Good Safety Schools for top students?

brazos21
Sun, 11 Jun 2017 17:10:46 +0000

on is in class of 2018 and is in the process of finalizing college list. His stats are very good (1560 SAT, 35 ACT, 4.0 Unweighted, 12 AP classes once graduate all 5’s so far, 800’s on Chem and Math II and Math I Subject Tests, #1 in class) and has good extracurriculars (3 sport varsity letterman, recruited in football and soccer; section lead in orchestra cello; leadership positions on teams and in school; research assistant to astronomy professor at Rice and co-authored scholarly article with him submitted for publication)…

He is primarily interested in math and theoretical physics. We are struggling with college list since most of the schools are reaches for everyone. Caltech has offered athletic support for application; loves Harvard and Princeton math departments; loves MIT; Stanford; Yale and Chicago will be on the list for physics…we are in Texas so UT Austin probably on list and Rice…

Not real excited about “safety” schools of Texas and Rice. Thoughts on building a college list for a kid like this who on paper should have a good shot at top schools but such reach schools make list difficult without reaching down to schools not excited about.