sob story or excuses.

LORs: LORs: My AP physics teacher had me for physics 1 and C he likes me a lot. And my AP Research teacher (prolly my fav teacher and we always have very deep talks so ig he will write a good letter)

Can get an outside LOR from the a professor at NUS (National University of Singapore)

Schools
ED1: Columbia

RD: UMich Ross
RD: Harvard (just for fun)
RD: UPenn
RD: Stony Brook
RD: Suny Buffalo
RD: I am honestly RDing to all t20s

Chance me for Northwestern ED Weinberg A&S for Econ [NY resident, 3.65 GPA, 36 ACT, 1580 SAT]
Chance me for Columbia ED1 for Econ [NY resident, 3.65 GPA, 36 ACT, 1580 SAT]
4

I’m confused -

OP - are you a citizen or do you have a green card? I assume you are a green card but saying all schools will see you as domestic? I don’t know the answer but suspect you are right. But someone can say if that’s incorrect because being international will be harder.

What is AP Cogo?

Now you come out with the truth - all top 20s - so it’s not I want to be close to home. If you get into Rice or UCLA, then not being in NY is ok?

I think you get into Buffalo and Stony Brook and no one else on your list. That’s just my guess.

The UCs won’t see your score.

If you are not a US Citizen, your odds may be worse.

I’m glad you have the two SUNYs.

Top 20 - and I’m not sure if that’s US News or Poets and Quants or Wall Street Journal or Linkedin or whoever - there’s probably 50 top 20 - but that’s a lot of apps so you should look at curriculums and slim down. If you are ok with the SUNYs, you’re done. If you want some with ranking “heft”, I mentioned a few before but a Richmond, UMD, Lafayette, Bucknell, Brandeis, U Miami type might be good fits. Syracuse would be safe but the Maxwell School is top notch.

Not sure the LOR is needed from overseas. Will it add more than they’ll find from your teachers here?

Given your entrepreneurial bent, you might also look at Babson and U Houston.

Best of luck.

5

AP Comp Gov

1 Like
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Thank you for completing the chance me/match me!

I’m glad to see you have some less selective but good options on your list. SUNY Buffalo is a great option. @aunt_bea can elaborate.

You can apply ED to Columbia if you would like to. Just make sure you have your other applications either ready to submit…or submitted…just in case Columbia doesn’t work out.

I think applying to all of the T 20 schools might not be the best strategy…that’s a LOT of applications to do well. You might want to look at that list and perhaps make some decisions about that.

Also, there are a lot of schools out of the top 20 that could meet your educational goals. Maybe look a little at those.

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This student says they are a green card holder. IIRC, they will be treated the same as U.S. citizens for admissions and aid purposes when applying to college.

@MYOS1634 @Mwfan1921 can you clarify?

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I’m not them, but I can answer the question. Permanent Residents (AKA Green Card holders) are treated the same as US citizens for admissions and FA.

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I thought but wanted someone to confirm - which sounds like just happened.

Thanks

10

s10342

A perfect 144 on the ACT. No college admissions committee is going to ignore this!

This may need to be your ultimate college application strategy due to your 3.65 unweighted GPA. I discussed this previously in one of your former posts.

For Columbia, you will need to decide whether to apply to Columbia College or Columbia Engineering. The major in Financial Economics is offered by Columbia College but the major in Operations Research is offered by Columbia Engineering. Do you have plans to apply to a specific major? For example, apply for operations research at Columbia but apply to economics at UPenn Wharton?

Schools like NYU, Syracuse, SUNY, & CUNY should definitely merit some consideration, ones you have a much higher and realistic chance of gaining acceptance.

By the way, what are your AP scores?

11

Yes, permanent residents (“green card holders”) are considered domestic applicants just like US citizens for admissions and financial aid.
(If part of their HS curriculum follows another country’s, they’re compared within the parameters of that country’s system.)

ETA
What does this mean?

(I saw the video from the museum lady who used the term for an object from the museum, but I forgot what it meant in context).

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Yeah Columbia is my top school right now, I want to apply to Columbia Engineering since my ECs really stick there even my co author paper. But I dont know if I will pass the first academic screening due to my 2 Cs during sophomore year. But I am applying different majors but in the same field at different schools.

But all my SUNY schools and CUNY i am viewing as safeties.

My AP scores I might send in, cuz honestly I am not tryna pay but wtv

AP Physics 1: 5
AP Calc AB: 5
AP Bio: 4
AP USH: 4
AP World: 4
AP Seminar: 4
AP Stats: 3
AP Pysh: 5

13

Can you talk in adult please? You may be a kid but you’re talking to adults and I have no idea what you’re trying to say?

Some schools will require you to list your scores on your app if you have them.

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14

Columbia, Northwestern, and SUNY/CUNY are not amongst them.

Rephrased in a polished manner - avoid shorthand or informal slang, as it makes your point difficult to understand. If you are seeking advice from experienced members, you need to tailor your communication to your audience.

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15

Add Carnegie Mellon to your list. Also MIT. Your strength is Comp Sci and AI - your achievement in that area sounds really off the charts. Assuming that there is a good reason for that 10th grade slip up, a school might look at your EC record and your stellar scores, and take a gamble on you.

Speak with your HS guidance counselor, and let them tell the story of what happened in 10th grade in the most sympathetic but honest way possible. You talk about the positives in your essays, about your future plans, about what the school has to offer you, in your educational journey, why they’re the right match for you.

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16

My main observation is you seem to like private colleges, but you are not planning to apply to any private Target or Likely colleges.

Obviously this is ultimately up to you, but over several cycles now I have seen quite a few kids get blanked by their private Reaches, and then they are upset they only have public Safeties as an option. Even just one private Likely and 2-3 private Targets would likely have given them more choices.

I have also seen quite a few kids get into some Reaches and then actually choose a Likely or Target. Merit offers, honors programs, other specific academic programs, or just really liking the college can all be factors. Again, it doesn’t take many carefully chosen applications to potentially make this an option.

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Correct. Probably none, because most colleges will not consider you first generation if your parents attended college elsewhere.

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I copied & pasted one of your previous posts for the sake of clarity. You’ve expressed a few times concern over not passing the initial screening (for both Columbia & Northwestern) by the admissions committee, which is indeed warranted.

So you’d be applying for Operations Research & not Financial Economics at Columbia? Also, you mention that your ECs & co-authored paper “really stick”? What does this mean? Is a professor at Columbia somehow involved in one of your ECs or in your current research?

There is nothing necessarily wrong with this. You are targeting colleges, specifically T20, based on overall reputation. As a full-pay applicant, you could have an slight admissions advantage at the need-aware schools. But remember that applicants with perfect scores get rejected every admissions cycle, especially at T20 schools. And also applicants with “C+” grades.

I would discourage you from doing this. Apply only if you are interested in attending.

19

Yes, but the student said all top 20. Stanford, as one example says,

AP

AP exams are not mandatory; however, if you have taken any AP exams, even if you self-studied for them, you are required to self-report all your AP scores in your application.

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s10342 probably should avoid applying to schools that factor in AP exam scores for college admission (e.g. Stanford & Yale).

It’s a nice mix of AP scores but not all "5"s.

Plus he did receive a “C+” in AP Statistics along with a “3” on the AP exam.

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