NYU Stern... rawr

Johnhughzy
Thu, 27 Jan 2011 19:41:31 +0000

I posted this in the main College Admissions forum already, but that was before I realized that this forum existed.

Ever since going to a college fair this past September I have been extremely interested in NYU. After doing lots of research on the school I decided to pursue NYU Stern, their business school. My problem is the internet has told me all kinds of contradicting things about getting into Stern, and the NYU website doesn’t help much either.

I am aware that the Stern MBA program is very hard to get into. What I don’t know is if Stern’s undergrad school is equally as hard to get into. The NYU website only has information on what it took the average student to get accepted, but nothing about the individual schools. It does at one point say “Admission to the undergraduate schools at NYU is highly selective. Though there are many similarities, the application process differs slightly from school to school.” but that doesn’t help much.

I have found all sorts of things about NYU on the internet such as it’s easy to get in, it’s hard to get in, stern is close to impossible to get in, you can only get in if you don’t need financial aid, you have a better chance if you don’t live in New York, you have a better chance if you do live in New York, and all sorts of other things.

What I need to know is if I have what it takes or even close to what it takes to get into Stern, and if not if another NYU school is possible (You can only apply to one of their schools). My college counselor says that she thinks I can get, but she has only sent one person to NYU so I’m not sure she knows 100% about what she is talking about.

My GPA is going to be around 3.7 (Unweigthed) Most B’s from freshman year
I took the SAT yesterday but on the PSAT in September/October I got around
Math: 65
Reading: 61
Writing: 59

As far as classes I go to a college prep high school, and all of our classes are considered Honors, but these are the APs im taking/have taken:
AP Euro
AP US History
AP English Lang
AP English Lit
AP Calc AB
AP Stats
AP Chem
AP Studio (Photography)

Although my GPA isn’t a 4.0 uw I have an A in all the AP classes I have taken or that I am taking.

Other things that I am guessing would show up on the application:
4 years of art
Month of community service
Swim team (3 Years)
Golf team (1 Year)
Drama class/club + productions
Working for my dad over the summers
Spanish club

Other things to consider:
-I’m from the state of Georgia
-I go to a Private, non-religious, School (On their site it says about 15% of their students come from private schools)
-I’ve shown demonstrated interest since sophomore year
-If getting in is possible I plan to fly up and visit the campus
-After taking the SAT yesterday I feel confident on math. Even if writing doesn’t go up that much I plan on getting math well into the 700s
-I havent taken the ACT yet (Might do better than the SAT)
-I’ve met the Georgia admissions rep or atleast one of them
-I already have a somewhat liberal and controversial essay planned out
-I plan on taking a Microeconomics class at Emory this summer and possibly some other classes
-My grades have improved each year, and each year I took a bit of leap on class difficulty.

Any advice is appreciated. If you don’t think I have any chance of getting into Stern let me know I would still love to apply to NYU even if it means applying to a different school. If not Stern what other business/econ opportunites would be available to me? Would these be anywhere near as good as Sterns? My long term goal is to get an MBA from stern regardless of whether or not I go as an undergrad.