UChicago, Northwestern, Cornell, will I need a miracle?

Chance Me / Match Me
1

Rising Senior

A note: I do not have a super career oriented profile (unlike many of the elite CCers). How was I supposed to know when I started HS that I would be interested in pediatrics when I thought I hated hospitals? I became interested towards the end of junior year, so yep, you won’t be finding any biology competitions or science Olympiad on here.

Objective:

Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 3.97 (only 9th grade not a 4.0)
Weighted GPA: 4.4
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): ~14/463 or top 3%

SAT I (breakdown): 2040 (680 all) and possible retake tba
SAT II: –
ACT: 31

AP (place score in parenthesis): Will have taken 12 APs by end of senior year. Freshman: Biology (3, def not sending) Sophomore: World (4) Physics B (2 oops) Junior: US History (5), Eng. Lang (4), Chinese (5), Calc AB (5)
Senior Year Course Load: AP Com Sci, AP Gov, AP Comparative, AP Calc BC, AP Lit, AP Macro/micro econ, Chamber Orchestra. Possibly switching econ to psych because of scheduling conflict.

Subjective:

Extracurriculars: I didn’t find my career interest until late Junior year, so these are largely orchestra dominated: Violin 10+ years, 4 years of Chamber Orchestra (principal player), Orchestra leadership team, District honor orchestra 4x, Solo & Ensemble (1st violin), Tennis 2x, Piano 7 years, aced 2 summer classes at local cc, played violin for retirement homes, summer swim, and going to join HOSA senior year.
Fluent in Chinese and English. Came over half way through 5th grade with barely just the ABCs. Though I guess many people are the same.

Job/Work Experience: Interned at a high-tech chemical wafer manufacturing company this spring, committed over 90 hours. Learned a variety of work management techniques and ethics.

Volunteer/Community service: 100+hrs. from Key Club. Red Cross. NHS. Chinese Mandarin Camp. I have been put on hold for hospital volunteering until my schedule opens up in late Oct.

Essays: Not done, but going to talk about my experience of moving from a rural, isolated area to the US.
Teacher Recommendation: From AP US and Lang teachers. All had really good things to say (top student in US, and lang teacher exaggerated a lot)

Counselor Rec: Talked to her a few times, but I was the first one to ask for a recommendation in my class so she has plenty of time.

Additional Rec: From intern mentor. A bit generic.

Other
Applying for Financial Aid?: Yes! This is very important. Income around $22000 with dad retired.
Intended Major: Biology related, depending on school.
State (if domestic applicant): WA

These are the schools, some I am applying through QB:

Stanford (QB, legacy)
University of Washington
Cornell
Seattle U
Santa Clara
UChicago (QB)
Northwestern (QB)
NYU
USC (QB)
Purdue

Thanks. I’ll try to chance back whatever I can w/ link.

2

The fact that you’re applying through Questbridge kinda changes things for the better. I don’t know too much about QB acceptance rates, but I’ll chance you based on RD.

Standford—reach for everyone
University of Washington—match/safety
Cornell—reach
Santa Clara—match/safety
UChicago-----reach for everyone
Northwestern-----reach
NYU------match
USC-----low reach
Purdue-----match

Good luck!
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/1803083-chance-me-please.html#latest

3

Anyone else, please?

4

SAT/ACT are low. Consider retaking if you can.

I hate to say this but I think you might fit into the “Asian stereotype” too much (I’m assuming you’re Chinese since you’re fluent and you moved over here from another country). You play violin, piano, tennis, and you’re into biology. You need to be able to somehow set yourself apart from all the other applicants, most likely through your essay.

Stanford: honestly, complete lottery
UW: low match
Cornell: high reach
Santa Clara: match
UChicago: high reach
Northwestern: reach
NYU: match
USC: reach
Purdue: high match

I’d suggest applying to more safeties.

5

Don’t apply to NYU, they’re horrible with aid.
In fact, Purdue doesn’t give that much financial aid/merit aid to OOS either so probably delete those 2 from the list.
It seems that you might be somewhere close to full ride. I feel like publics probably would not give that much.

The other posters are pretty accurate:
Stanford, Northwestern, Chicago, and Cornell are all reaches.
USC-high match as I think they would like your experiences
Santa Clara-Match
UW: Probably a safety

Are you a Chinese native speaker or heritage speaker?

6

@delineated Wow, I’ve never thought about it that way (fitting the stereotype), haha. Maybe I should’ve done drums, football, and go for political science (just kidding). I guess on paper, you are right, but the journey for me has been different from many other “Asians”, which I’ll address in my essay.

Honestly, I had about 20 colleges on my list, including quite a few safeties, but I cut them down because I wasn’t interested in the locations and thought I would rather go to UW when comparing(where I am likely to get a lot of aid from anyways). I have auto admission to WSU as a safety if I do apply, so there’s that. The rest of the schools in WA are either meh, middle of nowhere, or religious, which don’t really fit me.

@rden2614 Well, at least Purdue gives aid, unlike the UCs… But noted.
I am betting/hoping for UW to give me full ride (or close), as that is where I’ll very happily attend. I’ve been to their campus and area multiple times and I am already getting that warm and fuzzy feeling. An intern from where I also interned at got full ride with like a 1500 SAT and GPA similar to mine.
Also, do you think Cornell is a pipe dream, or is it realistic? My GPA is good, and my SAT scores fit barely into the 25% (except math) if I remember right. They seem to be really good with aid, that’s why I am applying there.

With NYU, I know :frowning: But if by the slightest chance I get good aid, I’ll happily become a Yankee fan. The other school is Columbia, but I don’t like my chances there of even getting in.

I am a native speaker from Taiwan, so it was my first language.

Thank you both.