Is UVA a match or a reach? (OOS)

Colleges & Universities University of Virginia
1

Bio:

  • Citizenship: US, Egypt
  • State of residence: Ohio
  • Class: 2018
  • Race: White (Middle Eastern)
  • Gender: Male
  • Intended Major: Biology (pre-med)

School:

  • Private school (around 240 students total, 57 in my grade)
  • Graduates (How many go to Ivies): 3 per year, 5 last year (there’s normally only around 30 students in a graduating class)
  • APs Offered: 11, 3 of them fine arts (3 APs per year maximum)
  • Only 5 classes per semester, including free period 90% of students take

Academic Profile:

  • Unweighted GPA: 3.90 (calculated this myself, school doesn’t send unweighted)
  • Weighted GPA: 4.10
  • SAT: 1500 (730 rw, 770 m)
  • AP Scores: Biology (4), Psychology (5)
  • Rank: school does not report class rank

Senior Year Courses (APs):

  • AP Calculus AB (school doesn’t offer BC)
  • AP Chemistry
  • AP United States History

EC (I have more, this is more quality over quantity):

  • Varsity Tennis Team co-captain
  • Science Olympiad co-president
  • 45+ hours volunteering at local university hospital
  • 30+ hours fundraising/volunteering for local mosque
  • 75+ hours of shadowing at a local hospital
  • Math Club

Honors:

  • Academic Honor Roll
  • National Society of High School Scholars (school isn’t a member of NHS)
  • National Spanish Exam Medal Winner (Gold last year, Silver this year)

Thanks!

2

UVA non-legacy OOS is a pretty tough admit. Which may not be apparent from the overall stats.

First, the overall data includes the in-state pool, which meaningfully differs stat-wise from the OOS pool.

Second, the OOS pool includes all the legacy applicants. Back out the OOS legacies (and other OOS hooked kids like athletes) and the admit rate goes down into the teens somewhere. So unhooked non-legacy OOS works out to be fairly similar in difficulty to applying to an Ivy ED or SCEA.

If you doubt that, go back and search the EA decision threads. You’ll see OOS kids getting deferred or denied at UVA but getting into Ivies ED or SCEA. Happens all the time.

Your stats are good enough that you may well get in. But very few folks can really call UVA OOS a match. That’s just how the numbers work.

3

Reach. Some IS students don’t get in with stats like yours. It has more to do with more qualified applicants than there are spots for.

4

So if you were in-state, definitely a match. OOS makes it a bit trickier, I would still say the odds are in your favor, but very slim margins. Also, I don’t know anyone who had a 3.9 UW and a 1500 SAT that didn’t get in in-state, so I don’t really get the comment above ^. I actually know someone from high school who had the same stats you have, including the same kinds of extra curricular, and he was accepted OOS to UNC which is definitely a comparable school, so I think you should definitely have a good chance.