Chance Me Please: 3.98 UW, 4.23 UCGPA, ACT 32 (retaking), [aerospace or mechanical] Engineering [CA resident]

Chance Me / Match Me
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Demographics

  • US domestic student (California resident)

  • Type of high school: regular public high school

  • Other special factors: none

Cost Constraints / Budget

  • No financial constraints (cost is not an issue)

Intended Major(s)

  • Engineering

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 3.98

  • Weighted HS GPA: 4.35

  • Class Rank: school does not officially rank

  • ACT: 32 right now, planning to retake aiming for 34–35

List your HS coursework

  • Science: IB Physics HL (A both semesters), plus other standard sciences (chemistry, biology)

  • History and social studies: standard high school requirements

  • Language other than English: completed school requirement

  • Visual or performing arts: Band (flute) 3 years

  • Other academic courses: mix of honors and AP (2 AP exams taken, scores 5 and 4)

Awards

  • None significant

Extracurriculars

  • Volunteering at local library (book organizing) for 4 years

  • Band member (flute) for 3 years

  • Helped out with family business

  • Tutored elementary students privately for a few months

Essays / LORs / Other

  • Letters of Recommendation from Physics teacher, English teacher, and counselor

  • Expecting solid but not extraordinary essays

Schools (current working list)

  • Stanford

  • Brown

  • Vanderbilt

  • Pomona College

  • Swarthmore

  • UC Berkeley

  • UCLA

  • University of Michigan

  • USC

  • Carnegie Mellon (considering ED here)

  • UC San Diego

  • UC Irvine

  • UC Davis

Questions:

  1. With my stats and profile, what schools on my list should be considered reach / target / safety? Should I modify this list?

  2. I am considering ED at Carnegie Mellon — is that a good choice for my profile, or would ED somewhere else make more sense?

  3. Realistically, what are my chances at Ivies/top schools and top LACs (Pomona, Swarthmore) given that my academics are strong but my ECs/awards are weaker?

  4. For UCs, where would I stand (Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD, UCI, UCD)?

Thanks so much for any guidance!

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Just about all of the schools on your list would be considered a reach for anyone.

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When you say met HS requirements - do you, for example, have:

  1. 4 years or 3 years or Social Science?
  2. 3 years of Foreign Language?
  3. What is your math level?

Thanks

PS - awards don’t matter. I mean, if you walk dogs at the shelter or clean the beach or move grocery carts from the parking lot to inside the store, you don’t get an award.

Your ECs are fine - they are not a weak spot - volunteering 4 years (assuming a fair amount of hours), 3 year band member and helping the family….that’s very good.

Your rigor - in how you stated it - concerns me.

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CA high school requirements are usually 2 years of language - how many have you done?

Echoing the question about highest math.

When you say met high school requirements for various subjects - does that mean these were standard college prep, rather than honors or AP?

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You don’t have any safeties - and you need some. You are a strong applicant - but all of these schools get applications from a lot more qualified applicants than they can accept, and admissions can be very hard to predict.

UC Davis may be a target - but quite possibly a reach for engineering. Calculate your UC GPAs here: GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub And take a look at data for your school to see if your chances at the UCs are higher or lower than each school’s average: Admissions by source school | University of California

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@Gumbymom can post the acceptances for the UCs.

I think your list is top heavy. You are a very strong student, and have the potential to be accepted, BUT these colleges get far more very well qualified applicants than they can accept.

What is your sure thing for admission that you really like?

I’m going to link a thread here. It’s an older one but please read the whole thing. The student in this thread was a NMF, top student excellent ECs, excellent LOR…and no one expected he would be rejected from every place where he applied his senior year, but that’s what happened. He really didn’t have a sure thing on his application list. He landed very well on his feet after a gap year, but his senior year in high school was not a happy time. You don’t want this to happen to you:

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Thanks for asking! For social sciences, I’ve completed World History, AP US History (score 4), and Government/Econ.

For foreign language, I’m currently in my 2nd year of IB Spanish.

For math, I’m taking AP Calculus BC this year.

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Thanks for your input. My UC gpa is 4.23. Forgot to mention on my post

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Thanks - any specific type of engineering?

I’d say unlikely to all (non UC) but I also think where you go for engineering, short of a Stanford or MIT matters little. What matters is ABET accreditation. My kid chose Alabama over Purdue and I thought he was nuts - but he told me I was. He’s was right - tons of interviews, many job offers and guess what - he hired on in a cohort of Purdue, Michigan, Cal Poly….but also W Michigan and Akron…..so don’t worry about the big names.

At Brown, if you did the four year AB, is not accredited by ABET so if you want to be an engineer, it’s not the way to go. If you do a concentration, it likely will be - does that take more time? I’m not sure.

Vandy engineering - it’s fine - but living in Nashville, most go to UTK or Bama….Vandy isn’t seen as anything special…I’ll just say.

Pomona is an odd choice - it doesn’t offer engineering.

Swat is general engineering - if it appeals to you.

Can’t speak for the UCs but I’d be surprised if you got into the others. Yes, a higher ACT will help - what’s your math score?

There’s lots of great schools out there - for example, very solid subs for Michigan would be Minnesota and Ohio State. If you wanted to take advantage of your great metrics, an Alabama, UAH, and Missisippi State would be sub $20K including housing - I see you are Asian. Yes, Asian kids go but not like that they at levels of others chools.

U Wash could be another great - I’d say target. Both Arizona flagships are outstanding as is Colorado and School of Mines.

If you like LACs, look at Lafeyette, Union and for small but mighty - Rose Hulman is #1 in the nation for schools not offering a PhD. #2 would be a better choice for you than Pomona - Harvey Mudd (also a reach). Rose Hulman would be a likely.

Figure out what type of school you want - Pomona and the UCs are very different.

Engineering is about ABET in most cases although what you study may impact that. Short of a few schools (Stanford/MIT), I’m not sure the where will matter - and you need more schools.

A higher ACT, especially in math (if your score is lower), will help. On the flipside, you can save a ton of $$ up front and likely end up with a similar outcome. My Bama son was at trivia night in Utah and started talking to an employee at another company - and found out he made more. The other kid went to Columbia. Companies pay the same for all and pay by location, not school.

Good luck.

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Did you use this UC GPA calculator? GPA Calculator for the University of California – RogerHub If so, it should have given you three GPAs. Can you share all three of them?

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You have a lot of reaches on your list. This makes me wonder if you can cut the list some. This in turn makes me wonder if as a potential engineering major you should be applying to a school that only offers engineering through something like a 3 + 2 program with a different college. Why not apply to Cal Poly Pomona instead, or just cut this one from your list?

You have large universities on your list and small colleges on your list. You have schools in warm climates on your list and schools in very cold climates (eg, one week when I was in Ann Arbor the temperature never got up to zero F). Do you have a sense regarding where you would feel more comfortable?

Regarding ECs, if you were a band member for 3 years playing flute, I am thinking that you must have been playing flute for quite a bit longer than 3 years. Is this correct? Volunteering at a local library is a good EC that helps people and 4 years shows a level of commitment. Helping out with a family business could be a little thing, or could be a huge commitment over an extended period of time. I think that this might be a good list of ECs, but it is hard to be sure without more information (which presumably would go into applications and/or your letters of reference, rather than on this web site). The point of ECs is to do what is right for you, do it well, and get along with other people. It sounds like this might be exactly what you have done.

Is Carnegie Mellon your top choice for a university to attend? It is a very good school and is very good for engineering. You do not need to apply anywhere ED.

I do not know the UC’s well enough to know whether there is a safety on your list. If there is one, it might perhaps be UC San Diego, but I am not confident that it is a safety. You should be applying to at least two solid safeties where you would be happy to attend. I am not sure that there is any safety on your list.

If I had to guess, my guess is that with this list you will get accepted somewhere. However, I would not bet a year of my life on this happening.

And a 32 ACT does seem low for most of this list. Hopefully you will be able to pull this up. As a potential engineering major, I wonder what your score was on the math part of the ACT.

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I think this is going to be a weakness for the highly rejective schools, both private and public, and especially for such a competitive major as engineering. It looks like you’ve just done the bare minimum for a few of your core classes. The most competitive schools usually want to see four years of each of the five core areas (English, math, science, social studies, foreign language). That’s not to say that they never admit anyone who has done less than that - they absolutely do! - but it will put you at a disadvantage when up against an incredibly competitive applicant pool. That ACT is low-ish for the highly rejective schools, although for the UCs, that won’t matter of course.

For an engineering major, almost all of your list would be reach, several high reach. I would look into a CSU or two to find a true safety, just in case. You have a shot at a few admissions on this list for sure, but because they are reaches there is no guarantee of that and you do run the risk of getting shut out. For that reason, you need an ace in the hole - i.e. a true safety. And then if one - or even a few - of your reaches do work out, all the better.

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Hello, I misspoke earlier. I actually took AP U.S. History (score 4), AP European History (score 5), IB Spanish SL for 2 years, IB English HL for 2 years, IB American History HL, and I am currently taking AP Calculus BC and IB English. Do you think this will make a difference?

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Your rigor is good - for non UCs, your ACT could be an issue. What’s your math score?

It’s an unusual list - as noted above.

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My math score is 35! Could you clarify why you said my list is unusual? Is it because I only included schools where I don’t really have a chance of admission, or because I added schools that aren’t particularly strong for engineering?

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That’s solid - you have a chance at some on your list (why Pomona, which doesn’t offer) - but you could strike out so I’d line up more. You have a chance though but the most important school is that affordable safety, etc. so I encourage you to look deeper at others.

And nix Pomona which makes zero sense but Harvey Mudd would, if you want a Claremont school.

Good luck.

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What kind of engineering?

Have you visited CMU? I would not recommend an ED application unless you have visited and felt like it was a good fit. It’s an excellent school but it’s not for everyone, and the “vibe” in person doesn’t always align with the impression one can get from researching it online.

Why Pomona if you want engineering? Swat at least has a general engineering major, but that’s still quite a different experience from most engineering programs. If you do want general engineering and you like the Claremont Colleges, the obvious answer is Harvey Mudd, as has already been pointed out.

Have you considered Rice? You have both CMU and Vandy on your list, which have nearly opposite social vibes; I feel like Rice kind of splits the difference, with some of CMU’s nerdiness but also some of Vandy’s social energy (albeit via inclusive residential colleges rather than via Greek life). Rice gives a pretty good ED “bump” too.

That said, you’re reaching pretty high here. Your stats and rigor are excellent, but not in a way that’s going to stand out among CA applicants to Stanford, for example. And your ECs are, again, great, but not in a way that will stand out at such highly-rejective schools. IMHO, this record coupled with “solid but not extraordinary essays” is not quite going to put you over the top at most of these schools. I read your summary, and look at your list, and think that 1) UCD is the most likely outcome, and 2) I think you’ll get into Davis but it’s not a slam-dunk - you need safer options too. (Also, UCD is a terrific school with a great undergraduate experience - would not be a bad outcome in any way!)

CWRU and U of Rochester seem to fit the pattern here and would be worth a look.

I don’t mean to be a downer, and I don’t mean to criticize your record; you’ve done a great job in high school. You just need to not underestimate how tough it is for “unhooked” applicants to get into schools like Stanford, Brown, Vandy, etc. When you take out the recruited athletes, legacies, celebrities, etc., the percentage of “regular” high-achievers who get into these schools is often, like, 2-3%. They don’t need a reason to turn you down; on the contrary, they need a compelling reason to accept you, above and beyond an excellent academic record and a nice collection of EC’s.

There are SO many places where you can get a top-notch engineering education, though. Tell us more about what interests you.

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Clearly a list built on perceived pedigree of the parents/students, not on becoming an engineer….

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Asking again, what specific Engineering discipline since the admit rates can vary? For Example Mechanical engineering at UCLA had a 3.8% admit rate while Chemical engineering was 14%.

I would add UC Santa Cruz, Riverside or Merced to the list if you are willing to attend.

What is your local Cal state as long as it is ABET accredited, it will make a good safety/very likely or there other Cal states of interest?

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Thanks for pointing that out! I’m mainly interested in aerospace engineering, but I’ve also heard it might make sense to apply under mechanical engineering at some schools and then specialize or minor in aerospace later.

Do you think ABET accreditation matters more than school prestige? For example, if one school has higher prestige but isn’t ABET accredited, and another school is ABET accredited but less prestigious, would the latter actually be the better choice?

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