Schools for Engineering/Business [4.871 W GPA] (WV resident)

Chance Me / Match Me
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Middle-Class South Asian Male
Citizen
WV
College Prep Public School (Wealthy Neighborhood)

Intended Major(s) Biomedical Engineering or Industrial Engineering p or some other engineering. Dual major in Business Management or Administration.

Stats
4.871 W (Honors/AP/DE add one point to each point group in comparison to a unweighted class), 4.0 U, Valedictorian, 1550 SAT
1560 DSAT, 790 Eng, 770 Math

Coursework
11 APs so far, 5 more next year, all fives except for a 4 on Music Theory. 15 Honors by graduation, 4-6 DE

Awards
I’ll just list them with the ECs

Extracurriculars
ISEF Internationals - 10 & 11th grade, I was ranked pretty low at internationals last year but at the state, regional, county, and school fair I got first for both years.

Cancer Research - It’s more genomics than anything. I’m currently working on publishing my findings alongside some more work that has been done alongside the professor I’m working with. This research was used during both years of the science fair, although they were separated exhibits and studies.

Start Up - Web Design contractor for local companies. I’d find restaurants and bars in high traffic areas with didn’t have a large internet presence, present my work and knowledge of web design and business needs, and get a contract to make a website that they collaborated on as well. I’ve learned a whole lot of tax law, marketing skills, communication skills, and I’ve made 25k in the past 3 years (only during summer in the midst of my research and volunteer work).

NHS - Over 240 hours working both independently and through group work, I’m the Junior president and our chapter was done work with the local food shelter, Ronald McDonald House, and the local animal shelter (with whom I volunteer for independently).

VEX Robotics - States 9th-11th Grade, State and Local Leadership for Elementary/Middle Schoolers, President 10th and 11th. I work alongside my former middle and elementary school and my goal is to grow each club to about 50 members each with enough funding to give these kids the right equipment and enough resources to compete with engineering magnet schools in and around the state. Raised somewhere around $4,750 for both schools to share.

NABT (biology club) - One of the first original members, VP Junior year, helped raise over $3,000 for the club and for the biology department to buy equipment. We typically work with the local community and other student organizations to create a “field day” where parents and students can come, learn, get food from local vendors, and enjoy the day whilst funding our student organizations.

Chem Olympiad - think like a normal science Olympiad. We won states both this year and last.

Academic Showdown - This is like a serious statewide event. My school has won every year, including the two years I’ve done it. The typical academic group competition, just on a grander scale.

Music - Marching, Concert, & Jazz Band All Four Years. All-County First Chair every year on multiple instruments, All-State Alto Sax 3rd Chair Junior Year (maybe next year as well) WVU Honor Band (10th) & Virginia Tech Honor Band (11th)

Beta Club - Just like NHS

Social Studies Fair - Honorable Mention Freshmen year, State Winner in my categories 10th and 11th. (It’s the largest academic event in the state, nearly triple the science fair which took me to internationals)

Studco - Treasurer all three years. Planned hoco and winfo, worked with local nonprofits but not to an extent that NHS and Beta Club did. Raised 15k.

Essays/LORs/Other
Really Strong, started them the second semester of sophomore year. I’ll adjust if need be but i’ve had multiple people proof and read over each of them.

Cost Constraints / Budget
~24k a year (my startup can fund a good amount)

Schools

  • Safety *
    WVU Honors College - in state
    Bama Honors College - lot of financial aid
    Penn State Honors College (as i’ve been told)
    Ohio State Honors College (as i’ve been told)
    Virginia Tech Honors College (as i’ve been told)

  • Likely (would be possible, but very unlikely or surprising, for it not to admit or be affordable)
    U of Florida Honors College - offers a lot of financial aid
    UVA Honors College

  • Match
    UT Austin Honors College
    UVA Honors College
    UNC Honors College
    UMich Honors College - My favorite fit
    Georgetown

  • Reach (some of these might go, I haven’t finished all of the essays for Brown and some others)
    WashU
    Vanderbilt
    UChicago
    Northwestern
    Brown
    UCB
    UCLA
    Columbia
    Yale
    Harvard
    Princeton
    MIT
    Stanford - my dream school

I made a post about safeties on here less than a week ago. Most of these schools get me down to about 25k out of pocket. My income from the startup will help me a lot, considering that most of the money is invested. I’m gonna continue this business in college and I’m planning on taking on low to 0% interest loans so I can maximize my current investments and pay off the loans right after college.

For the schools where I said so I’ve been told, I know that the schools are competitive, but considering my high school’s alumni and my stats, my gc has told me that I have a good shot.

I don’t want more colleges to add to my list, frankly cause the application costs are adding up and I’m sick of writing essays. I’ve taken campus tours from all of the schools that consider an applicant’s level of interest as according to the common data set.

I’m wondering if I’m over confident or if I’ve been misled to think that I have a good shot at these. Could y’all give me a chancing for these colleges and let me know if I have something that I should reconsider applying to?

Lastly, I’m wondering if prestige is all that. I feel like I’m better fit for a flagship u with an honors college cause I love football and I want a good social scene. If I go to Harvard, I’m not gonna be watching my school at the rose bowl or winning the national championship, nor am I gonna have a party scene like WVU. Is prestige all that, or does it stop mattering once you get to schools like UMich?

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There is nothing wrong with this! If this is what you want for your four years of undergrad…go for it.

You need to remove UCB and UCLA. These schools give no need based aid to OOS students so the cost would be roughly $75,000 a year.

Michigan doesn’t guarantee to meet full need for OOS students. Just FYI.

I think Georgetown should be moved to the reach list. I think UNC should be moved to reach also simply because NC is required to give preference to instate residents for admission.

You have a great admission list of things, and I’m sure you will be successful. But I do agree…your list is very long. You really only need two safety schools. And I would try to reduce that long list of reach schools. You have 13 and I think two others should be added. But then I also think UCLA and UCB need to be removed. But really…13 is a lot.

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This might make sense for IE because it’s business adjacent engineering. It doesn’t make sense for BME. They’ll end up with less technical skills that the grads they’ll be competing against for jobs, and won’t have on the job experience, so their business acumen will carry any gravitas.

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How did you reach that conclusion?

Also, all your matches are reaches. Some may be high targets given your accomplishments and the fact that you’re applying from an underrepresented area, but I don’t see any true likelies.

You’ve listed a lot of honors colleges/programs. Keep in mind, admission to honors isn’t guaranteed and often not directly in your control.

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I’ve used their net price calculator, most schools were around 20k, but I had my budget somewhere around 25k to be safe. By the end of this summer, I’m hoping to have around 40k of my own money saved up and in investments so I can pay for college. My parents have a 30k college savings account for me and they’ll help me pay for college throughout college. Considering that I’ll be continuing this business throughout college, I can graduate debt free (in a perfect world).

I feel like some of my matches are matches considering my stats, but I understand that they could be unlikely.

Lastly, I’m just applying to honors colleges, most schools have a box that you can check do be considered for honors college. The honors college is just an addition to the actual college application.

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The out of state public schools won’t give you much financial aid (if at all), with the exception of maybe UVA. So their cost is not going to come down to $23k. The highly ranked public schools on your list will also not provide much merit. So I would suggest taking them off your list.

Bama will give you a lot of money. Maybe tOSU as well. Not sure about Penn State and Virginia Tech.

The elite privates you’ve listed will meet your need so it’s good to give those a try.

But that’s the issue. These elite schools are holistic and consider many factors beyond stats. So they’re not a match, especially if you expect to get accepted into honors.

Yes, I know how it works :blush:
I am just pointing out that entry into these honors colleges is very competitive (and determined holistically in many cases).

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I know you say you don’t want more colleges but you should understand most of your matches and above are reaches. I would pare the list back and make room for other programs

It’s really not clear what your financial situation is so I would run the NPC for more schools that are not so “reachy”. Two examples.

Try the NPC at Lehigh which has excellent engineering and a good business program and has several well established interdisciplinary programs like IBE (integrated business and engineering). They offer some merit and do have good aid if your are not higher income. Again, difficult to tell from what you have shared

If you would consider chemical & biomolecular engineering, UDel is a serious contender. It is top 5 nationally and on par with UVa, UMich, and above Ivies/usual T20 for that specific major. Very affordable for you I think. You’d get $10-15k merit if not more. Kind of surprising for most people to hear though it makes sense - DuPont and Dow are in DE.

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FWIW, my understanding is that Virginia Tech gives very little in the way of merit aid. Perhaps you will qualify for need based aid, but I wouldn’t count on merit money from them.

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Below are my guesses as to your chances for admittance to the colleges you listed. Apart from honors at WVU and Alabama, which I think are extremely likely, I wouldn’t say that honors is likely or extremely likely at the other schools on your list, though I definitely think that it’s possible you would be invited for honors.

Extremely Likely (80-99+%)

  • WVU with Honors College

  • Alabama with Honors College

Likely (60-79%)

  • Penn State (but low probability for meeting a $25k budget)

  • Ohio State (but low probability for meeting a $25k budget)

Toss-Up (40-59%)

  • Virginia Tech (but low probability for meeting a $25k budget)

Lower Probability (20-39%)

  • U. of Florida

  • UMich (but low probability for meeting a $25k budget)

Low Probability (less than 20%)

  • UVA

  • UNC

  • UT (but low probability for meeting a $25k budget)

  • Georgetown

  • WashU

  • Vanderbilt

  • UChicago

  • Northwestern

  • Brown

  • UCB (impossible to meet a $25k budget without being a California resident)

  • UCLA (impossible to meet a $25k budget without being a California resident)

  • Columbia

  • Yale

  • Harvard

  • Princeton

  • MIT

  • Stanford

If this is what you want out of your college experience, then I would seriously reconsider the majority of the schools I classified as low probability.

For the big state schools on your list, I would look at the merit aid possibilities. They may have some (very) competitive scholarships that will cover all of your tuition or even give you a full ride. Unless it’s an automatic scholarship (a la Alabama), then I would consider those schools possibles, but low probability in terms of getting them into budget. But if an out-of-state school doesn’t offer sufficient merit aid to get the price within budget (and it’s not UNC or UVA), then I would eliminate it, because the school won’t be affordable. (State schools generally don’t give any need-based aid to out-of-state students.)

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Chicago and Georgetown don’t offer either of the majors you want. Some of the others, Yale for example, aren’t great engineering programs.

Rather than prestige, look at curricula, facilities, class sizes, etc.

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Penn State will most likely be unaffordable. They aren’t known for merit or generous FA. Especially for OOS. (I’m a PA resident).

Most of your matches will be reaches because you’re OOS and affordability.

Honors colleges are typically holistic admission and very competitive. No guarantees. Penn State Schreyer doesn’t look at stats if I remember correctly. All essays and you will write a lot. Good luck.

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I would put umich as well as in the “impossible to meet a $25k budget” category.

I agree, except that it makes sense for someone like OP who has high financial need to include them because they are pretty generous with need based aid.

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I had heard that U. of Michigan had started a policy for families with low incomes and couldn’t remember if it it included students from out-of-state. If it did, it no longer does. And if there are no big scholarships at UM (and my cursory glance doesn’t show any), then yes, it would be an “impossible to meet budget” school. But since I couldn’t 100% remember, I just put it in the low probability category.

And yes, reconsidering the schools on the low probability category doesn’t necessarily mean eliminating all of them. For instance, I suspect that Northwestern would be a better option than U. of Chicago as it has Big 10 football, even though the team is unlikely to make it to the Rose Bowl any time soon (and because it has engineering majors while Chicago does not). Vanderbilt in the SEC conference would probably be a better option than MIT. Stanford would probably be a better bet than Columbia. So narrowing down the low probability bucket to find schools that are more likely to get closest to the desired vibe while also being incredibly financially generous would be the goal, rather than eliminating all non-big state schools.

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I would keep UF in likely and move all the others to reach…especially if you are thinking “honors” for these schools. Schools like UVA don’t even have an honors college, they do have an honors program (Echols) but not college

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Before anybody writes anything else, I’ve removed UCB and UCLA.

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Good idea. You should also eliminate any schools that don’t offer your major.

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Oh yeah, so I’m taking out Princeton, Georgetown, and UChicago.

25k is approximately what I’m anticipating considering my current situation. I’m planning on focusing on my startup this summer, so if I can make 20k, I can easily afford any college on this list, except for of course the schools that I took out. After my parents contribution and the money I’ve made throughout high school and high schooling, I can hopefully pay over 100,000 of our expect contribution. Adding another 25k-50k that I am hoping to make throughout my four years of college, I can afford to pay over 125k and put the rest in loans (if needed).

25k is the amount I can afford if I don’t make a single dollar from now on, but if I’m estimating, it’s more like 33k per year.

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That’s good. You should also remove UMich, and likely most of the other out of state publics. Sorry.

If you want to take a moon shot at highly competitive full ride scholarships, you can add Georgia Tech and UMD. You’ll get football and big school spirit, especially at the latter. But they’ll only be affordable if you get the Stamps or BK scholarship, and these are very hard to get (but I think with your profile and geographic location, you have a competitive chance).

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Ok, so I’ve looked at all the npcs again and here’s what I got

WVU - Full Ride (this is from a private donation)
Alabama - idk (npc isn’t working)
Penn State - 45k
Ohio State - npc is same as bama
Florida - 45k
UVA - 31k
UNC - idk
UMich - 45k
Every private reach - around 22k

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So, those numbers indicate what your need is. The point I believe you’re missing is that public schools (with the exception of UVA I believe) do not promise to meet full need for out of state students.

Alabama will give you a lot of merit aid making it very affordable, but that’s the exception on your list.

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