Hello, I’m currently a junior that just finished the first semester and starting to look into colleges.
I am looking to go into BMed Engineering
UW GPA: 3.93
W GPA: 4.4
SAT - 1920
and here are my current top picks
Challenges - Duke, MIT, Caltech, John Hopkins
Safe Picks - UNC at Chapel Hill, Georgia Tech, University of Michigan
I am wondering about my chances at the ones that I labeled challenge. I’m currently in all AP classes averaging around A- and have only taken SAT once. Thing is I am concerned about my ECs. I am disabled so I cannot do sports, but I am trying to get involved in clubs at my school and other organizations. How much will not having a sport affect my chance into getting into the challenge colleges?
To be honest, with that SAT, none of your safe picks are safe. GA Tech and UMich have both been insanely selective this year, check out their “post your results” thread. Not having a sport won’t matter if you do meaningful stuff. Get that SAT to a 2200+ and your challenges will be attainable, but as for now, none are likely.
Ditto on Georgia Tech. I can speak on them specifically because I live close by and I along with many of my friends applied this year. Georgia Tech received 27% more applications just this year and their acceptance rate has been cut in half in the past 5 years. I watched a lot of pretty intelligent kids get deferred or rejected this EA round so I definitely wouldn’t count GT as a given anymore.
Ok thank you guys for the quick replies, I will reconsider my GT safe pick for now and I understand my SAT is reasonably low but hopefully in the future I can raise it up to 2200-2300 range.
None of those schools are even close to safe for you. You could very easily be rejected from all of those. Your SAT score is weak for all of those schools.
If I may ask, what is your disability? Some of the schools on your list may be interested in helping someone like yourself to succeed and may be understanding of your (less than perfect) scores.
My D had no sport either but she got admitted at UMich CoE with scholarships. The question is what other EC you have. Nevertheless, your test score is weak right now and there is no safe pick on your list. Indeed, no one from OOS can claim UMich as safety regardless of score and GPA. The admission median ACT was 33 last year which is around 2220 in SAT. In addition, the OOS admission rate is in teens even if you are within the range.
I think you need some additional college counseling. Even if you are a NC resident, UNC-CH probably isn’t a true safety, and NC State actually is the stronger Engineering school. I don’t see any of your “challenges” as remotely plausible for you with your existing stats. They would remain extreme long-shots even with a statistically-unlikely score increase of more than 200 points. What about Clemson, Pitt, Temple, Purdue, Alabama, USF or UCF, University of Colorado, et al? Northeastern might be within reach. Your grades are competitive for most colleges, but your scores are low for all of the colleges you listed. What is the breakdown for your Math SAT? Some Engineering schools like RPI might be forgiving of low Writing/CR scores if you have an outstanding Math score. Is English your first language?
For you, umich is not a safety school. Based on your SAT, it would be more on the match/reach borderline.
Not doing sports is fine. As long as you can really talk about the ECs you are involved in, you should be fine. It is better to have 4 or 5 activities that you can speak about with substance, rather than 20 or 30 where you have nothing to say for the majority of them.
Do you have any other subject test scores/AP scores? Your GPA is really great, but the SAT score suggests some grade inflation. Some more information would be helpful, like class rank.