Narrow Down RA Colleges

browndynamite
Thu, 27 Nov 2014 11:22:56 +0000

For the RA round of applications, I want to focus on top schools and work really hard on their applications. During EA I applied to my safeties/targets: UIUC, Georgia-Tech, and Rose-Hulman, and I just turned in the UC app for UCB, UCLA, UC Davis, and UCSB. I have more colleges on my radar than I want to apply to, and I just want some help narrowing down the list.

Schools I’ll definitely apply to:
MIT
Stanford
Caltech
Carnegie Mellon

Other schools I’m considering:
Princeton, Columbia, Harvard, Cornell, U Michigan Ann Arbor, and Harvey-Mudd.

Some info to help you guys out: I’ll be applying to engineering, and I’d like to go to a place with excellent Aerospace, EE, Mechanical, and CS. I’d also like if there was a lot of opportunities for internships and research and a focus on doing engineering than just studying it (this also includes engineering clubs like FRC etc.). Id prefer it if there were quite a few non-engineering clubs on campus like music clubs, arts clubs, MUN, etc. I prefer bigger colleges in cities with strong tech hubs, but if the college is really strong(like MIT) then I’d be willing to sacrifice those for four years. My parents can only contribute $7000-$8000 but we are upper middle class(they have to save for retirement) to my tuition, so I’ll be paying the bulk of full tuition myself and I’d like it if I didn’t sob violently every time I looked at my crushing debt after I graduate. I’ll also most likely be going for a masters, so if there’s a 5 years masters program or something like that(like Berkeley’s EECS 5 year masters) that would be helpful. My life goal is to run my own space exploration start-up, if that helps.

I don’t want to brag, but I feel I can objectively say I’m a strong candidate. I have a 2300 SAT(740 CR, 770 M, 790 W), 790 Chem, 800 Physics, 800 Math II. I’ve taken 7 APs: Euro, Calc BC, Comp Sci, Chem, Physics B, Physics C Mech, Physics C E&M, with 5s in all of them except a 4 in E&M. I have As and A minuses in all my classes except for 1 B because I was busy self studying for the Physics C exams. I also have good ECs: Research Intern at Sandia National Labs, Founder&Captain of the Robotics Team, Intern at a makerspace, over 400 hours of tutoring, editor of the school paper, doing an international robotics competition, organized a book drive for the African Library Project, work as a Tennis Coach(and play tennis obviously). Awards: NMSP semifinalist, AP scholar with distinction, CML, MUN, robotics awards, and I’ve gotten best hack at a hackathon. I think I can write good essays-my teachers say my essays are funny and have depth, and my teacher/counselor recs should be fantastic-my counselor said she cried writing mine, and cried reading my math teachers rec.

So with all of that in mind, considering possible acceptances from EAs and UCs, should I just focus on those 4 schools or is there a school I should also consider?