international student
rising senior at STEM School (a boarding school)
Female
interested in music, empowering women in STEAM, Art, and highly committed to research.
GPA: 3.7/4
My school does not offer ranks
ACT/SAT Scores: test optional
Coursework
My school does not offer any IB or AP courses.
I did discover that I am very interested in chemistry, especially organic and materials chemistry, during my work on my project which I have received several honors for. I’ve got to discover more about organic chemistry as I focused mainly on polymers and finding new ways to cross-link them. Furthermore, I was interested in using organic compounds in treating cancer.
Awards
Third place in the materials science category at the National Science and Engineering Fair
Was Selected out of 1000 projects to represent my country at the YESIST12 competition in Tunisia.
Bronze medal and Best Sustainable Development special award at IGEM Mena league
Second place at the Nasa Space Apps Challenge at the state Hackathon.
Secured 134th place at the qualifying exams of STEM School and was selected out of 20000+ students to receive the scholarship and join the school.
Won first place nationally in ninth grade in a music competition as a violinist in the school’s music team.
*Extracurriculars
Volunteered at a charity in my country. During this time, we visited the cancer hospital, got to learn more about the hospital, and played with kids. We also visited shelters for dogs and cats in Egypt and have done a lot of activities to help our community, including collecting donations, sorting clothes, and donating them to people in need
Head of Academics of Students’ English Activities Team in school.
Supervised the academic content of the sessions held by the team and volunteered as an instructor to serve more than 100 students and direct them regarding English skills and standardized tests.
Member of the organizing committee at MUN at my school, organized interviews and conferences held by the team
Volunteered as an instructor in the school’s counseling club, guiding more than 100 students regarding extracurricular activities.
Best science coach at a Team. Held online sessions, coaching more than 50 students in the field of science, and making them prepared for the qualifying test of STEM School. Through the sessions, we solved more than 100 questions.
Founder of a Girl Up Club at my community which aims to empower girls in fields of STEAM.
Violinist at the school’s music team.
Essays/LORs/Other
I am still working on my PS and I don’t have any prompt in mind yet.
Cost Constraints / Budget
My family contribution is 0 due to the inflation in my country. So, I will be applying for full financial aid.
Schools
Amherst (need blind but hard to get in)
University of Chicago
Wesleyan
Vassar
Denison
Franklin and Marshal
Bryn Mawr: My Dream college
Bard
Reed
Sewanee
Rhodes
Whitman
Lafayette
Connecticut college
Colgate
Bucknell
Washington at St. Louis
Are you planning to go to medical school? If so…where? Because international students have VERY small chances of getting accepted to medical schools here…and paying for this will be impossible if you don’t have some of your own funds.
Your biggest obstacle will be getting a full free ride here. Your list is comprised of a lot of reach schools OR schools that do not guarantee to meet full need for all accepted students. I hope you have an affordable option in your home country.
What does this mean? Your cost of living in your country will not be used to calculate need based aid. Your family income and assets will be used. Inflation is happening everywhere and doesn’t factor into the financial aid calculations.
Why are you going test optional? In my opinion, an international student really would benefit from submitting a test score.
Then the cost of college here will be an obstacle as many of your schools are need aware for admissions and will consider your financial need when they review your application for admission.
Your family will need to complete a certificate of finances for you to gain a student visa here. Will your family be able to show that there is money to support your college costs here? This can include already awarded college financial aid. It cannot include potential forms of money that are not yet secured.
Look at the acceptance rates for these colleges on your list and divide in half. That is about what the acceptance rate is for international students.
I’m hoping that some folks here can give you some options that will be affordable, and where your chance of acceptance is higher.
I’m unable to speak to the chance me part of your post because I’m unfamiliar with the schools on your list, but did want to comment about your major.
Based on your interests, you may want to consider chemical engineering as a major as it combines both chemistry and materials. My daughter, a recent college grad, works in the advanced polymer industry. She and most of her colleagues studied chemical engineering as undergrads. My daughter did a concentration in polymers and materials engineering, but it’s very much a subset of chemical engineering.
Chemical engineering also is more employable, even without a graduated degree.
Just some food for thought but it would greatly change your college list if you pivoted to chem e.
OP likely lives in a country where minimum wage earners make about $120-130 a month and $300 a month is middle class. So, EFC0 and would need full aid, which colleges that meet need could provide but need aware colleges will be difficult.
OP is likely attending a pioneer school, sort of like Stuyvesant with regional entrance exams (hence the boarding school, as students come from hundreds of miles around). @mmmmkkk1 :
Are you preparing a baccalaureate? Will you be able to present grades or scores from an externally-graded national exam?
Are your teachers used to writing US style recommendation letters?
I don’t think Bryn Mawr is a good choice because of your SAI (new accronym for what used to be EFC). Your best best would be to ED to Bowdoin or Amherst (chemistry major). Wondering if Dartmouth would be a possibility.
It means having everything ready early. Will you and your school be able to do that?
Do you have school options in your home country, including at least one safety school?
I do think you will have some acceptances on your list, but none that may be affordable.
Agree with myos to look at Bowdoin, Amherst, Dartmouth for ED (Bowdoin also has ED2, so you could pick Dartmouth or Amherst ED1 and if deferred or denied, choose Bowdoin ED2).
I’m not so sure that it matters that much whether the college is need-aware for internationals or not. Given the fact that the handful of need-blind colleges like Amherst, Harvard and Yale, are already rejecting 90% or more of their applicants (who may or may not be applying for FA), it would be hard to make the case that being awarded a full-ride from Wesleyan - which is need-aware - would be any more difficult. In other words, the selectivity rate for internationals seeking lots of need-based aid would be in the single digits for both kinds of highly selective colleges.
I do think that Wesleyan should remain a contender as it has an African Scholars Program that covers the full cost of attendance for up to 10 African students each year. The link on this page for the African Scholars Program goes to the Freeman Asian Scholars Program, but I suspect if you reach out to Wesleyan, you can get access to the correct information:
I have options in my home country, a lot of options actually, but I would love to study at the U.S.
I had Bowdoin, Amherst, and Dartmouth in my previous college list but I though that It would be impossible for me to get in.
For what it is worth I agree with you. It seems to me every college is finding a way to ration out a limited International aid budget (if they have one at all). A few colleges are managing to do that by being so hard for even extremely well-qualified Internationals to get admitted that they don’t need to do anything more to stay on budget. Many more instead are a bit easier for highly qualified full pay Internationals than highly qualified high need Internationals, but I am not sure that actually makes them harder than the first group for high need Internationals! It is more that they get a little less hard (sometimes very little less) for full pay Internationals.
Then eventually you get to the point that highly qualified full pay Internationals are actually pretty likely to get admitted. And yet equally qualified but high need Internationals may still find it much harder. But again, not necessarily any worse than for high need Internationals at any of the above, it is more that they are simply not benefiting as much from the improving odds for full pay Internationals.
Assuming all that is right, the first time something really significantly “new” happens for highly qualified high need Internationals is when you get to the colleges that actually see them as an opportunity to get some highly qualified students they could not otherwise get. And then they start not just admitting the ones they want, but maybe even offering them merit money.
None of this is meant to discourage highly qualified high need Internationals from taking some shots at what would be reach/target schools for US applicants, where if admitted they could get enough need aid to be on budget.
But I tend to agree whether those colleges are nominally need blind or need aware for Internationals may make less difference in their actual chances than hoped.
The college board does not provide fee waivers for international students but some colleges (not all) will do something for you.
I would strongly suggest you check every college website of interest for their policies and what you will be required to submit for consideration for need based financial aid.
In your first post in this thread, you still had Amherst listed.
You have quite a few highly competitive colleges on your list.
I agree that Bowdoin might be a better option and possibly a tad less selective than some of the other colleges on your list…and they guarantee to meet full need for accepted international students AND are need blind for international students.
Good that you have some affordable options in your own country just in case the finances don’t work out here.
High need international students typically send the ISFAA (unless the college provides a CSS fee waiver because of the income disparity between countries.
All of these are incredibly difficult to get into.
If you find a way to raise the money it may worth it to try the SAT or ACT so you can try&qualify for merit money, though full rides are rare and you would likely get better academics either in your country or in a partner country such as France or Britain.
Note that some colleges recognize externally graded, national exams.
You can look at endowment per student+women’s college to see whether one has a very big budget per student and thus a higher likelihood of being able to fund a student who needs a full ride.
I don’t know how the international specific acceptance rates compare, but Bowdoin’s class of 2028 acceptance rate is 7%, Amherst’s 9% (Dartmouth 5%). I don’t think acceptance rate should necessarily drive OP’s strategy, but it would be one way to make decisions.
That is good news. So no harm in giving things a try in the US, at both need blind and need aware schools. Any might choose to fund you (but all are reaches.)
I’m amazed no one has mentioned Smith College. Not only do they have a large number of international students, but it’s one of the few LACs with an engineering program.