My S24 is currently studying international relations/global studies at one of the schools on your list. When he was crafting his list of colleges, he put less emphasis on national rankings and was more focused on the global rankings of particular IR programs. He also considered whether the schools he applied to were well known in the region where he intended to focus his IR studies (for him, that was Germany and the EU). Some universities (even some of the Ivies) may be popular in the US, but not well known abroad. This could impact international internship/job opportunities. Looking at global rankings and considering what region you might concentrate on in your IR studies, could help you narrow down your list of reach schools. Another thing to consider for IR is that the schools on your list have vastly different approaches for IR majors. UPenn has the Huntsman program that combines IR with business. UChicagoâs global studies program has several unique thematic tracks rather than requiring a student to choose a particular regional/language focus. UMich has both regional and thematic tracks for IR. Some schools have separate IR schools (like BU, Notre Dameâs Keough, Georgetownâs SFS). You may want to be sure your strengths, goals and interests are aligned with each of the reach schools on your list. Also, you might want to add Claremont McKenna for IR. Notre Dameâs Keough School is also great if youâre interested in the global south.
I am really glad you mentioned because that is where my mind was going as well. From experience, when kids load up on the AP-lite list, they sometimes look worse than the kids who throw in an interesting elective or two.
My biggest ? for the reaches is if you took any calc? If you already took BC calc, then I am less âworriedâ about only AP Stats. (EDIT I see you did take BC as a junior! great!).
This is REALLY hard to gauge w/o knowing more about your specific school context too (and for anonymity donât tell us that). If 50% of your school takes Calc 3, then that is a concern. If 5% do not as big deal. FWIW our LPS doesnât really have true Calc 3 and a few top kids can get through BC as jrs, many go on to true reach schools.
I agree AP ES is considered âlesserâ rigor than AP Chem or physics C, but you have really loaded up on other Soc. Sci APs, and if you already took Chem/Physics/Bio (of some sort) I think not a huge deal (though not perfection) considering you want IR. I am a fan of kids not only selecting for admissions purposes..
I might consider Tufts for your list, too, if you want IR.
Is there one school that stands out? You could ED to possibly improve your odds.
What does your guidance counselor think? How many students get into T20 schools?
You really should list your safeties/targets so we have a better picture.
14 reaches is a lot. Apps will be time consuming. Quality vs Quantity.
Good luck.
this is an important point, I would really recommend NOT applying to that many reaches - you will be SO exhausted and you want to keep your grades up.
I agree.
I will add that if you really do a good job identifying the best possible Reaches, you do not have to worry you are going to miss out by not applying to a lot.
One obvious goal is to determine which colleges you would be most excited to attend. This means carefully investigating each college, including visiting where possible, or at least attending online information sessions and such, looking at the department pages for any areas of possible interest, possibly doing a rough mapping out of what a four-year curriculum might look like, and so on.
But another equally important goal is to identify which colleges would be most likely to be excited to have you as a student. This involves carefully looking at their admissions pages, including whatever version of a âWhat we look forâ page they might have. It might involves looking for any podcasts or other public statements their AOs have made, again visiting or attending online information sessions, and so on.
So the combined goal of all this is to develop a sense of where the best two-way fits might be, in the sense you have specific reasons to be particularly excited about these colleges, AND an informed understanding of why you would be the sort of student they are looking for. And as a happy side effect of all that effort, it becomes very easy to write things like âWhy us?â supplementals, because you have already given those questions a lot of careful thought.
So suppose you do all that and pick, say, the best five two-way fits you identified to be your Reaches. One of two things will then happen.
You might be admitted to one or more of those five. Great! Then if you did this work up front, you know these are better fits for you than any other Reaches, so you donât need any more offers from colleges that are worse fits.
Or you might not be admitted to any, which to be frank is the much more likely outcome. In which case, it is extremely likely you would not be admitted to any other Reaches either. That is because these are not independent outcomes, they are correlated. So if you have taken your best five shots and gotten no offers, that is really very strong evidence you will not be getting any offers from this level of college.
Which is fine, as long as you have great Targets and Likelies. And indeed that is what happens to most kidsâthey get blanked by their Reaches and end up choosing their best Target or Likely offer. But if you really did the work to identify your best two-way fits, and then wrote your best possible applications, you did everything you really could.
The thing about all this is it takes work, and some kids I encounter online would prefer just to âshotgunâ a list of colleges that are ranked high on some generic list, or possibly some âgood for Xâ list. That may lead to the same outcome if the same college ended up on the shotgun list and admits you. But I think there is a big risk you will end up either not applying to some excellent colleges for you, or not writing your best possible applications, and do worse as a result of such a strategy.
Excellent advice from @NiceUnparticularMan. Chiming in to agree and share an anecdoteâŠat my kidsâ well-respected private school there are about 225 graduating seniors each year. Normally about 10-15 percent of the class admitted to a top 20 school. Last year almost no one was. There were a couple admitted to Notre Dame, but that was it. No ivies or other top 20 at all. One of my childâs friends who had stats similar to OP and great leadership and EC was waitlisted at 4 ivies plus Stanford, MIT, Northwestern, Hopkins, Chicago and Vanderbilt. So close but it didnât happen for her or anyone else in their class! This yearâs graduating class has at least 20 percent of the class going to a top 20 schools So last year was kind of an unfortunate fluke, I guess. But it happens. Finding targets and likelies you are happy with is SO important. OP - you say you have them, and thatâs great. I wish you the best.
Yes, unfortunately most of the chatter kids see online is from kids who get into some Reach they are excited about, and they are excited to share that news. People who are blanked by Reaches are far less likely to be eager to share that news, and if they do mention it somewhere it may only be once or twice and not lots of times.
So I think some kids get the impression that a large percentage of the kids who shotgun a bunch of popular Reaches get in somewhere. But we know that must be wrong, there simply are not enough slots to go around to all the kids applying to the popular Reaches for more than a fraction of them to get into any at all (assuming most admittees to one or more such Reaches enroll at one of them).
This was in fact stressed to us at our own feederish HSâmost kids are going to end up enrolling at a Likely or Target, so take VERY seriously which colleges you choose for that part of your list, because it is very likely one of them will be your actual college.
Which is fine, because for most kids, there are so many great Likely and Target colleges that would be particularly good fits.
As an Asian male, I do not believe that you would be regarded as a URM at most colleges, but being a first gen going to college, you may get favorable treatment by some.
As surely others have told you, the schools you have listed are similar mostly in their USnews ranking. They are otherwise different (location, size, etc). Better to discern what you want (size, location, etc) and shoot for it, as chances are small at all these schools.
I believe OP was just copying the template - has ânoneâ after the colon in first post.
Got it. Sorry about the oversight. Thanks for picking it up.
Aside from all the great advice that others have provided, in my experience, there is always a good bit of regionalism in admissions. I have seen that Northwestern and UMich have a slight preference for applicants from well regarded high schools in Chicagoland. As far as I have seen, UChicago does not have that preference
Since youâre interested in IR, why not ask your AP Gov teacher?
Totally agree. When my D applied she got so burned out and started slashing schools off her list just because she couldnât stand the thought of writing more essays, and it was taking so much more time than she anticipated. You think youâll be able to reuse more than you actually can. Every school has a âwhy usâ essay which is very important and needs to be personalized. And then they all have a couple other essays that just donât overlap as much as youâd think, or that have different word count requirements.
I would recommend applying to a couple safeties and targets early on, especially those with EA or early admission. Once you start getting acceptances you might decide to skip some other applications. Like if you know youâd chose school A over school B and youâve already been accepted to A, then skip the application to B. As for your reaches, Iâd also target any with EA and any that are your absolutely top choices. That way if you burn out or run out of time, you hopefully have gotten to the ones you really want.
Good luck to you. As everyone has said, reaches are reaches for everyone. Youâve got good stats but so does most everyone who applies to those schools and you just donât know what will speak to them. My D applied to 4 of the schools on your list and was accepted at 2. She had a friend who applied to a lot more, and who everyone thought would definitely get into a reachy school, who got into none of his reaches and ended up at a safety (and he ended up loving it). You just never know.
I have a relative who was similar - top IB rigor/grades, all the ECs, sparkling essays, for sure great teacher recommendations, looked a fabulous candidate. Didnât get any reaches OR even targets. It was brutal, to say the least. Her safety was SUNY Bing (not a safety for everyone obviously but like I say - stellar applicant). The difference was she hated Bing, but she transferred into a T20 in her sophomore year (and ended up graduating magna cum laude as well as finding her future husband along the way). One of D19âs friends was a different story - was never going to be a top applicant, went to one of the CSUs thatâs an easy admit, partied too hard, dropped out, went to CCâŠand ended up graduating from UC Berkeley, which was never even on the radar while she was at high school. And of course, also the stories of people who have ended up loving their safeties or targets. All of which is to say, there is more than one path to ending up somewhere thatâs right for you, whether thatâs blooming where youâre planted, needing to move along the way, or even messing up and taking charge after doing that.
Strong academics and standout extracurriculars. However, as an unhooked applicant from a top public school, T20s will be extremely competitive. Essays and narrative will be key to differentiate.
To answer you, sure you can get in. Will you ? I donât know.
APEs will not be why you donât though.
My daughter took APEs and no AP of another science and got into a top LAC. And other strong schools. She was an IS major with IR focus in her coursework (she chose a safety school).
Good luck with your apps. That you have a safety that you can afford and would be happy with is all you need.
The rest is gravy - apply where you want and see.