Demographics
Asian, Male, International- New Zealand, Private School, $100k income
Intended major to study at college: Development Studies
Stats
SAT: 1510
iB Diploma predicted score: 42/45, Subjects: SL English A, Math and French HL Bio, Econ, Geo
AP Human Geography 5
AP Environmental Science 5
Awards:
Academic Colours and Honours for all five years of high school.
French Prize
Geography Prize
Biology Prize
New Zealand Oustanding scholarship in Geography (Top 0.1%)
New Zealand scholarship in Statistics (Top 3%)
Leadership position at high school: Peer support leader, focus on Geography mentoring
EC’s:
Research with Geography professor at university (2 research assignments/papers)
Bronze Medal at 16th International Geography Olympiad (iGEO)
Worked with Geography teacher to set up a Scholarship geography workshop for students wishing to take the annual Geography Scholarship exam in my country.
Captain of Varsity Squash and second tennis team at school
ESOL, Mathex (math competition held in my country) and S2S (student to student) mentor at high school.
Co-founder of two businesses (one is an amazon affiliates website and another is a service/package for post natal packages for new mums)- New Zealand Startup Company of the Year award, over 10,000 website views and hundreds of sales combined.
Team leader of a group of 10-12 for a sporting organisation volunteering at national sports events.
Jobs:
Holiday programme tennis coach
Food and Beverage steward at national sports stadium
Rec Letters (not decided yet):
iB Geography teacher
iB Biology Teacher
Team leader for the geography olympiad.
If you are sure that you want to attend Cornell, and if you can afford it, then I would give it a try.
Given your stats, I am guessing that the best universities in New Zealand are probably safeties for you. To me this suggests that there is no point in applying to anything other than the really top schools in the US, such as Cornell.
Your profile is outstanding. You could probably go anywhere in the world. In fact, why are you thinking Cornell? It’s a great school, but on a lower tier among elite universities. Is it a really great fit for you? Because, if not, I’d look into Harvard/Yale/Princeton, Stanford, or Oxford/Sorbonne.
@TRCO271, It is nice to be encouraging, but the OP is not a shoo-in for Cornell, and Cornell is not on a “much lower” tier than HYPS. And: the Sorbonne is not a peer university with Oxford, and Cornell heavily outranks it on all of the international rankings of universities.
OP, your predicted IB score is super, but your HL subjects are not famous for being the most challenging in their categories (by reputation or by the annual Statistical Bulletin results listing), and the same is true of your APs. Geo does line up with your ECs though. Just as an fyi, your SAT is in the middle 50% of admitted students for Cornell. On CC a profile like yours is sometimes called ‘average excellent’
I’m not sure what course you are interested in when you say “Development Studies”. Do you mean the Ag & Rural Development program (BS Ag) in CALS? If so, your science is thin for the course (they like Bio, Chem & Physics), but the only ask for pre-calc, and as there is Calc in the SL Math, that might off-set the lack of physics, and they might take the APES.
The headline admit rate for Cornell is 10%, but note that of the 3218 first year students enrolled this autumn, just 346 were internationals: that is, ~10% of the 10%. I’m with @DadTwoGirls girls on this one: you will have your pick of places in NZ (and Aus), so going straight for the top is a reasonable way to go.
Make sure you have your universities in NZ lined up (+ top universities that recruit on stats - beside Australia, UBC in Canada, for instance).
You have the stats for Cornell ED and an unusual major - so, your chances are fine, but only means that instead of 1% your odds are 5%. Your family’s income will be against you since Cornell is need-aware.
Cornell also has dev studies via the social sciences.
I’m not sure how all that “geography” relates to or promotes you for DS. If you mean human geography, you neither mentioned that, nor show that background. There seems to be a lack of any apparent interest in communities. Starting a business isn’t relevant (nor the number of views. This is a college app, not for an internship.) And volunteering at sports events isn’t digging into comm service or any evidence if curiosity about the people around you, etc.
So I think they’re going to wonder why this major and whether you put the pieces together, what you’re thinking.
