<p>I’m from Silver Spring, Maryland, in a well below average high school. I applied by the priority deadline(November 1st), with essays and recommendations and all.(Essays are about leadership, persistence, tolerance, and my coming really far from when I was a child-I couldn’t construct my own sentences until I was six.) My passion is teaching-I have utmost respect for teachers and have a great desire to teach mathematics in middle school, high school, or college(depending on nature of students and content I’m most comfortable teaching).
My primary hook is my autism, a language and social disorder, and thriving and holding several leadership positions in spite of it.</p>
<p>I’m a senior and here are my credentials:
3.38 GPA Unweighted (3.88 weighted) I have had an upward trend in class grades(I have started with a 3.0 at the end of freshman year). All classes are honors and AP where appropriate, though my Special Ed coordinator advised against me taking any APs, so I don’t have many. I have difficulty with reading comprehension and text interpretation, so I got a 2 on the AP Lang exam. I’m taking AP Psychology and AP Statistics now. I’m predicting a 3 on Psych, and a 3 or 4 on Stats. I wanted to take AP Physics B and/or AP Music Theory, but not enough people signed up for it. I filled the empty holes in my schedule with a PE class, Child Development, and an open period for student-teaching at my middle school. </p>
<p>Incidentally, my county DOES NOT RANK. If I were to take a guess at my class rank, I’d say 40-60 out of about 300.</p>
<p>SAT(Single Sitting, only attempt)
560 CR
740 M
600 W. 61 MC, 8 essay.
1300 M+CR. 1900 Total.</p>
<p>Extracurriculars:
Varsity Cross Country Grade 9 and 11. Injured Grade 10, not running this year because of Pep Band, heavier courseload, and student teaching conflict with practices. </p>
<p>During the summer, I swim with my local swim team. My mother is the social director of this pool, so I’m heavily involved. The team rarely wins meets and we’re at the bottom division, though this isn’t specified in the application.</p>
<p>Comedy Club. I write and perform scripted comedy skits. I’m a published author, and we performed at the Capitol Fringe Festival in 2010.</p>
<p>Marching Band, Symphonic Band, and Concert Band. I play the French Horn. Students in the Concert and Symphonic Bands are required to be in the Marching Band. Marching Band was lost to budget cuts this year; I would have been the Drum Major, but I’m instead a pseudo-Drum Major of the Pep band for football and basketball season. During the Marching Band season in years past, I won Outstanding Sophomore, Outstanding Junior, and Outstanding Marcher, which are awards voted on by my peers.</p>
<p>I’m a Boy Scout. Currently, I’m a Life Scout, which is one rank behind Eagle, the highest honor in Scouting. I’m a few merit badges and a service project away from this award. I hold the position of Instructor and taught scout skills to scouts as young as 10. I’ve participated in a number of service projects, and my most rewarding scout-instructing experience was teaching archery to Cub Scouts, boys as young as 5(They’re actually hitting the targets!)</p>
<p>This year, in order to gain experience in the classroom, I’m student-teaching at the local middle school that I graduated from. I teach math with a teacher one period, and working as a lab assistant for another and after their school day ends. Teachers there were ecstatic when they found out that I was returning; they LOVED me. </p>
<p>I have a few recommendations, one from a counselor and two from teachers. I have not read any of them, but I have faith in their ability to write good recs, for we know each other very well. I have 210 community service hours, and will easily make the award for completing 260 for the community service award.</p>
<p>I do plan on applying for financial aid, if that makes any difference. By the time I’m in college, both me and my brother will be in college, so aid would be helpful.</p>
<p>I recently got my acceptance letter to UMBC with these credentials, so I’m feeling a bit more confident, but UMD has been getting so selective lately that I don’t think I have a good shot. I applied by the priority deadline; I knew I wouldn’t have a chance at UMD without it.</p>
You got it… wow.</p>