Reach school acceptances/ Chance me?

Chance Me / Match Me
1

Hi! I’ve recently received two decisions from EA schools and after getting denied by Northeastern and deferred from Fordham, I began to fret over whether or not i overestimated myself as an applicant. After talking to many people, I’ve heard stories about the unpredictability of college acceptances and how they sometimes just don’t make sense. I’ve heard of people who got rejected from northeastern but accepted to dartmouth and waitlisted at Harvard or Rejected from Fordham but accepted into Davidson. And it convinced me enough to not give up on applying to my reach schools. I have a fairly different profile from the average student, and even my guidance counselor tells me that its difficult to predict decisions especially with my situation. Until this October, I was just planning to apply to some schools that were good but not necessarily true reaches for me. But I decided to give it a shot and so I am applying to Wesleyan University, Colgate, McGill University, and NYU. So I was wondering what is your take on those cases of students who got accepted into schools they never thought they had a chance in? I’m not keeping my hopes too high for these schools, but it would be nice to hear that its not an absurd thing to hope for.

Female, Bangladeshi (asian), CT

Gpa/grades: (difficult to calculate since I transferred from private to public school) but in short… I had mostly As and Bs my freshman year with a couple honors courses, my sophomore year was a train wreck due to some personal issues that involved my mental health so I had VERY bad grades with an F, a C, 2 Bs and 1 A-. This year is my major downfall and what makes me so doubtful of acceptances. I was taking 3 honors classes (chemistry, algebra, and Spanish). Junior year I transferred into public school and my first quarter was rough because of the academic and social change… but every quarter after I had almost all As with one B for the year. I was not taking any APs since the curriculums of the two schools were very different and my grades just didnt qualify me for them, but I was doubling in math, totaling to 7 courses. My senior year I am taking AP Econ, AP Gov, AP stats, AP Environmental science, Literature, and Calculus. I am glad to say that I have the best grades of my entire high school career with the hardest course load I have had. I have all As and A+s. My current gpa (at this school) is approximately a 4.2 (weighted). I hope that my upward trend and dramatic change is something colleges will look at positively.

Test scores: 1440 on the new SAT
720 Sat on the math II subject test

ECs
Community/Service Activities
Distressed Children International Time Commitment: 2 hours monthly
(Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior Year)
Church Street Eats (Freshman and Sophomore Year) Time Commitment: 3 hours monthly
A Capella performances for community and school Time Commitment: 1 hour weekly
(Freshman and Sophomore Year)

Employment
Intern at the BRAC Institute of Governance and Development in Bangladesh
(June 14th-July 18th 2016) Time Commitment: 40 hours weekly

School Activities
Multicultural Club Time Commitment: 4 hours monthly
(Freshman, Sophomore Year)
Model U.N. (Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior Year) Time Commitment: ½ hour weekly
A Capella group (Freshman, Sophomore Year) Time Commitment: 5 hours weekly
Key club (Senior Year) Time Commitment: ½ hour weekly
Asante Sana for Education (Senior Year) Time Commitment: ½ hour weekly
Soccer (Freshman, Sophomore Year) Time Commitment: 13 hours weekly
National Art Honor Society (Junior, Senior Year) Time Commitment: 2 hours monthly
Basketball (Freshman, Sophomore Year) Time Commitment: 13 hours weekly
Change Club (chapter of U.N.’s GirlUp campaign) Time Commitment: 2 hours monthly
(Sophomore Year)
Earth Advocates (Senior Year) Time Commitment: 1 hour weekly
National Honor Society (Senior Year) Time Commitment: 1 hour weekly
Young Democrats (Senior Year) Time Commitment: ½ hour weekly
Awards
Scholastic
High Honor Roll (Junior Year)

Extracurricular

JV Soccer (Freshman Year)

  • Coach’s award

Achievements

  • Attended a STEM program for girls at Union College Freshman year
  • Selected for and attended the New England Young Writer’s Conference at Middlebury College Sophomore Year

Essay: don’t think I should post, but I feel very confident in it and many teachers, friends, family friends, etc. all say that they LOVE it. I talk about identity as a Bangladeshi-american, tying it into my experiences this summer and basically make the point that I’ve grown from the struggle of having an identity crisis in ways that make me inquisitive and passionate about self exploration and exploration of the world. Cliche but its what I could write the best about.

Colleges:

BU
Brandeis
Colgate
Connecticut College
Fordham University (deferred)
NYU
Northeastern (denied)
Syracuse
UConn
Trinity College
Umass Amherst
UVM
Wesleyan University (if I get in I’ll be absolutely stoked)
McGill University

Hopefully I’m not crazy for applying to these schools, thinking I have a chance (be it slim or not)

Thank you!

2

Most of those schools will be very hard with a very slim chance if any.

3

what schools do you think are more appropriate then? and what in my profile is keeping me from being a candidate for these schools?

4

Syracuse, Trinity, Umass, are safeties. You should be able to get into BU, Con College, UVM, and Colgate. Really can’t see why Fordham deferred you, you’re extremely qualified :confused:
On the common app, you are able to add a note about your grades if there is anything you would like to say. However, coming back from an F your sophomore year and having a 4.2 is amazing and I am sure colleges will recognize that.

5

my counselor told me that i should expect a deferral for EA schools since they want to see my mid year grades

6

Update: my GPA at my current school is actually 4.38
and my intended majors are Economics and International Relations

7

You have a pretty decent chance to get into all of these colleges. It really depends on your essay and how you have improved throughout High School. Your GPA and SAT scores are impressive and should be qualified for these schools. The only thing that will hurt you from not getting into these colleges are your sophomore year grade.