9 AP classes including 3 taken senior year. all honors other than those
AP scholar award, all county soccer award
Extracurriculars
Sports: Soccer, XC (captain), Track (captain), weightlifting
Clubs: Drama (president), NHS (president), Newspaper (editor-in-chief, president, founder)
Class President
Ashbrook Scholar
HOBY Ambassador
Representative to a local organization dedicated to reducing overdose deaths
Researched the history of town, specifically the sports history
Would assume essays would be strong based on writing background
Good social scene would be preferable, but also bookish and will appreciate time in as well as out
Safeties would include OSUs and UW of the world, but the allure of a more prestigious school has its draw as well
Really very little idea of what a good match would be, in search of help and guidance
A few more things to think about…
-Any price constraints?
-Any geographic constraints or preferences (to include part of the country as well as rural/urban/suburban settings)?
-What size of school do you prefer (the ones you noted are all quite large)?
-Do you want/not want any specific outlets (Ex. Greek Life, big time sports, etc)?
-Are religiously affiliated schools ok?
One suggestion would be to get your hands on a good college guide book (ex. Fiske, Princeton Review) and read up on some of the different types of schools out there.
University of Washington, Ohio State, it was only a turn of phrase, meant flagship public schools or schools similar to those
Location doesn’t matter much, but would probably prefer along the coast. Size really doesn’t matter, would be comfortable at a big school or a small one
No definite career direction, most likely politics, academia, or law
Because you are involved as an Ashbrook Scholar, you may want to research schools in the Washington, DC area due to the availability of year round internships/externships (such as Georgetown, GWU, American University, College of William & Mary, U Virginia).
Any state flagship university.
Tough to make suggestions as it appears that you are open to all schools in all locations at any cost with no clear career goal.
Claremont McKenna College might be of interest to you. The school likes those who exhibit leadership qualities.
Has your family considered the cost of grad school when discussing your budget? Your career goals indicate that grad/law school is highly likely. I suggest keeping that in mind if the potential for $700k full pay bachelors + law school would be uncomfortable for your family or result in $$$ loans.
For your academic interests, you probably want smaller classes where you will read books (not just excerpts in textbooks), write&edit a lot, and discuss ideas, visuals, etc. So your best choices are likely flagships’ honors colleges that offer honors classes for gen eds and some majors (not just an Honors freshman seminar) and LACs (Macalester, Bowdoin, Haverford, Dickinson. .) or LAC-like colleges like Tufts or William&Mary. Then round that out with Georgetown, GWU, and american U and, if you wish, ivy+ universities.
Religiously affiliated schools vary in how much religion is part of the environment. Where religion is a bigger part of the environment, your religious preferences including denominational preference are likely to matter more.
UW shouldn’t be considered a safety even if your in-state. Same with Ohio State. I feel like most people in this forum don’t realize that most state flagship schools are extremely difficult to get into now.
I disagree. Your statement is school dependent and major dependent.
As a humanities major, if the OP is a Washington resident UW would be a likely. IMO.
Ohio State would be a safety in-state.
ETA: I believe you may be projecting the opinions of many CA residents across all 49 other states. It really isn’t all the same so one should be cautious of making blanket statements.
Most? Probably not… unless you mean in a population weighted model where a much larger percentage of students are in states with more selective flagships than the percentage of states with more selective flagships.
Yes. Off the top of my head I can only think of California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, North Carolina, Texas, Virginia and Washington as having public flagships that are not easy to get into. That’s far from “most states”, and each of these is a lot easier for in state students, and also easier for many majors.