Chance me for Princeton and Harvard, 3.1 UW but large upward trajectory, 1460 SAT, NMSF [NM resident, physics or engineering]

Chance Me / Match Me
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Guidelines

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Demographics

  • US domestic
  • State/Location of residency: NM
  • Type of high school (or current college for transfers): public charter school
  • Other special factors: (first generation to college, legacy, recruitable athlete, etc.) second gen immigrant

Cost Constraints / Budget
(High school students: please get a budget from your parents and use the Net Price Calculators on the web sites of colleges of interest.)

Intended Major(s)

physics

Engineering

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: (calculate it yourself if your high school does not calculate it) 3.1
  • Weighted HS GPA: (must specify weighting system; note that weighted GPA from the high school is usually not informative, unless aligned with the recalculation used by a college of interest, such as CA, FL, SC public universities) 3.3
  • College GPA: (for transfer applicants)
  • Class Rank: none
  • ACT/SAT Scores: 1460, 720 math 740 reading

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, English 10, IB English Lit HL 2y

  • Math: (including highest level course(s) completed)

    Algebra 1, Geometry, Advanced Algebra 2, IB Math AA SL 2 years

  • Science: (including which ones, such as biology, chemistry, physics) Physics, Biology, Chemistry, IB physics HL 2 years

  • History and social studies: Advanced NM History, World History and Georgraphy, Economics, Advanced US History and Geography, IB History SL, We The People, IB Psychology SL, IB Core

  • Language other than English: (including highest level completed)

    Spanish II, Spanish III, Heritage Spanish 10, IB Spanish B HL 2y

  • Visual or performing arts: Modern Music, Modern Music, Modern Music III

  • Other academic courses:

College Coursework (Transfer Applicants)
(Include college courses taken while in high school if not included above.)

  • General education course work:
  • Major preparation course work:

Awards

National Merit Semifinalist

IB learner trait award for risk taking

College Board National Recognition

Extracurriculars
(Include leadership, summer activities, competitions, volunteering, and work experience)

Varsity Girls Swim Team Captain

Swim team (2y)

Dance (4y)

Hiking Club (2y)

Varsity speech and debate (3y)

Music, playing and performing 5 instruments, self taught music theory and music production (4y)

Math, self taught calculus in 10th grade, learn math recreationally (3y)

Essays/LORs/Other
(Optionally, guess how strong these are and include any other relevant information or circumstances.)

Basically about improving as a student and the things that inspired me to do that, uses a quantum physics metapjor

Schools
(List of colleges by your initial chance estimate; designate if applying ED/EA/RD; if unsure, leave them unclassified)

REA: Princeton or Harvard

RD: NYU, RIT,

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I think no to all four but maybe an outside shot at RIT.

Do you have any budget concerns ? You can go for near free with NMSF at U Tulsa.

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Why a no

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Your GPA and SAT are low for the first three (very low) and gpa low for RIT.

What is your budget? You chose 100k a year schools.

Maybe I’m wrong. Apply but you need safer schools.

U Arizona would be a home run for you.

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Look again, I listed my math courses.

All of the schools I listed cover tuition for low income families like mine

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Yes I removed b4 u wrote back.

I don’t believe RIT meets need.

Nonetheless, with your stats, you are not close.

4.0 and 1600 get turned down at Harvard and Princeton. NYU is tough. RIT is possible.

What is your class rank ?

Your home state UNM and NM Tech would be other good ones to look at.

Anyway, that’s my opinion. Sorry if you don’t agree.

Here’s what Tulsa offers - fine school. They are generous with NMSF.

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What is the matter with UNM? It has your majors and would be a great bargain for you as instate resident. Terrific option well worth considering.

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Let’s start with the good news.

I don’t see the details of your uptrend. However, I am confident that an uptrend will help you a lot. This will help you with university admissions. More importantly, it will help you to be ready to do well once you get to university. This is a big deal. This is way more important than whether you get into a famous or highly ranked university for undergrad. Also, your SAT is quite good and suggests that you are likely to do well in university (particularly when combined with the hard work and improved study habits that are needed to create an uptrend).

However…

You can apply if you want to. I do not see either one happening for your undergraduate education. Your GPA is way low for these two schools. While your SAT is quite good, it is way below the median and somewhat below the 25th percentile for both Princeton and Harvard. Personally I would not even bother applying to either.

Also, I would not apply REA for another reason: You probably should want to apply EA to other universities where admissions is way more likely.

I think that NYU is similarly unlikely. Your chances there and at RIT might (?) partly depend upon how strong your uptrend is.

For engineering you should be looking for schools that are ABET accredited, and that are a good fit for you, and affordable, and where you can get accepted. They do not need to be famous or highly ranked.

I did not think that this was true for RIT. For the other three schools it is true if you can get accepted, but to me that seems unlikely.

As others have pointed out, there are some very good schools where you can get accepted and do very well. Your uptrend is huge and will most likely help you several ways, but probably not as an undergraduate student at Princeton, Harvard, or NYU.

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Have you and your parents checked the net price calculator for each college of interest?

In any case, a 3.1 GPA makes Princeton, Harvard, and NYU unrealistic reaches.

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At NYU, 1% of enrollees have a 3-3.24 UW GPA and it might be closer to the top. None were lower.

Just to give you a sense.

The 1460 is below their 25th percentile SAT but there only 28% submit. I’m guessing you are well ahead of your school’s average so that helps.

And you need to have your family run the NPC on schools to see what they say how much you’d pay. You may think they cover the bill but they may think otherwise.

There are many other meets needs schools - they’re still a reach but less so - like Denison, Oberlin, BU if you want urban. Still unlikely but they aren’t Harvard/Princeton.

Just curious - where did you find RIT? It sticks out in that group.

Tulsa is a home run. If you get NMF, that will open more including full rides.

So that you are NMSF is a home run assuming schools accept you !!!

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A large upward trend resulting in a 3.1 cumulative GPA means that your earlier grades had to be C’s and below. Competitive-but-holistic colleges are often willing to forget earlier stumbles followed by strong improvement, but this sounds like a lot to overcome when aiming for colleges with single-digit acceptance rates, where and overwhelming majority of accepted students are at the top of their high school classes. What is your college counselor going to say in your recommendation, about any extenuating circumstances in the earlier part of high school?

Why are you singling out some of the most difficult schools to get into? If it’s because you need the most generous financial aid possible, then RIT doesn’t fit the pattern. But there are schools that do meet need and aren’t as ridiculously hard to get into as Harvard and Princeton.

It may be that UNM or one of the other New Mexico publics ends up being your best option, and you can get a great education at one of these. What don’t you like about them? Is it that you want to go farther from home? Is it that you think you’d be happier at a private university rather than a public one? Is it that the aid at the top privates is better than what you’d get at an in-state public? Is it just wanting a famous school that everyone has heard of? What’s driving your decision tree?

Have your parents run Net Price Calculators for the schools you’re already interested in? Since you’re hoping to go somewhere with need-based aid, you and your family should familiarize yourself with NPC’s and run them for every school you consider. Plus, it would help commenters here to know your actual budget - what UNM would cost for you, and what elite schools like Harvard and Princeton would cost if you were to get in, and what costs would actually be manageable for your family. (You note that these schools are “tuition free” for lower-income families, and this is true, but non-tuition expenses can still cost upwards of 20K/year so “tuition free” doesn’t automatically equal affordable, for a lot of students.)

Once you have that info on the schools you’re already thinking about, IMHO, you should try running NPC’s for some still-excellent but slightly-more accessible schools. For example, try running the numbers for Trinity University in San Antonio. It would be a change of scene from NM but potentially driveable. Trinity offers multiple engineering disciplines, and physics, plus an established pathway to double-major in physics and engineering science: https://www.trinity.edu/academics/departments/physics-and-astronomy/double-major-roadmap They meet full need, and admissions are need-blind.

Others to look at could be Lehigh (no-loan financial aid for low-income students), Lafayette, Case Western Reserve (check out their ABET-accredited Engineering Physics major Engineering Physics, BSE < Case Western Reserve University) and U of Rochester. And since you’re female, check out Smith College also. Smith College | Engineering Smith has strong physics and engineering in its own right, and you can also cross-register at its consortium partner schools including UMass Amherst and Amherst College.

To be clear, I’m not saying that any of these would be an admissions slam-dunk for you. A mixed profile like yours is always a judgment call for colleges, and nobody here can predict how that will go. But applying to some schools that at least have double-digit acceptance rates (but still offer generous financial aid) would be a step in the right direction.

The thing is that, as tsbna says, there are some full ride or nearly-full-ride scholarships available for NMSF that could be far more advantageous for you than relying on need-based aid. U of Tulsa will give you a full ride even if you don’t make Finalist (not a problem for most semifinalists, but I’m unclear as to whether your grades could make that not a sure thing). Tulsa is a mid-sized private university; if Ivies appeal to you, then Tulsa might as well. They have engineering physics too… and if you’d have any interest in continuing your Spanish studies, you could look at their International Science & Engineering program, which is a five-year dual-degree program (fully funded for you) where the fourth year would be spent abroad in a Spanish-speaking country. (One semester of academic classes, plus a full-semester internship.)

Other NMF scholarships to look at would be those at UT-Dallas, U of Alabama, U of Alabama Huntsville (smaller and more STEM-focused than the Tuscaloosa flagship), U of Central Florida, and U of Maine. Engineering Physics

I don’t think a “Harvard/Princeton or bust” approach would work out well, but there’s no harm in a few super-reach applications as long as it doesn’t divert energy from applying to less-rejective schools as well.

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Remember NYU is test-flexible as well as TO, so the 28% likely understates the total number of students submitting some form of standardized test (a spread of APs across subjects, IB diploma etc). I agree the GPA makes it a reach. Typical GPA is 3.7%; but also remember that this is likely brought down slightly by Tisch where portfolios/auditions can offset lower grades to an extent. (It is probably also Tisch that partly skews testing stats % down as for similar reasons.)

Unclear exactly how the grade trend has progressed; Princeton places less emphasis on 9th grade (but doesn’t ignore it completely).

Princeton REA does not restrict EA to public schools so OP can do both (but cannot apply to privates through EA or ED).

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Check out Colleges that Change Lives ctcl.org

Princeton and Harvard are among the hardest schools to get into. But aside from that, prestige is not a good reason to apply to schools. How much do you know about other options? Generous financial aid is certainly one reason to apply to top schools. We don’t know your cost constraints. In my state, CC means automatic admission to the excellent state U. with some benefits like priority registration. Also investigate merit scholarship possibilities at some schools.

Any chance you have been scouted for swimming? Will you swim in college? You can submit a dance video at some schools. Some do a music supplement but it looks like that would not be a fit for you. Interesting that you have taken Modern Music a few times.

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What’s your UW and W GPA by year?

In the likely case you end up going to UNM or NM tech, you should be prepared to know how your IB credit will (or won’t) be accepted. Consider registering for the AP Physics C / calc BC exams if your IB scores won’t be accepted for the courses you would like to skip. (E.G. IB Physics HL will not give you credit for Physics 2, while the physics C EM exam will let you place out of the lecture for physics 2 but not the lab.

Just curious, what did you use to learn calculus in 10th? What math and physics have you learned since?