<p>Im a soph in i think the 1st or 2nd best public high in Pa (voted different places different years) and am looking to major in language and journalism or english at any ivies that offer such programs but especially Dartmouth, UPenn, Columbia, Yale, or Princeton. I havent really researched Brown and i dont think Harvard offers much in the way of Journalism.</p>
<p>my stats are-</p>
<p>Freshman Year-
English Hon- A
Geometery Hon- A
French II - B
Health/gym(req)- A
West Civ. Hon- A
Physical Science- A
Bio hon(taken at West Chester university in the Summer)- A</p>
<p>Soph Year (First Semester)-
Chem Hon- A
English Hon- A
Hon Alg II- A
French III- A
Cult Studies Hon- A
Gym(req) - A</p>
<p>Junior Year Classes-
Ap Chem
Ap Us History
Ap English
Ap Art History
French IV Hon
Hon Advanced Math</p>
<p>ECs-</p>
<p>NHS/French Honors society
2 years of Lead Guitar in highschool Jazz Band
Volunteer/Member at local Quaker Meeting House
Volunteer at senoir center once a month
Have volunteered in Rocomadour, France the past few summers (Aunt is mayor of the town) She taught French at Dartmouth
Debate Team
Academic Team
Newspaper Editor
Chess Team
Concert Classical Guitarist(attended/played at masterclasses at John Hopkins (peabody institute) and Temple university
Varsity Hockey freshman year (dont play due to injury)
Varisty Rower (Father varsity Rower at Temple)
JV Cross Country (4 out of our 6 Varsity runners are top ten in country)</p>
<p>i mainly focus on writing, guitar, and crew.</p>
<p>I know or am related to people who go to or are alum of my universities of interest(specified above).</p>
<p>Just wanted to see if im on the right track to getting into ivy leagues and if theres anything i can do to better my chances.</p>
<p>Your grades are fine if your school is as good as you say. It’s a matter of your SAT scores (try to get them above 2200) and, much more importantly, you need to have glowing recommendations and essays that truly make you seem unique and worthy of an elite institution. They get plenty of applicants from schools like yours with grades and interests like yours. You need to find out what sets you apart and make that clear in your application so they’re dying to have you. For a school that accepts fewer than 1 in 10 applicants, it’s not like they’re hard-pressed to find really interesting candidates.</p>
<p>PS: “admittance” is spelled with one “e”</p>
<p>hey. I think your app is nice. Test scores will be important. Focus on depth. Do something outside of school in your community. I was the editor of my newspaper but also did a journalism internship at a well-known sports museum and was published for them. ( I got into Harvard, Stanford, Dartmouth, Penn, Cornell) Also, if you want a sure in, focus on crew. Recruits dominate. I also think colleges will really like the community service in France. Write and essay about that maybe. Good luck.</p>
<p>Harvard offers the wonderful journalism experience of working on a major daily newspaper, the Harvard Crimson. Harvard does not have a journalism major, but young journalists love to study there.</p>
<p>“major daily newspaper” is a generous, or unintentionally comedic, description. The Crimson is a fancier and better funded version of what one might find at many similar-size universities, and smaller than the dailies of some state schools. It gets its Harvard-external news from wire services, the students only (or mostly) work the campus beat. I don’t think the Crimson is necessarily a pre-professional training ground for journalists so much as a hobby for most of the students who participate. For some it’s both. </p>
<p>Harvard does not have a journalism program as such. It does have a research center for study of journalism’s interaction with politics and public policy. It is based at Kennedy school and has some senior ex-journalists as affiliates. Marvin Kalb ran it a while ago, don’t know who does it now. There are also journalists who spend a semester or two in residence at various parts of Harvard such as the Institute of Politics, Radcliffe (e.g. Bunting Institute), international studies, languages and so on, but you would have to find them program by program.</p>
<p>siserune wrote:</p>
<p>“I don’t think the Crimson is necessarily a pre-professional training ground for journalists so much as a hobby for most of the students who participate. For some it’s both”</p>
<p>Did you ever work on the Crimson? Did you ever know anybody who worked on the Crimson?</p>
<p>I would have to strongly disagree with you on all points. The Crimson is DEFINITELY a pre-professional training ground for jounalists. It is not just a “hobby.” It is seriously pressure-filled with HUGE amounts of work. Most of the editors work their tails off, huge amounts of time. A great percentage go on the newspaper or literary careers.</p>
<p>Just to get on the Crimson staff takes major dedication. You can’t just “join the newspaper.” You have to “comp”, ie show you’re competent.</p>
<p>Yes, I have known people at the Crimson. “comping” is done for most of the Harvard student publications, the radio station, the Lampoon, basically anything that involves meeting recurring hard deadlines. This is done at most other universities as well, and does not in and of itself imply anything rising to the preprofessional level. For the Crimson, many people were high school newspaper devotees and love it enough to spend many hours a week on it in college. That too is true at many other schools, it’s a self-selected crowd.</p>
<p>For some people these “comped” activities are career-setting either intentionally or in hindsight, and I said as much above. I think that the fraction of Crimson staffers who continue in journalism or journalism school upon graduation is much lower than 100 percent. Do you have an estimate from the recent classes?</p>
<p>No. Reason? Verbosity.</p>
<p>Seriously: “Do i meet qualifications for potential admittence into Harvard?” does it need to be that long?</p>
<p>“Can I get in?” probably works better.</p>
<p>I would hate to read your application.</p>
<p>“Name: I have been known to be called XXX, but my parental legal guardian sometime refer to me as YYY, which is legal under the law.
Age: According to the Gregorian Calendar, which unless a political correct term is necessary, then Common Era, I am at the age of a eight and tenth years”</p>
<p>Bad sarcasm aside, keep working hard and if Harvard won’t take you, then other great schools will.</p>