Is my list well rounded?

College Search & Lists
1

<p>Major: Business or Law
GPA: 4.8/6.0(Most Demanding Schedule in class of 2011)
SAT: 2140(1420 sub score, 720W)
I am a merit scholarship student at a boarding school in Connecticut. I have a strong interest in economics/business and law. My strengths include English, Math and Logic/Analysis based courses. I am a fairly good athlete, I have some community service ECs and I am doing an internship at a huge bank working under someone that is on the board for Brown University, someone that is on the board for Stanford and for two graduates of Chicago. Should I put Stanford on my list because of this?</p>

<p>HELP ME:
A. Add some colleges or delete some because they are out of reach or don’t have a strong undergraduate business program or a strong curriculum for my interests.
B. Delete some choices
C. Add some more safety schools that have strong expertise in business.</p>

<p>The number of “<em>” denote my interest in the school… I tried to pick schools with really strong business programs. </em>* is the first choice for me</p>

<p>My list right now is:
Babson***
Boston Coll**
Boston Univ*
Brown Univ***
Carnegie Mellon Univ**
Claremont McKenna***
Univ of Chicago****
Colgate Univ**
Cornell Univ**
Dartmouth Coll*
George Wash Univ**
Johns Hopkins Univ*
Northwestern Univ**
Occidental Coll**
U of Pennsylvania***
Pomona Coll***
Rice Univ***
U of Rochester**
U of Southern California**
Tufts Univ***
U of Virginia***</p>

2

<p>University of Richmond has the 12th best undergraduate business program. </p>

<p>Dickinson College has International Business and Management with a very strong Study Abroad Program.</p>

3

<p>When you say that you’re a “merit scholarship” student, do you mean a National Merit student or do you mean that you attend a boarding school on a scholarship?</p>

<p>If you are attending a boarding school on a scholarship, should we assume that your family will need financial aid to pay for college? If so, then your list need to carefully include that parameter. </p>

<p>How much will your parents pay each year for college?</p>

<p>What will colleges likely expect your family to pay? If the expected amount is larger than what they can pay, you’ll have a problem.</p>

<p>What schools are your financial safety schools? These are schools that your family can either afford to pay for outright, or they are schools that you are assured to get scholarships from to make them affordable.</p>

<p>However, if your family is willing to pay $55k per year for the school of your choice, then awesome!</p>

4

<p>Chicago, Northwestern and Occidental do not have undergraduate business programs. I would add Cornell and MIT as reaches and Indiana-Bloomington as a safety.</p>

5

<p>Most of the schools on your list do not have undergraduate business majors. None, as far as I know, have law majors. A few (such as Penn) have undergraduate business/finance programs, but the curriculum focus at nearly all of them is on liberal arts & sciences.</p>

<p>If your Stanford contact at the bank has closely observed your work and knows you well, then s/he might be able to write a strong letter of recommenation that would help your application. However, the mere fact that this person has a connection to Stanford would not necessarily deliver any more impact than a LOR from an English or Math teacher who knows you well.</p>

6

<p>Indiana would be a good safety if the parents can pay. Their merit scholarship is only for about $9k which can still leave a student with about $28k to pay (I think COA for out of state students is about $38k or so). Owing $28k after merit is fine if the parents will pay that much.</p>

<p>I can’t tell if the parents are paying for the boarding school or if the student got a scholarship to go to the boarding school because of income. If the latter is the case, then Indiana won’t be affordable.</p>

<p>If money is an issue, then safeties must be financial safeties - which often means schools that will give enough merit that the rest can be covered with fed aid.</p>

7

<p>I think the last is filled with great schools, to which you have a greta shot at because of your grades, but maybe add one or two definite safeties maybe Michigan State as well as in Indiana, but I’m not too sure.</p>

8

<p>Sorry, but I think it’s an odd list. How did you come up with this? </p>

<p>What are you looking for in a college, eg, size, location, attitudes, sports, etc? How do you like spending the 150+ hours per week that you will be spending outside of the classroom? </p>

<p>Do you plan to stay in the USA after graduation? How much of the USA are you familiar with?</p>

9

<p>My college counselor helped me with the list.</p>

<p>I like Babson a lot, but I really feel that I need a big base of knowledge to really prosper and achieve. I want to take English classes to further my writing and analytical skills. The core is very important because I feel like you need a bit in every area to be a high functioning businessman. I would love to take classes in biotech or biochemistry so if I want to invest in a pharmeus one day I can understand their research a little better than the average bear. </p>

<p>I love urban. I really don’t want a political bias either way, and I’m looking for a bigger school so I can take some business oriented classes as well as getting a great core in. I think a core is important because I want to be pretty well rounded going out of college… I will stay in the USA, I am a US citizen and I was born here/live here. </p>

<p>I have a enough outside of school financing options through the company my dad works for and various competitions… PAYING IS NOT A QUESTION. I just want the money they spend to be incredibly well worth it…</p>

10

<p>Brown has no business program, but if you’re looking to get an MBA, or go to top businesses straight from school, is a great choice. Personally, I don’t know what the fascination is with getting undergrad Business degrees: study economics or engineering or CS or something that truly interests you, make sure your writing is high quality, and learn to be personable. If you gain skills/knowledge in something other than purely “management,” you can just as well find employment at top businesses, but you’ll bring something unique to the table. And you can always get an MBA afterwards, if that’s necessary.</p>

<p>No school is really “out” of reach for you: by the time you actually apply, probably drop places like Dartmouth that are anything but safeties, but you’re not that interested in.</p>

11

<p>I want to go to a great business school right after grad school… I’m probably going to go for either econ or finance with a minor in philosophy and a minor in applied mathematics.</p>

<p>I have scholarship cash coming in from my dad’s business, (maybe) some honor societies, my iq society and some competitions.</p>

<p>I have around 8 AP classes completed(3 Soph and 3 junior year but physics is two and I took macro w/o taking the class). I think I can get a 2250 at least. I know I can get a 2200(I missed one on the math section… just gotta be careful). I can add 50 points to CR if not 100…</p>

12

<p>How about NYU? U Maryland and Penn State might be good to add as well.</p>

13

<p>

So you will be going from Undergrad —> Grad School —> MBA?
8 years of schooling before hitting the work force?</p>

14

<p>ital,
First, slow down on your long-range planning. Probably the only thing that is sure is that your plans today are going to change over the next 4-6 years.</p>

<p>Two, you don’t want to go to MBA school without work experience. It’s a waste and plus your classmates will get little of consequence from you as you’ll have no perspective. </p>

<p>Three, I’ve got some suggestions and thoughts, but I don’t know you and your interests so don’t take too literally.</p>

<p>Ok, your comments above are helpful. </p>

<p>You say you want a bigger school and yet you start at 2000. Most folks interested in a “bigger school” would probably start at a larger number of undergrads, eg, 4-5000. Given that, cut or downgrade the following:</p>

<p>Claremont McKenna & Pomona (unless you want to count the other colleges there as part of the student population-reasonable thought btw)
Occidental
Rice</p>

<p>If you say you want urban, then it’s hard to understand the following:</p>

<p>Colgate
Cornell
Dartmouth</p>

<p>Cut them.</p>

<p>That leaves the following:</p>

<p>Babson (left despite size constraint as you explicitly stated you like it and its entrepreneurial reputation may make it a match for your business interests)
Boston College
Brown
Carnegie Mellon
U Chicago
George Washington
Johns Hopkins
Northwestern
U Penn
U Rochester
USC
Tufts
U Virginia (I wouldn’t describe this as urban either)</p>

<p>Re your stats, your 4.8/6.0 equates to a 3.2 on a 4.0 scale. While your SAT is nice, it won’t make up for this when you apply to colleges classified as most selective and thus makes most of your targets as reach colleges. Here’s a prelim guess at your list:</p>

<p>Reach
Brown
Carnegie Mellon
U Chicago
Johns Hopkins
Northwestern
U Penn
Tufts
U Virginia OOS</p>

<p>High Match
Boston College
USC</p>

<p>Match
Babson
U Rochester</p>

<p>Safety
George Washington (might be a stretch calling this a safety)</p>

<p>As for adds, I’d suggest:</p>

<p>Match
Tulane
Wake Forest (Winston Salem is not a big urban center, but in certain has a lot of urban/arty feel)
U Miami
U Richmond (though size is small)</p>

<p>Low Match
SMU</p>

<p>I could be completely off as so much will come down to an Adcomm evaluation of your transcript and your overall application with essays/recs/etc., so take this with a huge grain of salt. But my impression is that you’ve got too many reaches and high matches, too few true matches, and no “lock” safeties.</p>

15

<p>My new list has Richmond and Umiami.</p>