Recommend some schools for me?

Puzzle
Fri, 01 May 2009 20:28:55 +0000

Hey y’all. I’m a junior and I think I have my college list pretty much finalized, but just thought I’d throw out a line and see if I’m missing any gems.

Currently, I’m planning applying to my in-state safety school, Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and MIT, for various reasons - mostly the student life and culture and atmosphere, their strong science/engineering programs, and strong reputations.

About me: I’m an Asian (sucks) female (good for engineering :D) and I’m primarily interested in medical research and/or engineering. I did consider Johns Hopkins and Duke for these reasons, but my main concern there was that if a situation did arise where I decided I didn’t want to do medical stuff, those two universities don’t have much to offer elsewhere (please please PLEASE correct me if I’m mistaken). Thus, I was wondering if any of you knew of any other schools that have strong overall science programs (not just medicine) that you think I should consider?

Also, it would help if you gave me a rough idea of if it was a reach/match/safety for me. Here’s a brief summary of my stats/ECs:

2400 combined SAT, 34 composite ACT w/ writing, 4 APUSH, 5 AP tests in the next two weeks (shoot me now, but I think I’ll get 4s and 5s on all of them - 5s def. on calculus and chemistry), I’m in a mixed bag of average EC’s - including debate, orchestra, tennis, science olympiad…

any advice on new colleges to consider is MUCH appreciated.

P.S. should I apply for Stanford just to round out the HYPSM? I’m thinking that I won’t like california much, which is why I didn’t apply…