Chance me please?

International Students
1

<p>These are the colleges I plan to apply to. Please be brutally honest about my choices and tell me how much of a chance I have getting into these colleges?</p>

<p>Rice University
Harvey Mudd
UT Austin
UC Berkeley
UC Los Angeles
University of Southern California
UC Santa Barbara</p>

<p>My SAT scores: CR 620
Math 790
Writing 650
My writing score is poor because I got only a 5 on the essay(I’m not sure how. I’m not a horrible writer or anything, I think I just crack under the pressure of writing a great essay in 25 minutes)</p>

<p>SAT subjects
Math 2: 730
Chemistry: 790</p>

<p>I’m going to take the ACT on Dec 13 and these are my average practice test scores
English 34
Math 33
Reading 29
Science 30</p>

<p>My extra curricular activities:

  1. Indian classical dance, Bharatnatyam (started at the age of 4, learning for 13 years), received Junior diploma cert. and passed first year exam with distinction
  2. Indian classical music, Agra Gharana (started at age 10, learnt for 3 years)
  3. Piano- received junior diploma certificate and passed first year exam. with distinction
  4. Swimming(not competitive)
  5. Skating</p>

<p>Social Service

  1. Associated with an NGO-made donations, tutored children
  2. Member of interact club(social service club of our school) - received recognition from notable charity homes in our city, Kolkata
  3. Worked with children having special needs and have a LOT of experience in this as my younger brother is hearing impaired. I’ve been working with him, helping him and acting as a mentor for him. I have experienced the difficulties of such people first hand .I plan to mention this in my essays as a special trait of mine.</p>

<p>Academic:

  1. Scholar badge holder: grade 9
    merit certificates in English, Bengali, Social science, Science
  2. Scholar badge: grade 10
    merit certificates in English, Bengali, Social science, Science, Mathematics</p>
2

<p>All universities you mentioned other than Harvey Mudd are a pretty much reach considering that you have a pretty good school record. If you score a composite of around 33 on ACT, then it will be really great.
Your extra curriculars are fine but you will benefit from sending them an arts supplement as you do not state an special high level of achievement in any of them
Your social service is fine
Good luck</p>

3

<p>Just calculate the hours you spent on a weekly basis for justification. Otherwise they may look at your achievements as gifted (not earned). It is not very difficult to get certificates in India.</p>