chances, help me out here!

arget10
Sun, 18 Dec 2005 17:55:42 +0000

I’m only applying to 4 schools–two UCs and two privates. Privates are due on Jan.1 and I’m mostly done with them, about to mail them out.

Academics:
Unweighted GPA: 3.8
Weighted GPA: 4.4
Rank: ~120/480
SAT1: 2400
SAT2 Bio: 800
SAT2 Math2C: 800
APs: 5s on Bio, Euro history, Psych, and Stats

ECs:

co-captain of city soccer team, starting striker, played for 8 years

piano for 11 years, advanced level standing, played in honors recitals and won some awards

church bible school counselor/sunday school teacher

tutoring after school for free

held 4 jobs, made around $2000

conducting a research project right now

Awards:

national merit semifinalist

ap scholar with honor (4 APs)

presidential scholar nominee (50 ppl per state)

director’s cup 2nd place (soccer)

hayward fall classic 4th place (soccer)

branch honors recital participant (piano)

Applying to:

UCBerkeley (bioengineering)

UCSD (bioengineering)

UPenn (bioengineering

Johns Hopkins (biomedical engineering)

I think my strengths are my scores and my 4 jobs, but my weaknesses are my grades and lack of prestigious ECs or awards. Just want some peace of mind or help on what you think are my strong and weak points so I can write (or not write) about them in my essays. thanks for any help at all!!!

P.S. Also wondering, do you think my rank will hurt me a lot? My school is one of the top public schools in California, theres like 30 valedictorians or something and they dont weight our grades before they rank us. I’m in the 2nd quartile and according to Penn’s site only 7% of students ranking in the 2nd quartile got accepted for 2009. Any ideas how much my rank will hurt me?

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