Please understand…reach schools are…reaches. Trying to predict acceptances at them is folly. These schools reject kids with perfect stats, and accept others. If you do or don’t get accepted, you will never know why.
These schools have VERY low acceptance rates for mechanical engineering majors. VERY low. Your chances are like everyone else who applies…you might get accepted and you might not.
In the meantime, I would urge you to find some true sure things for admission and affordability. Right now…you have no sure things for admission, and you don’t seem to think affordability should be a metric for you. I hope you rethink your strategy.
And I’m doing this in a separate post. Please read this thread I’m going to link. This student was a stronger student than you and admissions have only gotten harder since the thread was written. Like you, he really had no sure things for admission as a HS senior, and was rejected everywhere he applied…an outcome no one expected. He did land on his feet after a well crafted gap year, but his senior year of high school was…awful.
It gives me perspective and a check on my expectations.
I’ll work on creating a realistic and robust portfolio of schools that match my interests and eligibility.
As a parent, of course I would love to have unlimited resources and let my kids pick any school they wanted. However, my college professor paycheck is much lower than people realize (on the very low end of middle class in my state) and I myself have my own debts to pay off. Sadly, most parents and kids underestimate the overall cost of college and overestimate how much merit money they will receive. I’ve been on a lot of college admissions pages and this one here is the most accurate with giving estimates. You yourself can only take out $5500 in loans that first year. Any other loans you would need require your parents to qualify for and take out. So remember to factor in how much you are asking your parents to put on the line for your education.
Having been around college admissions for awhile, there are 2 ways of thinking about “dream schools.” One is apply no matter what and at least be able to say you got in. Or then there’s those who are totally crushed and become depressed and angry at their parents and the world because they feel “all their hard work was for nothing” when they did get into their dream school and then finances didn’t work out. Only you know what you can mentally handle.
You seem like a smart kid so here are things to look at. For each school you can google how to run their net price calculator or NPC. This will give you a better idea of what YOUR family should expect to pay for YOU. Also, google Common Data Set for each college. This is a totally unbiased, real numbers guide on that college from the college itself. People will say “The colleges aren’t transparent enough” but Georgia Tech for example is openly showing people that they only accepted 1% off their deferred list. Page 17 on the CDS tells you what Georgia Tech believes is important when looking at applicants. Section H on the CDS talks about their financial aid given. Georgia Tech says the average merit given was only about 6k/yr to those not needing aid. https://irp.gatech.edu/files/CDS/CDS_2023-2024_V3.pdf
Agreed, especially with less expensive but higher ranked publics like Purdue and UIUC on the list. We are in MI and Purdue would have been less expensive for my son than UofM.
You have a great chance to get into all!!! UMich if OOS is really hard to get into.
The issue is a probability game… so you might have an OOS 8% accept rate, and as a result… its just a numbers game so DO NOT feel bad if a school doesn’t give you an acceptance! It literally has nothing to do with you at some point!
That written, having set two kiddos through college with stats that were awesome, but not in the upper 1% like yourself… I’d expect you get into UMD, UIUC, Purdue, GT, NW, Cornell, UMich… in that order… like you’ll definitely get into the first 3 or 4… and while I’ve seen kids rejected from GT with 1580SAT… okay, but maybe they get accepted to Cornell.
Thank you all for weighing in… although you’ve given me a reality check i also appreciate that you’ve not been dismissive of all I’ve done so far., and offered some solid advice.
I’ll work on creating a new list and would love your feedback.
You have garnered an impressive academic record. Kudos to you.
Some random thoughts…
Your CV is stronger than my son’s (higher test scores, but no AP Chem or Bio) and he was accepted by Purdue. I would be surprised if you didn’t get accepted there, but one never knows.
All the schools on your list are top 20; you may want to add a couple safeties. Your record is strong, but these schools have extremely low acceptance rates and turn down many qualified candidates. You may also get more financial aid from a top 40 school.
You might want to look into the honors colleges at less prestigious universities. These programs often provide early registration (important if you are in a lock-step program like engineering and need to get into pre-req classes on schedule to graduate on time), research opportunities, more face time with professors, and financial aid packages.
Some high endowment schools (think Ivies, Stanford, etc.) are very generous with financial aid. For example, Princeton has a policy of covering 100% of tuition and room/board for students whose family income is less than $65k. As long as you are applying to top schools, why not take a chance on a school that could give you a very generous package if accepted. It might be worth a couple admissions essays. The worst thing that could happen would be they reject you.
Finally, make sure you understand the admission process for each school. Some are direct admit to your desired major, and some admit you to general engineering and then you request your desired major at the end of your freshman year, which you may not get if your GPA is not high enough.
first son we had a bunch of OOS-honors colleges… what we also learned was getting into an OOS elite school is hard enough… but the HC even harder. so, for our second son, we became a bit smarter.
apply to in-state honors colleges… b/c an HC immediately is worth it no matter what… so kind of have a built in safety of two schools b/c you’ll get into your states top publics… and then if you get into their HC… you have real option.
second kiddo, we did not apply to UMich. It was just a waste of an application for OOS. So instead we used that to have a slightly more targeted list.
first kiddo we had too many safeties. Like 4-5. So I think two are good enough… and then also turn those into the schools you’re applying to Honors Colleges at…
None of my sons are at HC… but I cannot stress how awesome those are for UG… they help kick down the door to wherever you want to go next.
Then you don’t have budget issues. You can go for free or very close to it - saving you potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars. Or excessive loans.
Schools like Tulsa, Alabama (if get NMF) and more. Others are free tuition.
Since that is the case, you may be interested in this thread that describes the schools that give big merit for NMSF/NMF status. These schools can make excellent admission and financial safeties, and since the big scholarships attract so many National Merit students, there would be others with stats like your own. Maybe pick 1-2 of the ones you like best and add them to your list to round it out?
While NMF status will lead to an affordable admit to a certain group of safety schools, I don’t think I’d call it a “golden ticket”. Most NMSF kids do not attend those schools. None of the NMSF schools are on OP’s original list.
The truth is we don’t really know OP’s financial situation. He could be looking at a better deal at any number of schools. A couple of schools on his list, Cornell and Northwestern, do meet full financial need.
But it is good for OP to know about the National Merit Schools. He’ll need a few more likely admits for his list. The fact that they’re very affordable or even free, is a big plus.
I think you have a shot at all these schools. However, admission competition is among applicants in your area. If you were my student, I would suggest that you ask other FRC teams where their senior members are going. I teach in Texas and used to coach FTC (still ref and judge). If you are the chief engineer of your team and a Dean’s list semi-finalist in Texas, I’d say your chance for all these schools are very realistic.