Daughter is thinking of applying ED for FALL 2016.
She is strongly hoping to major in ENGINEERING, looking towards biomedical, mechanical or chemical.
Her qualifications:
She attends CHARTER SCHOOL OF WILMINGTON in Delaware (top-ranking science Charter school) and has a 4.1 GPA.
She received a 5 on her AP ENGLISH LANGUAGE exam her junior year.
Her senior year schedule is:
AP CHEMISTRY
AP STATISTICS
AP US HISTORY
Honors Physics
Honors Calculus
Honors English
She is an avid participant on her state robotics team, she attends daily for 2-3 hours and they placed 21st in national championship last year.
She was accepted to CORNELL’S Curie Academy (week-long women engineering seminar/camp) last summer and that has confirmed her desire to study engineering and apply to CORNELL. She received a application fee waiver as a result.
SAT scores: 700 reading, 710 math, 640 writing
SAT subject tests will be taken in Oct
We may sign up for ACT to test in late October - should we? Will the scores be sent to Cornell in time? Deadline is Nov. 1 for app.
She doesn’t have many EC’s, she was diagnosed with Juvenile Arthritis in middle school and significantly hindered her ability/desire to play sports, etc (her essay will be on this, studying biomedical/robotics to help arthritis)
ECs:
volunteering with robotics team, here and there, robotics fairs for kids, literacy groups, girls in engineering, nonprofits, etc.
national advocacy day: went to DC and spoke with congressman and reps about STEM and FIRST robotics
CORNELL Curie Academy
worked summer job as lifeguard
How much do these EC’s really matter? Honestly, robotics team takes ALOT of time, almost every night and weekend, I don’t know she could do anymore. Will the lack of EC’s hurt the app?
she has to do well on a math II subject test to make up for that SAT I math score- I’m in the same boat. that curie academy will looks pretty well as shes ED to cornell. if she writes a strong essay she has a very good chance of getting in
^^ Yes! Also, some kids do much better on the ACT so she should definitely take a practice test. I think they will get the scores in time but either check the website or call the school to confirm. She may need the ACT score for RD schools so it’s probably good to take it anyway if she has the time to adequately prepare for it.
Almost all kids who plan on going into engineering take the math SAT II.
Frankly, if she can’t score well on the math II, she should seriously reconsider whether she wants to do engineering. Cornell engineering is one of the top engineering schools in the country and Math II should not be difficult for anyone who wants to attend. She’s had the preparation for it since she attends a top charter school.
Sure, I agree. I’m not worried about her doing well, I just chose Math 1 by mistake, looks like it shouldn’t be a problem to switch to Math 2 though.
This is what it said:
It is not necessary to make changes to your Subject Tests. As long as you are registered for at least one Subject Test, you can finalize your Subject Test choices on the day of the test.
You can google when the scores come back but typically the turnaround is pretty quick. I want to say 10 days or something like that.
The middle 50% for SAT Math is 740-800 for last year’s class at Cornell Engineering so your daughter’s 710 is solidly in the bottom quartile. She needs to put in a good showing for the SAT Math II exam. If she’s doesn’t take the ACT, I would consider retaking the SAT exam if I were her but realistically time is limited because the start of senior year is always tough with applications, college visits, hard classes etc. Just tell her to do the best she can and not bite off more than she can chew. I wish her the best!
Is that 4.1 weighted? What is her approximate rank? If that is a weighted gpa and she has B’s on her transcript then that coupled with a 2050 SAT score would make getting into Cornell engineering extremely challenging.
No rankings at her school, I don’t think the GPA is weighted, they do things very differently so I’m not sure how the GPA is calculated. Not a single B all of her high school career.
Based on what you are saying, I think we need to try again with the test scores. Do you recommend ACT or SAT?
It depends. How many time has she taken the SAT? How long has she prepped for it? It’s not worth retaking the SAT if she has already reached her potential. On the other hand, if she’s only taken it once and with minimal test prep. There may be room for significant improvement. As a would be engineer, I would imagine that raising her math score should not be too difficult.
As I said earlier, some kids strongly prefer the ACT (while others the SAT). The only way she would know is to take a practice exam and see how she does. Most kids don’t do that well on the Science section at first but it is the easiest section to improve upon once they realize that it requires very little knowledge of science and is more about reading and interpreting graphs, tables and charts. With practice the scores go up significantly.
The problem is one of time. She has a pretty full plate starting senior year and it really her call if she can fit in extensive test prep into her schedule. If you have other younger kids, next time have them prep the summer before junior year and take the tests in the fall of junior year. That way there’s plenty of time for retakes if necessary. My kids did not actually prep the summer before junior year because they were busy but they were able to prep for one month prior to fall exams and were “one and done” which took the pressure off them for the spring of junior year.
No B’s on her transcript is good! Get the test scores up and she has a decent shot. Even though the school has no rankings, most kids have a rough idea where they stand in the class. They can tell who the competition is.
Speaking of class rank…how important is that really? My son has a solid GPA, solid test scores, solid rigor…but 12.2% in his class. Is that going to hurt him a lot?
^^ Sorry to hear about her rejection. Hopefully, she has applied to bunch of schools that are both match and safeties. I don’t think it is surprising at all that she was rejected outright to Cornell engineering. As I noted above, Cornell is one of the top engineering schools in the country and her standsrdized test scores, particularly math, were subpar and really called into question if she could handle such a rigorous engineering program. She will likely thrive at a less demanding program is what Cornell appears to be saying.
Incidently, I find it amusing that you have often used the pronoun “we” when referring to tests and other things that “she” has done. Good luck! I’m sure she’ll end up somewhere she will love being at.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude but one of the biggest peeves that I hear from friends of mine who work in admissions is when parents say “we” are doing this and that so I guess my radar is overly sensitive to it. Anyway, I hope everything goes well with your daughter. This is a very stressful time for HS kids.
The last info session I was at was for a top college and a woman raised her hand during the Q&A and asked, “if WE got 3 Bs during OUR sophomore year, would that sink OUR application?”. Her poor daughter was sitting next to her and she just lowered her head in embarrassment. The AO was about to say something and then thought better of it and just launched into the “holistic” admissions thing.
I agree with your son that it is a we thing in that parents should be there for guidance and support. It’s just certain lines shouldn’t be crossed because it’s our kids’ journey and not ours. I wasn’t implying, however, in any way that OP had crossed any of those lines. I just was commenting on the “we” thing catching my attention. In hindsight, I should have left well enough alone. My bad.
