Chance Me, Kinda Weird App

adchang
Tue, 09 Nov 2010 20:46:14 +0000

I have a friend who was actually admitted to Johns Hopkins junior year-- I don’t know the exact details though. He chose to finish high school, and his eventual choice was to stay in-state-- he couldn’t afford it.

But Harvard, no offense to JH, is a cut above.

A 2200 is decent, but I wouldn’t say by any means a “strong point” of your application. Your GPA is excellent, but it could mean anything-- without some sort of standardized comparison as to the rigor of your classes (no AP/IB in your first two years?) it is impossible to hazard a guess about the “rigor” of your school. Like, I have a 3.92 unweighted, but have 4 5’s and 2 4’s on AP exams. I know some people with 4.0’s, but haven’t made over a 3 on an AP exam.

Your EC’s are pretty nice, I assume you want to study math, computer science or engineering?

However, the clincher will be your essay and recommendations. First, I don’t know what teachers would say if you asked for recommendations. From what I know, recommenders are generally teachers (who like you) that taught you junior year in a core academic class, preferably a “difficult” or AP/IB level one that you did well in.

Far as your SAT writing/reading scores, (though these are by no means a measure of “true” writing ability necessarily) I honestly don’t know what sort of essay you would be able to hash out that would set you apart from the several tens of thousands of others.

This said, I suggest you wait a year and apply before Nov. 1 for all those schools next year. You’ll have time for a really great essay, as well as getting some AP/IB scores, and making nice with prospective recommenders.