Chance Me - NJ Resident 3.6 GPA, 1500 SAT, 11 APs, Finance + Stats Major

Chance Me / Match Me
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Demographics

  • Gender: Male
  • Race/Ethnicity: Asian
  • Residence: NJ
  • Income Bracket: Upper middle-class
  • Hooks: None (first-gen, legacy, etc.)

Intended Major(s)

  • Primary: Finance, Statistics
  • Secondary: Supply Chain Management (GT)

Academics

  • GPA: 92-93/100 (School reports weighted, ~3.6 or 89-90/100 UW equivalent)
    • Trend (weighted): 89 → 93 (1 ap) → 95 (5 aps) → 96-98 (5 aps) (projected senior year)
  • SAT: 1500 (790 Math, 710 EBRW)
  • APs: 11 total (all 4s except one 3 so far). macro,micro,bc,apes,gov are senior year so no scores for those
    • STEM: Calc BC, Stats, Physics 1, CSP
    • Business/Econ: Macro, Micro
    • Other: Lang, USH, Psych, Gov, APES
  • Other Courses: 3 PLTW Engineering, 10 Honors, 1 Dual Enrollment (Writing)

Extracurriculars (not finalized for common app in best to worst order)

  1. Published AI Research – First author of peer-reviewed paper on wearable tech in soccer (with college professor who is 2nd author). Spent like a year on this project. 150+ downloads in 1 month.
  2. FBLA National Winner (top 10 nationally in Securities and Investments) 60+ service hours and 3x state qualifier and 1x national winner.
  3. Cybersecurity Internship – NJCCIC Advanced Cybersecurity internship. Competitive state gov program (~15% acceptance rate); case studies, research, creating CTFs, and etc. All contribute to cybersecurity as a whole in NJ and CTFs/unplugged activities will be published for public use.
  4. Algorithmic Trading Bot – Python bot testing RSI/SMA strategies (Published it on GitHub so anyone can edit and give feedback. Mainly did this to learn Python but might as well put it on here as an EC).
  5. Economics Research – Co-led study on light pollution’s economic impact (SSRN-published, influenced policy–proclamation got passed) did this through an internship.
  6. Finance and Quantitative Modeling for Analysts – Completed 4 Wharton Coursera series (Excel, valuation). Got a certificate. (this is more of like a filler ec for the bottom).
  7. Nonprofit Outreach – Expanded astronomy program for visually impaired students to 15+ schools and 150+ students internationally.
  8. Marketing Internship – Increased social media engagement by 25%. Created content to assist teens with mental health. 25k+ followers.
  9. Local tutoring center volunteer (150+hours; 1500+ assignments graded; guided 10+ new volunteers).
  10. Soccer (HS & club, state/national level, captain)

Awards/Honors

  • FBLA Nationals Winner (10th Place at nats)
  • AP Scholar with Distinction
  • PSAT Commended Scholar (i pass the cutoff for this year)
  • FBLA Awards (bunch of state + regional ones)
  • Maybe research pubs but idk if they can be put here if mentioned in my ecs so dont count it
  • NHS

Letters of Recommendation

  • AP Lang Teacher: 9/10 (strong writer, knows me well)
  • AP Stats Teacher: 8/10
  • Maybe Research Mentor (college professor)

Essays

  • Common App: 8.5/10 (id say around this level. above average for my list but not the greatest).

College list (im open to suggestions and give me any feedback regarding if its realistic or not):

  • Boston College (RD)
  • Boston University (RD)
  • Emory University (RD)
  • Georgia Institute of Technology (EA)
  • Indiana University Bloomington (EA)
  • New Jersey Institute of Technology (EA)
  • New York University (RD)
  • Northeastern University (EA)
  • Rutgers University (Honors College as well as regular NB campus) (EA)
  • University of Florida (EA)
  • University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (EA)
  • University of Pittsburgh (EA)
  • University of Wisconsin-Madison (EA)
  • Washington University in St. Louis (RD)
  • and some safeties in state which are not listed but have 80%+ acceptance rate.
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Upper middle class means a lot to a lot of people. Budget concerns ? Meaning how much can you spend per year ? Have that chat with your folks now.

Is Supply Chain only at Ga Tech ? Why not finance there ?

I’ll assume you are at a public so chancing you with that and assume you are not going for athletic recruiting:

BC, BU, Emory, Ga Tech, NYU, Northeastern, UF, Wisconsin, Wash U - unlikely / reach

UIUC - possible but leaning no for Gies. But possible.

IU safe but Kelley unknown.

NJIT - likely

Rutgers - likely but Honors unknown

Pitt likely - apply early, they are rolling

You asked for others - if supply chain a desire (like Ga Tech), look to ASU, Michigan State, UTK, and Purdue.

If budget an issue, look at Alabama and WVU.

Since you put UF on the list, UGA (and Bama) are similar with Bama, in addition to inexpensive, a safety. UGA and UF are not and UGA isn’t direct admit. Others that might work - U of SC - smaller campus area wise than UGA, UF, Bama or Miami Ohio Farmer. These are all solid finance.

Now if finance means Wall Street, then Fordham and maybe Bentley in Boston. Plus ASU again and the IBIS program.

Really budget needs to drive your list - unless your family is ok paying $50k and up (to $95k).

Let us know.

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Lehigh

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Budget is around 50-60k per year. Also supply chain is at other schools but gtech has a program which is supply chain with a finance concentration so that’s why.

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Does your family qualify for need based aid?
If not, then several schools on your list will not be affordable.

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Yes we do qualify for a bit. Ran the npc for bc and bu and both estimated total costs were around 90k. I’m not sure if (hypothetically) I get accepted and they would give decent aid or not to get within our budget. Along with this info, I’m not sure if it’s better to apply to more OOS public like gtech for example where it’s 50-60k oos or private colleges and hope for aid.

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If you ran NPC schools and your cost was around $90k, it doesn’t sound like you qualify. So while merit is possible at BU, it likely won’t be that much and given you are unlikely to get in anyway, I’d remove it. Same with BC, Emory and Wash U.

There’s a distinction between $50-60k so figure out which. College often costs more than the published price - books, fun, sports etc. if that amount is all in, best to stick to $50k-ish. So more public schools.

I mentioned many earlier - if you like Florida, then how about UGA (reach - not direct admit), and Bama (will be mid 20s for you and is safe). The three are mainly substitutional with different levels of admit difficulty. You could add FSU (reach but less than UF) and U of SC (target). Miami Ohio, WVU, Delaware , etc. ASU, Michigan State and more would all be safe entry and all should hit although Delaware may not.

If truly $50k and not $60k, eliminate Pitt, IU, Wisconsin, and Illinois. You can Binghamton, UMass, and URI as others in addition to the above.

For privates, Elon and Denver are possible but not probable budget wise.

Build to the budget. An admit you can’t afford or comes with loans is one you don’t need.

And you don’t need so many. You can focus your list - doesn’t need to be crazy big. Just needs a few affordable admits.

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Understandable. Also, if you don’t mind, can I ask on what basis you categorize them into reaches and targets given my profile?

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I’m not an adcom, of course. So it’s my opinion. But assuming you’re at a public school, your unweighted GPA is low although I don’t know your rank.

An Emory has a 10% admit rate. 1500 is on the lower end of scores. 75% had a 3.75 UW.

Take out ED, BU is below 10%. No matter, you can’t afford it.

IU - in as said but Kelley no longer has statistical admissions so you could get in there. Don’t know. And if you get in, maybe you can’t afford it.

Back to ‘reaches’ - UF, add a point for AP and .5 for Honors. If you have a 3.6 UW, no way you have a 4.5 weighted - that’s the 25th percentile.

This is the analysis I’m doing in my head for each school plus looking at admit rates, test scores, etc. Costs matter too. Hoping they meet your cost when ample data is out there to know if it’s remotely possible or not can help you build your list.

If Wall Street isn’t the goal, frankly every school I mentioned is solid.

And reaches or targets aren’t your most important - the affordable safety is - need two of those.

Hope that helps.

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Did you just divide 92 by 25 to get that GPA? Many NJ schools that use a 100-point scale have a specific conversion chart. You should check with your counselor - a 92–93 might actually convert to a higher GPA on a 4.0 scale.

BU’s cost of attendance is just above $90k, so as @tsbna44 mentioned, that NPC seems to indicate no aid. But even if you were going to get a little bit of aid, how would you bridge the gap between what you can actually afford ($50-60k), and what BU wants you to pay ($90k)?

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If the BU and BC net price calculators indicate your net cost will be $90,000, this likely won’t change if you happen to get accepted.

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The 92-93/100 is weighted, and uw is like a 89-90/100 which i believe is roughly a 3.6 uw

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ok thank you for this

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Was the Emory NPC more favorable than BU and BC? How about NYU, Northeastern, and WashU?

Emory has the advantage (for you) of excluding 9th grade from their GPA calculation. The other east coast school that does this is Carnegie Mellon; Tepper would be a big reach for you but could be worth a try if the NPC shows enough aid (somewhat stingy reputation, but their need-based aid has gotten more generous in recent years).

It’s really hard to say how much it matters whether a school systematically excludes 9th grade from the GPA, vs. just looking at your strong improving trend holistically as many schools will. The bummer is that holistic tends to correlate with expensive.

Echoing what others have said, that applying to schools whose NPC shows double your budget, and just hoping that the actual aid package is dramatically better is a waste of effort. BU/BC aren’t going to be affordable. And while your even-reachier privates may be a bit more generous, it’s unclear whether any private you can get into (or even those you can’t) will be generous enough, in terms of need-based aid. And you’d have to target privates that are less competitive than Rutgers/NJIT to have a reasonable expectation of getting large merit scholarships. (Even a half-tuition scholarship wouldn’t get you to budget at many/most privates.) Are you applying to TCNJ?

If you are interested in a coop school (Northeastern), maybe consider Drexel (sufficient merit possible) and/or U of Cincinnati.

It may turn out that the NJ publics are tough to beat in terms of value. Adding a few SUNY schools could be smart. Temple U might work also.

I don’t see foreign language in your coursework/AP info - what have you taken?

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You might want to check out Ohio State. They have supply chain in the engineering school as well as an IBE program with their business school.

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OSU a target at best in engineering - this year direct costs are $58k. Yes merit is possible.

Given a supply chain desire, #1 Michigan State would be a much more sensible choice - admission and cost wise.

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lol ok.
The student is not choosing a school to attend yet; they are asking for suggestions for applications. My son had similar scores and a better GPA and got nice aid at OSU plus other perks. No need for you to dump on someone else’s suggestion.

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Not dumping. Just noted it’s not full proof to hit budget but the top supply chain in the country likely would be. I didn’t say it wouldn’t be possible.

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I have taken 2 years of Spanish. So regarding cost and my goals, would it be better to swap some of the more expensive private school reaches for OOS publics which are still reaches like I already have as some higher end targets (UIUC, GT (def a reach), UW Madison, for example)?

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Main goal is finance and statistics. I only have supply chain for GT as they have a supply chain + finance concentration at Scheller.