Texas Resident looking for “prestigious schools”, match me

hello. i am so sorry that this is so wordy and long, but i wanted to put down every “flex” that would potentially increase my chances. i would like to get into a fairly prestigious school, especially one that gives a castle or hogwarts look/feel to it because that has been my dream since i was young, plus bragging rights for going to a university with a well known reputation. my main concern and focus is that the campus is pretty along with highly rated dorms since i spend most time in my room and a beautiful city to go with it, preferably a large city and much to do and explore.

i am a first generation student, female, living in texas but open to anywhere except alabama, oklahoma, california, missouri, mississippi, tennessee, or wyoming (there’s a very long backstory). i am a junior looking to double major in accounting and computer science/cybersecurity. i am of mixed race, black and white and open to selective hbcus. i have a 3.6 gpa unweighted and 4.15 weighted. i got a 1110 on my sat junior year but looking to retake it asap. i am also currently joining national guard

i have taken apa alg 1 and 2, apa english 1 and 2, business information management and received student of the month for it, intro to engineering, principles of engineering, foundations of cybersecurity, office assistant , civil engineering and architecture, engineering design, apa geometry, apa geography, ap us history, ap english, dual credit business information management, dual credit us govt, dual credit macroeconomics, dual credit stats, dual credit psych, engineering science, dual credit algebra, dual credit english, and apa spanish 2.

i am a part of communities in schools where i help lead with many different organizations and projects like donations for clothing and food, participated in a book donation event to kids in africa, i am team captain for varsity tennis since freshman year, played softball varsity since sophomore year, lead of software department 6th-8th grade in vex robotics, nocti certification, member of national honor society, member of texas deca and president of finance, member of communities in schools, joined robotics sophomore and junior year once again and helped with software, achieved 2nd place in districts for tennis as a freshman for both girls singles and mixed doubles, 2nd place singles for tennis sophomore year in districts , received 5th place for informative speaking at districts, over 50 hours of volunteer work, stop the bleed certified, played basketball jv freshman year, received most valuable player for tennis sophomore year, but endured a season ending shoulder injury towards the last month and a half of my junior year season, attended baylor universe cybersecurity camp and girls who code summer immersion program, had a summer job at a restaurant where i was deemed employee of the month, received student of the month for career and tech department freshman year.

thank you so much for reading.

Congrats on your strong record. My initial impression is that if you made a Venn diagram of all of your criteria (famous/prestigious, Hogwarts-like, nice dorms, in or near a large city, and offering a potential double major in CS/cybersecurity and business/accounting, and attainable with your stats), you’re going to find the area where all criteria overlap to be fairly small. On top of that, there’s the question of affordability; is the premise that you’re definitely joining the Guard, and using GI Bill funding for college?

A lot of Hogwarts-like schools are not urban. Also, it’s more difficult to find comfortable, highly-rated dorms in urban settings where real estate is expensive and space is constrained.

Many schools with well-regarded business and/or CS programs have even-more-competitive processes for direct-admission to those majors, and it can be hard to combine them. So you have to assess this in addition to looking at the school as a whole.

One program that could fit your interests well is the Raikes School at U of Nebraska, Lincoln. This highly competitive honors cohort program (getting in would definitely not be assured) offers a core curriculum that combines business and CS, and then students build on that core with a major (or majors) of their choice. https://raikes.unl.edu/ UNL is also in a great student city with lots to do. I wouldn’t say it’s known as a “Hogwarts school” might it might still be worth considering - it’s quite a unique and highly-regarded program.

Howard has a Cybersecurity Analytics Center (CAC) | Howard University School of Business in their School of Business. Great urban setting in DC. Definitely worth a look.

Fordham might be one to look at: https://www.fordham.edu/undergraduate-admission/majors-and-minors/accounting-information-systems/
Maybe take a look at Boston College too.

However, I’m speculating without a full understanding of what would work for you financially, and how the National Guard piece figures in.

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thank you, financially i am not worried because various members my family and extended family have been saving for a very long time, in addition to bringing home $180k a yr. i have also been saving since the 8th grade, leaving me at around 25k from me alone. i also do plan on using the GI Bill

i also did not realize that my interests would contradict, me wanting a nice dorm while also living in an older building lol, but honestly as long as the dorms are decent and don’t frequently have major problems. i am very interested in howard,but i am concerned about the city because i have heard that the area away from campus is very dangerous, but again, i live in houston so it’s not much different.

i will look into these other schools, but thank you so much. what do my chances look like for rice, ut austin, southern methodist, and georgetown? these are schools i’ve grown quite fond of.

thank you, i loved boston and georgetown

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Congratulations on your achievements.

Are you in the top 5% of your class? If not, UT Austin is likely out of reach. Rice and Georgetown are also likely out of reach. Of course it’s ok to apply to reaches, but a balanced list is a must…a few reaches, a handful of target/match schools, and at least one affordable safety/highly likely school. Identifying reaches is often easier than finding schools with higher chances of admission that you would be happy to attend. Have you identified at least one affordable safety/highly likely? If not, I would start there.

What classes will you have senior year? Have you had any coding or CS courses, beyond the ECs?

UNL Raikes is a great idea, you might also look at U Houston and Trinity U in San Antonio to start.

I would run some net price calculators along with your parents to get an estimate of costs, as some school costs are pushing $100K per year. Here’s SMUs (you/your parents would enter 2024 earnings along with current cash/savings/investments): SMU Net Price Calculator - SMU Enrollment Services

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Link to OP’s previous post where good advice was already given: Chances for UT Austin, Rice, and University of Washington [TX resident, 3.37 GPA, top 21% rank; computer science and business; C/O 2026]

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You’ll find that colleges are always updating and changing. And many offer a mix of “traditional” architecture along with high-tech new buildings. One of my daughters went to Michigan State (not on your list, but using this as an example) and it was a mix of beautiful older dorms and newer dorms, older academic buildings and a new STEM building. You’ll get a little of both at most schools, with pluses and minuses on either side.

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OP can you clarify the differences in GPA in both your threads: 3.6 unweighted/4.15 weighted here and this from your prior thread:

Also in your prior thread you said $50K in income and here $180K. You certainly don’t have to share much about finances here, but you must sit down with your parents and understand what the family contribution can be each year, and also run the NPCs.

There were many great school suggestions on that previous thread. Did you research those? Which suggested schools are of interest and which don’t make the cut? That type of info will help posters give you better guidance. Have you also worked on your list with your HS counselor?

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Checking for clarity. You, the student, are earning $180,000 a year? This could put you out of the running for need based aid at the very generous colleges, I think.

And where has that money been going? If you are earning $180,000 a year, one would think you would have more than $100,000 saved for four years of college.

What about your parents? Are they contributing to your costs?

This is from your other thread:

My income is $50k/year

Please clarify your income. What you wrote here and what you wrote there are different.

And on your other thread, you say you can afford up to $70,000 a year for college. How will you be guaranteed to do this?

So my suggestions…

You need to look at colleges that are truly test optional, unless your SAT score increases substantially from what it is now.

I think you will need to make some compromises on your college application list. So look at your criteria and figure out which things you really could live without.

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i plan on enrolling in a lot of courses from coursera to start earning certificates

im sorry please ignore that post, my account was somehow used by another student. unfortunately, cc wouldn’t let me delete it so after weeks of just finding my login to this account again i decided to post, but forgot about that issue

Roxann,

I tend to be a facts & figures kinda person and approach most problems in a clinical and sterile way. You’ve come onto an anonymous like forum to ask for input, and so I’ll assume you want honest responses. Also recognizing you are a junior - to shortly become a rising senior(?) with college applications starting in 4+ months, so you are not really just a child nor yet a ‘fully formed adult’. We should all keep these things in mind in our responses.

There are a few things you’ll need to come to terms with yourself - and you don’t have to share them with the internet but you do need to perform a ‘self check’ here.

(1) You need to define what Prestigious really means to you. For some people thats IVY or IVY PLUS, for some thats T20 (top 20 ranking on common ranking lists) or T50 etc etc. For others it may be what are the best known ‘names’ in their state or region -or as you mention HBCUs - it may be ethno-culturally prestigious programs.

(2) You also speak to the quality of the dorms and buildings and the beauty of campus as a primary driver (or Hogwarts like). While not totally incongruous, you may find that a lot of the schools that others might define as “Prestigious” are ‘old’ campuses with varying levels of facility decline and rebuild / rebirth going on, or campuses which are not known for their aesthetics but rather for their educational merits (or purportedly so). There are lots of ‘beautiful’ campuses, but beauty is subjective and only you can determine what is beautiful to you. I would encourage you to really think about the choice to put the aesthetics of your environment -ahead- of the education and reputation of the school / program you are interested in as you will likely only be spending 4-5 years of your young life there, but will carry those credentials for the rest of your life. It’s a short term / long term tradeoff.

(3) Your ‘Stats’ (GPA / WGPA, Class Rank, SAT scores and course rigor, especially in advanced math / stem) don’t align with the 25-75% range of admitted students in the Ivies, T20 or T50 (I’m using US News as the ranking metric here). As an example you specifically mentioned SMU - US News ranked them around 90th in -overall- academics - their admitted student profile has their median GPA around a 3.7 with the 25-75% around a 3.5-3.9… but… their SAT median at 1370 and 25-75% SAT 1320-1480.

If you are entering your Senior year, you really don’t have much road left (or none at all) to improve your grades or your class rank (not in the top 20%) - some schools, if they haven’t already decided on admit/decline by late December, will ask for updated semester grades and class ranks after the fall).

You may be able to improve your ‘course rigor’ a little as reported on the classes you are going to take or are taking at the time of application - but those grades won’t be available to the schools during fall application.

You may want to consider either looking at schools where your SAT scores are well in the 25-75% or where test scores are still considered optional or schools which are test blind (they don’t want them) though more schools have gone back to test report mandatory each of the last 2 years. Alternatively, you should really consider spending the time and money to invest in yourself this summer through solid SAT (and/or ACT) test prep courses and guidance. It’s -possible- to make a big jump in your SAT score before applications are due.

(4) Your extracurricular achievements are good stuff and show commitment and a broad set of interests and pursuits. Unfortunately, what we see/hear from students (and the parents of those students) applying to and accepted to the ‘prestigious’ schools of the IVY, IVY+, Public IVY, T 20s and even into T50s is that the more competitive students -all- have extracurriculars which are ‘good stuff’ and quite a few have a pretty strong ‘hook’ in their extracurricular such as a State or National championship or other state/national awards or recognition.

(5) Comp Sci and Business as areas of study should help yu to further evaluate your own choices. For ‘prestigious’ schools in Comp Sci, your current Stats are not competitive for schools ranked in the T20. Those programs lower end GPAs tend to be 3.8+ with a lot of Math/Science rigor and lower end SATs 1400+. That’s a rather large gap from where you are currently. If you look a T20 ranked undergraduate Business Schools, you will also find their admitted student profiles are rather competitive. Outside of the T20 rankings, especially in the over rankings over 50 are going to be progressively lower in rigor.

(6) There are many schools where your “First Generation” status will receive favorable consideration. Your self-reported bi-racial makeup shouldn’t directly be a considered factor - based on relatively recent SCOTUS case decisions as well as the current national government administration climate - however, some schools specifically cite personal essays which speak to challenges you may have faced (as a result of your bi-racial background) and overcome are considered as important as challenges other applicants may have overcome which are not race-based. So both of these factors may be helpful to your application.

I do think you need to ask yourself and try to be internally honest about your own assessment here - are your GPA, course rigor and SAT scores reflective of your true academic capacity. Or is there some solid reason you feel your true performance ability is that of a 3.8++ GPA // STEM Overachiever // 1400+ SAT.

I ask this because while it may be possible for your extracurriculars, your first generation status, possibly your bi-racial background and your personal story via essays may find you a spot in the truly competitive or highly prestigious Comp Sci or Business programs, your performance stats should show you whom you are really going to be ‘competing with’ in those programs… and STEM programs are notoriously going to be more Math and Analyticalally rigorous and unforgiving than anything you’ve experienced thus far in hiugh school, while Business can certainly be math and analytically focused, there’s often more ‘soft skill’ and wiggle room between different area focuses such as marketing or human resources versus finance and accounting.

You really don’t want to set yourself up to fail by being so far behind your fellow classmates in their math and analytical skills, that you spend your first year underwater and can’t recover.

-IF- I look at just the facts/stats for your academic profile…
You are non-competitive at Rice (General admission data… individual programs are harder to assess), UT Austin (General, Comp Sci or Business) or Georgetown (General Admission data… individual programs are harder to assess). For SMU, your GPA is likely with the 25-75% range, however lower end, but the current SAT score isn’t competitive.

My opinion, and I don’t know -you- from anything moret han what you’ve posted here, is based on the sterile information provided, you should really spend more time looking at “FIT” of the school rather than their prestige. And by FIT, I mean schools where your academic track record are comparable to the other students attending - so GPA and SAT are comfortably in that 25-75%, and where there campus culture aligns with your personal beliefs (be that religious, ethnic/racial, political, environmental etc), and then with that grouping you can look at the asthetics of the campus and the costs. You need to be able to be academically in range, so that you don’t spend your entire college experience really struggling just to stay in school (either by having to study 8 hours a day 7 days a week just to get Cs in required courses which are often ‘weedouts’ for competitive majors) or are miserable because you choose the ‘look’ of the school but find the atmosphere of the students and faculty to be vastly different than your own personal value system. Given that, I think you are looking outside of the T50, may have a few reach to achievable in the T100s, and should spend sometime investigating programs outside of the T100 (using US news as the ranking metric here)… unless you really were somehow hamstrung in your 3.6 GPA to this point and can blow out a 1300+ or 1400+ on another attempt at the SAT. At which point I would re=evaluate schools in your academic zone, and still then look for FIT for your personal comfort.

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i apologize for this confusion, im not sure how i messed up so bad.

*my family is able to give up to $50k a year
*$20,000 from gov
*joining national guard, using gi bill
*14,876 in grants
*planning on applying to every single scholarship i lay on eyes even as little as $1000 (i’ve had surgery so i couldn’t get started as early as i wanted)
*$10k in savings
*working from july to august (not sure exactly where yet because im still weighing options and other factors)
*recently heard of a company called questbridge for scholarships

I’m not sure what you mean by this? This isn’t your senior year plan is it? Certificates from coursera aren’t necessarily going to help with college admissions. What classes are you taking senior year?

Ok. Then let’s start by responding to the feedback/answering the questions posters have asked on this thread.

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Do NOT start down the Coursera road.

You need to focus on academics. That means actual courses from real teachers in your HS. Certificates will not help you.

Thanks for clarifying your financial limitations-- very helpful.

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Is this the GI bill, or something else?

What is this from? Did you run a college’s NPC and this was the result?

Questbridge is a program for high academic/low income students which allows them to send one application to many partner colleges. Your family’s income of $180K is too high to allow you to participate in Questbridge.

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Closing temporarily for review.

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