Decision: Accepted OOS
Background on me: I’m a US citizen who grew up in India, so I’m international for all purposes except financial aid. I was in an actual school until 10th grade, and homeschooled in 11th and 12th grade. So for those two years I did Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) A-Levels, which are way more rigorous than the default international system. I did 3 A-Levels and one AS-Level, which is considered US Junior + Senior year equivalent.
Objective:
SAT I (breakdown): 1540, didn’t submit
ACT (breakdown): 35 c. 35 maths, 36 english, 34 science, 34 maths. 9 writing (RIP)
SAT II: didn’t submit.
Unweighted GPA (out of 4.0): 4.0
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 1/1 coz homeschooled
A-Levels (place score in parenthesis): English Language (AS-Level A grade), Maths and Stats (A), Economics (A),
Psychology (A) - Basically all highest possible grades except Maths where A* is the highest. (I’m only going into so much detail because I assume most people reading this won’t know much about A-Levels)
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel etc.): nil
Subjective:
Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): 6 years of hardcore mountaineering with an internationally recognized institution, including a Himalayan course.
6 years participation + 2 years volunteering (leadership) at my previous school’s physical/cultural/community outreach after-school program.
A number of small data-mining projects related to economics and psychology.
Job/Work Experience: nil
Volunteer/Community service: My previous school was extremely focused on ‘giving back to the community’ so it was basically six years of intensive community service alongside normal school.
Essays (rating 1-10, details): Common App (10): Wrote about my previous school which was a selective magnet school and how their unique philosophy shaped my education and life, and included some interesting and funny anecdotes.
Supplemental Essay 1 (10): Peer who made a difference in your life - wrote about my extremely shy best friend and how I recognized signs of her shyness in myself, overcame it, and how that made me a different, more outgoing person, while in a way still making sure she was never left behind (sound weird but it’s very well-written IMO.) Supplemental Essay 2 (9): Thing you wish you could change about the place where you live - won’t reveal exactly what because I want to write more and expand upon this idea but it was a good way of thinking and also had place to talk more about some of my own experiences. Showed I was a thoughtful person who expands upon her experiences and draws parallels with other aspects of her life.
Recommendations (rating 1-10, details): Counselor Rec (10): My father was my counselor as a homeschooler, but I also included a letter from the vice-principal of my previous school. She loves and respects me a lot and had many enlightening anecdotes about me to add. She also said I was the most intelligent person in a class of people already selected for their intelligence (tbh I find that irrelevant because most of my peers are really smart, hardworking people… more so than me in many aspects.). I assume all this was reflected in the letter.
English Teacher (9): He’s a strange man who didn’t really understand the concept of rec letters to US colleges but he has a great deal of respect for me and said I was his best student in 20 years of teaching. Hopefully he remembered to include that in the letter lol.
Maths Teacher (9): Wasn’t very close to her but I always had great grades and helped students that struggled. She also caught on to what I needed really quickly (most of these teachers had never written a rec letter in their lives) and hopefully delivered.
LOR Rank (1-10): Idk what this means
Interview: Didn’t have.
Other
Applied for Financial Aid?: Yeah
Intended Major and College: Economics/ Psychology/ Journalism/ Public Policy
State (if domestic applicant): na
Country (if international applicant): na
School Type: Homeschool
Ethnicity: Asian (Indian) - didn’t self-select
Gender: F
Income Bracket: Lowest lol, we earn in rupees and my parents are semi-retired.
Hooks (URM, first generation college, etc.): nil rip
Reflection
Strengths: I broke away from the norm and did a really hard curriculum as a self schooler… colleges do realize that.
Grades and test-scores were good too. But I also worked super hard on my essays and they all revealed another facet of me while still representing a cohesive picture of who I am.
Weaknesses: ECs for sure, but I must’ve been evaluated with respect to my Indian background, and Indian applicants in general have weaker ECs .
Why you think you were accepted: Diversity since I was homeschooled but also had objectively evaluated grades, and also US citizen schooled abroad. Most important had to have been essays and test-scores though.
Where else were you accepted/deferred/rejected: Accepted OOS UMich and UOregon, Rejected UVA, Deferred Yale
SCEA.
General Comments : First of all, I’m sorry this is so long. If you read this far, you the real MVP lol. But anyways, I was deferred by Yale SCEA and felt pretty bummed, but them UMich and UNC accepted me OOS! I was super surprised and honestly, I’d be as happy to go to either of these as I would to go to Yale. What I mean is don’t give up hope even if your dream/top school defers/rejects you. There are other great schools who’re gonna want you, and you’re gonna want them. It’s an exhausting process but at the end are 4 (hopefully amazing) years, and it’s all gonna be worth it in the end. Stay positive.