Do I have a shot at an Ivy League?

Chance Me / Match Me
1

I’ve never seriously considered applying to an Ivy League or other elite schools because I know it’s very competitive, and I never thought I would stand a chance. The other day my mother was was talking to me about how it wouldn’t hurt to apply to one or two elite colleges (ivy/top 20), especially since we can afford it. I guess my question is do I even stand a chance at a school like Cornell, Johns Hopkins, CalTech, UChicago, Dartmouth, Emory, etc., or would it be a waste of time and money to even apply?

Junior from a Public School in KS
GPA: 4.40 (W); 3.88 (UW)
Rank: somewhere near the top 10%
APs: 4 Junior Year - chem, lang & comp, apush, & calc ab
APs: (just got done selecting courses for senior year) 5 Senior Year - bio, lit, gov, stats, & psych
note: I was in a special selective program through my high school known as the 21st century medical proffesions academy, for students interested in going into the fields of health care or medical research. Through this program I took advanced science courses that were not offered to students at my school that weren’t a part of the program, such as advanced biotechnology, and advanced genetics.
All honors classes through freshman and sophomore year

SAT: 1400 (probably won’t report this)
ACT: 32 (retaking in June, hoping for a 34)

Academic Honors:
High Honor Roll every semester since freshman year
NHS
bronze presidential service award

extracurriculars in school:
•DECA club member
•student council member - varsity letter in student council, expected leadership position senior year
•nhs inductee - possible leadership position senior year
•wish club member
•medical society club member
•I have a hospital internship set up for one semester of my senior year schedule through the program I am a part of
•applying to two competitive senior only clubs next year, the first one is link crew which is where seniors are given a small group of freshman to help them transition to high school, the second is a chemistry club where seniors do chemistry shows for elementary schools

extracurriculars outside of school:
-6+ year’s of art classes
-6+ months of yoga lessons (planning to take 200 hour course to become certified yoga instructor, and then work at a local yoga studio over the summer)
-planning on taking cna course to get cna certified over summer
-by the time early application deadlines approach I will have 300+ hospital volunteer hours, and at least 100 physician shadowing hours
-tutored third and fourth graders in math and writing

2

If you are or might be premed, Caltech and UChicago are generally not recommended because of likely grade deflation.

3

To me, your SAT seems low for an Ivy League school, as does a 32 ACT. If you can get your ACT to 34 that would help quite a bit.

Other than that, you stats look typical of the students who are accepted to Ivy League schools, but also look quite typical of probably 80% or so of the students who are rejected by Ivy League schools. Acceptance at top universities in the US seems quite hard to predict. This of course encourages more students to apply (because they might get in) which appears to be something that they prefer.

Your activities make it look as if @Ynotgo has made a reasonable guess that you might be premed. If so then @Ynotgo is probably correct that you need to avoid schools with grade deflation, and also you need to budget for 8 years of university, rather than just 4. I would run the NPC on the schools that you are considering applying to and try to figure out how much they are likely to cost. Even if you can afford them, spending an extra $200k to go to an Ivy League school for undergrad might not be worth the cost if you are going on to medical or graduate school, since there is probably something else that money could be used for (such as medical school). On the other hand, the Ivy League schools in general do have large endowments, so they could be inexpensive for those students that qualify for whatever need they care to give out.

4

You are in the general range of the applicants who apply to the ivy/top schools. Even though I agree with @DadTwoGirls that your SAT/ACT or even GPA may not seem to be too competitive in general, but your states might be consider high in your state, and the top schools might want to admit certain amount of students from your region/state for diversity reason, and that would be your advantage over similar state students from Northeast, West Cost regions. I would agree with your mom that you should apply to couple of top schools; why not.

5

You have a chance, but its slim. GPA and standardized tests honestly depend on the school. For example, my school is (what I would consider) really smart with full IB. According to Naviance data and charts, kids from my school that get accepted usually have 1550’s+ and over 3.9 for schools with under 20% acceptance. Although, I’ve seen quite a bit of 1600’s and 4.0’s that get rejected from Ivy. You have good EC’s but honestly, the volunteering is a waste. Colleges literally pay no attention to that. I would recommend investing that time for a really high ACT score, like a 35 or 36 to make up for your slightly below average UW GPA. Also, you’re EC’s seem all over the place because you show an interest in art but then you also have an internship at a hospital and took a lot of STEM classes. I think it helps to narrow down EC’s to your intended major. But anyways, definitely apply to some Ivies as reach schools if you really want to go there and I wish you best of luck :slight_smile:

6

@NotABonobo I disagree with what you said. Why can’t people be interested in more than one thing? Lol

7

@ynotgo I’d rather go to a tough school and get a good education (even if my gpa isn’t the best) than to go to an easy school with grade inflation.

8

@lilyflower3241 I have read here and elsewhere that schools wanting “well rounded” students is a bit of a myth. Top schools are attracted to applicants with very narrow and deep interests. I mean, go where your passions lie, but a scattershot EC resume may not hold up against someone who has 1 or 2 EC’s in their major’s area of interest and have been doing them awhile, held major leadership positions, and garnered recognition at a state level or beyond. That may be the source of @NotABonobo 's observation.

9

I would never argue with that philosophy in general but will point out that 1) you can get a good education at places that are not famous for grade deflation and 2) if med school is your goal, you might want to be bear in mind that GPA + MCAT = the first cut for admissions.

Also, your senior year schedule is notably less rigorous than junior year. Even if your GC will check the ‘most rigorous’ box the tippy tops may notice that.

CalTech will almost certainly ding you for the stats (instead of BC).

Are you actually interested in Cornell, JHU & UChicago? they are pretty different than Dartmouth & Emory.

10

“…than to go to an easy school with grade inflation.”

Premed classes are going to be quite tough at any university ranked approximately in the top 200 or even top 300 in the US. If you go to your local in-state public flagship (or in-state #5 or 6 if in California), you should be aware that there will be premed students there who had 4.0 unweighted GPAs in high school, have never had a B in their life, have 1500+ on the SAT, and who work very hard and are determined to get into a top medical school. There will be mid term exams where the class average is below 50. The same is true for engineering classes, and many other subjects.

11

@collegemom3717 I’m confused… how is 5 APs less rigorous than 4?? Also at my school there is a set math schedule. After Calculus, you take Stats. It’s not a choice

12

@Undercrackers I’m sorry but I would rather do what I’m interested in than what colleges want to see. Science is my favorite subject in school, and art is a hobby…

13

@lilyflower3241, the options available to you obviously trumps ‘typical’ or ‘recommended’- it’s unusual to see a school offer AB but not BC, so it didn’t occur to me that it wasn’t an option for you. If you do apply to CalTech I suggest making sure that it is clear that you did not have that choice (ie, don’t count on them parsing the school description).

Depending on the specific subjects, 5 APs can be seen less rigorous than 4- for example, BC is seen as more rigorous than Stats (never mind Psych).

Also, you asked for opinions, and even though I don’t agree with all of the responses above, so far they have all been given in a helpful spirit. Whether you mean it to or not, your responses are coming across as rather sharp.

14

@collegemom3717 Ok a) We are given a choice after precalculus if we want to take Calc AB or Calc BC. I chose Calc AB because with 3 other AP classes, along with a 2 hour block of advanced biotech, as well as anatomy, I felt that it would be a good idea to take AB instead of BC. I made the right choice for myself, because I do things based on what I like and not what I feel confident plebes will like. b) Now that I have taken Calc AB I only have one option for next year, which is Stats. c) I am taking AP psych because it is something that really interests me d) I did not ask for an analysis of my schedule. I asked for an opinion on whether or not I would possibly be able to get into the colleges I listed. How do I come off as “sharp”?

15

^*colleges not confident plebes

16

I personally don’t think @lilyflower3241 has been “rather sharp” in any of their responses. You should definitely apply to some of the schools you listed. It’s definitely possible for you to get in to even just one of them. Your extracurricular activities look fine IMO, especially since you do seem like you have some sort of medical or science focus based on them. I think colleges understand that applicants have various interests and want to participate in various extracurriculars. The only part of your application you’re lacking is high test scores, so I suggest retaking the ACT and/or SAT. If you get a 34+ or 1500+, write some great essays, and find teachers willing to write recommendations for you, you’ll definitely have a shot!

17

@summerhazed thank you!

18

You can be interested in multiple things, nothing wrong with that. I guess what I was trying to say is that you should work on refining your biggest area of interest and invest most of your time into that so that colleges take notice in how you distinguish yourself from other applicants. Most Ivy league applicants will all have EC similar to your’s with membership in various clubs. However, taking it one step further and achieving a top place in a notable club competition (such as Science Olympiad) would incredibly help in setting you apart from others.

In other words, I believe its much better to invest your time into one or two clubs but be really good at them and win competitions, rather than be a member of like 5 various clubs but have no achievements to talk about.

19

I agree with @NotABonobo. Unless you have some achievement to stand out, your chances are slim.

20

@NotABonobo I have achievements to talk about in all of my clubs.