Applying to college

[DiscoDucky]

Well, I would like to congratulate those who were accepted into Cornell and Columbia today (and Washington University of St. Louis yesterday)!

Remember, even if you didn't get in, as long as you're in the competitive threshold for the high end schools, you'll definitely have a really good chance of getting in!

I can't wait the hear more good acceptance stories from Smogonites!

 

[Empress]

Just got deferred from Brown. Still have 6 choices on the board: Tufts, Wesleyan, Brandeis, Trinity, Holy Cross and Providence.
Let's see: Awful 3.45 unweighted GPA, 2220 SATs, 750 and 650 subject tests (math 2 and physics respectively), 2-time All-New England percussionist, 3 National Spanish awards, and PA announcer for all my school's sports teams. That's about all the important stuff.
Which of the remaining 6 colleges do you think I'll ultimately attend?

 

[KM]

Which of the remaining 6 colleges do you think I'll ultimately attend?

probably only one of them, unless you're a fucking wizard genius space alien

oh wait jk this was a serious question uh you will attend whatever school you like the most that you get into. admissions is somewhat of a crapshoot at time, you might be qualified and not get in or not qualified and randomly get in. if you can't do anything about it now, don't stress about it until the time to decide comes.

 

[Empress]

probably only one of them, unless you're a fucking wizard genius space alien

oh wait jk this was a serious question uh you will attend whatever school you like the most that you get into. admissions is somewhat of a crapshoot at time, you might be qualified and not get in or not qualified and randomly get in. if you can't do anything about it now, don't stress about it until the time to decide comes.

Thanks Kitten. Still, easier said than done- the anxiety has been killing me this entire year. Do you have any tips on what I can do to just chill a little bit?

 

[Soul Fly]

Thanks Kitten. Still, easier said than done- the anxiety has been killing me this entire year. Do you have any tips on what I can do to just chill a little bit?

porn. not even kidding. gets you through a lot of anxious nights.

 

[Ender]

Just got deferred from Brown. Still have 6 choices on the board: Tufts, Wesleyan, Brandeis, Trinity, Holy Cross and Providence.
Let's see: Awful 3.45 unweighted GPA, 2220 SATs, 750 and 650 subject tests (math 2 and physics respectively), 2-time All-New England percussionist, 3 National Spanish awards, and PA announcer for all my school's sports teams. That's about all the important stuff.
Which of the remaining 6 colleges do you think I'll ultimately attend?

Also remember that deferral != rejection. I know plenty of people who currently attend Ivies that they were deferred from when they applied early. Keep your head up.

 

[Cresselia~~]

Has anyone got any information on distance learning courses?

I'm looking for a distance learning biology related course. (bachelor's)
I had been studying in another university for a long time, but do not really have the physical health to progress further.
I would like a course that can transfer my previous credits.

 

[uragg]

Al_Alchemist Ice-cold Claws

come to berkeley =] it's pretty cool

 

[Ender]

Actually, come to New England- we have all the colleges you could ever ask for up here.
Soul Fly, thanks for the tip, but keep in mind that can only do so much. I do that when I get anxious sometimes, but it's so temporary that I often see little difference.
Ender, I like the positive attitude, but I know of like 1 person who got deferred from an Ivy and ultimately got in, so I don't have my hopes up.

I'm at an Ivy so my sample size might be a bit larger than yours. It's not a sure thing obviously, it just puts you in the same category as the rest of the regular applicants, except most (if not all) schools won't waitlist a deferred applicant.

 

[Ice-cold Claws]

Al_Alchemist Ice-cold Claws

come to berkeley =] it's pretty cool

I've actually toured Berkeley just a few days ago, and yeah it feels like an amazing place to be.

My chances aren't looking pretty though. Still waiting for my SAT score - which will come in exactly 1 week - but I'm predicting about a 2100, which is.... slightly disappointing.

Also my grade average is 80%. Apparently that translates to a 3.0 GPA, what the heck? My grades aren't that fantastic but they're decent imo, I swear something is seriously wrong with the percentage-GPA conversion scale.

 

[gali]

I finished all my apps about 2 weeks ago. My goal is to go for horn performance, and I want to stay relatively local to where I am in Philadelphia, so I ended up applying to Peabody, Oberlin, Carnegie Mellon, Temple, Penn State, and West Chester. Out of those, my top choices are Peabody and CMU. Both of them have fantastic horn faculty and are connected to good schools outside of music.

Anyone get into Penn?

 

[KM]

am currently wallowing in half-regret half-happiness that I chose to only apply to UCs as people around me get in and get rejected from their colleges of choice early decision and i'm like "ha i'll find out in three months whee~"

the wait is painfully real

 

[totoTavros]

As a soph looking into CS (especially info security fields), would it be worth mentioning any of the following:

*I've been trolling the infosec, Tor, and code golf stack exchanges for at least a year by now, and will probably be doing so at least until senior year?
*I'm currently working on developing a fan-game for pokemon (we haven't started programming everything yet, we need to get everything like moves, abilities, size, weight etc. done first, but it should be done by my junior year, senior at the VERY latest) not a romhack, a legit, fanmade game not running off of any pubically available downloadable stuff (like not RPG maker and shit)
*I'm currently trying to shoehorn programming into every single class I take to make my life easier in the long run in those classes (currently finished my bio punett square solver)
?

Are there any good Cali schools for programming besides the obvious ones (Stanford, CalTech, Berkely)?
Are there any really good CS schools on any of these lists?
http://www.tuitionexchange.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Families|Member Schools
https://wp.cic.edu/Chapter/CICChapterMembers.aspx?CID=4776a598-90cd-db11-a182-005056873acc

 

[Bad Ass]

As a soph looking into CS (especially info security fields), would it be worth mentioning any of the following:

*I've been trolling the infosec, Tor, and code golf stack exchanges for at least a year by now, and will probably be doing so at least until senior year?
*I'm currently working on developing a fan-game for pokemon (we haven't started programming everything yet, we need to get everything like moves, abilities, size, weight etc. done first, but it should be done by my junior year, senior at the VERY latest) not a romhack, a legit, fanmade game not running off of any pubically available downloadable stuff (like not RPG maker and shit)
*I'm currently trying to shoehorn programming into every single class I take to make my life easier in the long run in those classes (currently finished my bio punett square solver)
?

Are there any good Cali schools for programming besides the obvious ones (Stanford, CalTech, Berkely)?
Are there any really good CS schools on any of these lists?
http://www.tuitionexchange.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Families|Member Schools
https://wp.cic.edu/Chapter/CICChapterMembers.aspx?CID=4776a598-90cd-db11-a182-005056873acc

do what you want. pursue interests that make you happy. in your application you should be addressing those things that make you different than all the other applicants; the things you truly care about. if what you listed is among those things, then mention them. also, you can search for top CS schools in the country / cali, but make sure you do some research more than someone told you they were good to know whether you really wanna go somewhere.

 

[Al_Alchemist]

As a soph looking into CS (especially info security fields), would it be worth mentioning any of the following:

*I've been trolling the infosec, Tor, and code golf stack exchanges for at least a year by now, and will probably be doing so at least until senior year?
*I'm currently working on developing a fan-game for pokemon (we haven't started programming everything yet, we need to get everything like moves, abilities, size, weight etc. done first, but it should be done by my junior year, senior at the VERY latest) not a romhack, a legit, fanmade game not running off of any pubically available downloadable stuff (like not RPG maker and shit)
*I'm currently trying to shoehorn programming into every single class I take to make my life easier in the long run in those classes (currently finished my bio punett square solver)
?

Are there any good Cali schools for programming besides the obvious ones (Stanford, CalTech, Berkely)?
Are there any really good CS schools on any of these lists?
http://www.tuitionexchange.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/Families|Member Schools
https://wp.cic.edu/Chapter/CICChapterMembers.aspx?CID=4776a598-90cd-db11-a182-005056873acc

I've heard great things about Harvey Mudd, but also very horrible things about how difficult it is over there. It's a liberal arts college that makes you take all sorts of different science courses more so than "arts courses" and is pretty reputable or whatever. Take this information with a grain of salt though obviously. http://talk.collegeconfidential.com...dd-vs-other-schools-for-computer-science.html

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/12/17/the-top-10-colleges-that-fuel-the.html?page=all

 

[Expulso]

Hey! I'm an HS freshman from Ohio, and I'm hoping to get into a really competitive college. My GPA is currently ~4.1, and I got a score 211 on my PSAT. One thing I've been wondering about is what I could do at this age to give me a "leg up" in college admissions? I'm sure there will be plenty of candidates as qualified as me—or more qualified—if I ever apply for an elite college, so some other things to work on would be appreciated. Thanks!

Things I've done / am interested in:

• Taekwondo black belt: ~5 years of training
• Basketball: I'll probably end up making varsity as a sophomore / junior, and could go for a basketball scholarship
• Latin: got 11th out of ~700 7th-12th grade competitors at the Ohio Junior Classical League Convention (hah nerd!)
• Theater: acted through middle school, also did some camps and extracurricular activities
• also applying for my school's big annual math / science scholarship this week

Thanks!

 

[GatoDelFuego]

Hey! I'm an HS freshman from Ohio, and I'm hoping to get into a really competitive college. My GPA is currently ~4.1, and I got a score 211 on my PSAT. One thing I've been wondering about is what I could do at this age to give me a "leg up" in college admissions? I'm sure there will be plenty of candidates as qualified as me—or more qualified—if I ever apply for an elite college, so some other things to work on would be appreciated. Thanks!

Things I've done / am interested in:

• Taekwondo black belt: ~5 years of training
• Basketball: I'll probably end up making varsity as a sophomore / junior, and could go for a basketball scholarship
• Latin: got 11th out of ~700 7th-12th grade competitors at the Ohio Junior Classical League Convention (hah nerd!)
• Theater: acted through middle school, also did some camps and extracurricular activities
• also applying for my school's big annual math / science scholarship this week

Thanks!

You're on a good track, keep those extracurriculars going. Theatre is a great one because it's a bit more 'uncommon', I think. It's good that you're starting early and have a good mindset early in HS. Keep in mind that colleges mostly use unweighted GPA calculations, so just beware. Only suggestion I have is find a way to fit in community service somewhere; colleges (especially the top ones? but I'm no expert on how2ivy) eat that up.

 

[Bughouse]

I've heard great things about Harvey Mudd, but also very horrible things about how difficult it is over there. It's a liberal arts college that makes you take all sorts of different science courses more so than "arts courses" and is pretty reputable or whatever. Take this information with a grain of salt though obviously. http://talk.collegeconfidential.com...dd-vs-other-schools-for-computer-science.html

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/12/17/the-top-10-colleges-that-fuel-the.html?page=all

If you want to take courses at Harvey Mudd, but actually live like a human with better dorms and food, go to Pomona, Claremont McKenna, Scripps (if you're a lady), or Pitzer. The 5 schools are all on a consortium and are basically on top of each other. A good friend majored in math and CS (iirc) at Pomona and took a lot of those major classes at Harvey Mudd, where the faculty is better recognized in that field. But because he went to Pomona he got all the benefits of their superior student life. And yes, his education was still well-regarded even though his STEM majors came "from" a liberal arts school. He's now a grad student at MIT.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claremont_Colleges

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Any Canadians looking for advice my inbox is open

 

[Ender]

Hey! I'm an HS freshman from Ohio, and I'm hoping to get into a really competitive college. My GPA is currently ~4.1, and I got a score 211 on my PSAT. One thing I've been wondering about is what I could do at this age to give me a "leg up" in college admissions? I'm sure there will be plenty of candidates as qualified as me—or more qualified—if I ever apply for an elite college, so some other things to work on would be appreciated. Thanks!

Things I've done / am interested in:

• Taekwondo black belt: ~5 years of training
• Basketball: I'll probably end up making varsity as a sophomore / junior, and could go for a basketball scholarship
• Latin: got 11th out of ~700 7th-12th grade competitors at the Ohio Junior Classical League Convention (hah nerd!)
• Theater: acted through middle school, also did some camps and extracurricular activities
• also applying for my school's big annual math / science scholarship this week

Thanks!

1. Weighted GPA doesn't matter. Only unweighted + class rank + hardest courseload possible. If by "elite" you mean Ivy, Duke, Stanford, MIT, Chicago, Caltech, Hopkins, etc then you should ideally have an UW GPA of 4.0 and a class rank of top 3 (not even kidding on this one - at my school, 40-50% of students were valedictorians and another 10% were salutatorians). If you're not top 3 as a freshman, don't worry. Usually the AP courses separate the men from the boys. I wasn't ranked second until halfway through my junior year.

2. PSAT score and SAT score don't correlate very well. You're going to want to aim for 2300+, so make sure you study hard. Also get 750+ on 2-3 subject tests (unless they are Math 2 or Korean, in which case you're going to want an 800 since that's like 85th percentile and 60th percentile, respectively). 211 PSAT isn't a bad place to start, but it's not a great place to finish (for reference, my PSAT as a junior, which was my 3rd time taking it, was somewhere from 200-210, idr exactly, but my SAT scores were much higher, so you're starting off well).

3. Your ECs don't matter unless they're absolutely ridiculous (publication, founded a successful organization, USAMO whatever shit, etc). You just need to show that you've spent your time doing something other than playing video games. Having something meaningful to write your personal statement about is also a huge plus.

THAT BEING SAID...

The best thing you can do now as a freshman is keep your GPA up, take the hardest classes you can, and in a year or so, start to prep for the SAT (which you should ideally take twice). Get to know 2-3 teachers very well (preferably teachers in core classes like english, history, science, math, etc) and 1-2 adults in charge of your favorite ECs (so in this case, your basketball coach and either your Latin teacher or your Taekwondo coach) - these will be your letters of rec writers. Very strong LoRs can help you stand out from the thousands of 2300+ valedictorians while weak or mediocre ones will make sure you get glossed over.

At the end of all this, keep in mind that most of it comes down to chance and even if you do everything right you can get royally fucked, so apply to anywhere you think you'll be happy going to. Count your blessings if you're accepted and don't feel bad if you're rejected. Good luck and let me know if you have any questions.

 

[Stratos]

^What year are you? that is going to have a huge effect on any advice i give

 

[Stratos]

sophomore (10th)

ok well first of all i wanted to say, don't worry about it. this is a lesson that it will take forever to learn when you have parents like mine and it sounds like you do. no matter what, the worst that could happen to you is you don't get into the college of your dreams and you go on living. There's no situation shitty enough that you can't find happiness in it. You said you don't know "what you're doing wrong" but from the looks of it, you're not doing anything wrong. You have a 2100s SAT as a sophomore in high school, and a perfectly fine GPA. If you want to improve, then maybe someone else can help you with study skills (i sure as hell can't) but you're not being a miserable failure as is.

Another thing I'd recommend is not to do extracurriculars JUST to get into a college. those extracurriculars are decent, not "weak," theyre certainly better than mine were. if you don't get into the college you wanted because you didn't do enough community service in africa or some bullshit then fuck those pretentious douchebags, you didnt want to go there anyways. Of course, if it's something you always wanted to do anyways but only college will actually motivate you enough to go do it then that's a different story.

You could be bombing finals because of stress, which seems plausible considering how worked up you are. Make sure you get sleep before your finals in the future, and eat healthy. I'd say "study well in advance" but we all know thats bullshit rofl just dont prioritize studying over getting at least 6 hours of sleep the night before the exam because it truly won't help.

in hindsight i know i didnt give much advice on how to get into college but that's because looking back on it from someone who's currently going to their "safety school" (university of maryland) i've realized that the college admissions process isn't something worth stressing about. It's about finding the place where you truly fit, not where you want to fit. Not everyone is cut out for studying all the time under the most demanding curricula in the world, and you'll get by fine and have a lot of fun at any decent university. Calm down and enjoy high school while you're in it.

 

[toshimelonhead]

Might as well post here since I'm really in need of some advice.

I'm a Sophomore from Houston, Texas, and I go to a high ranking public high school (in the top 25 from news week's ranking thing afaik). I currently have a 4.4 weighted and 3.7 unweighted GPA, which will fall to a 4.2 weighted and god knows what unweighted at the end of this semester (tomorrow). I've gone as far as quitting Smogon, don't have any sort of social media to waste time on, have control freak parents, etc etc. I just don't understand what I'm doing wrong :/ Anyway, as far as standardized tests go, I scored a 220 on the October PSAT, which is slightly past the Texas cutoff. I score around 2100s on the SAT. I'm planning on taking the old one over the knew one because the old one has more material to study from. My grades are pretty much irrecoverable at this point and my rank is in the solid 30s-40s out of a class of about 200 people.

I honestly think my mom is my main problem. She always yells at me for bad grades, and, well, pretty much anything. I think without her bugging me so much, I could do better, but that won't be happening ever @_@. It's not that my grades are particularly bad; I got pretty much all As this semester, but the finals just tanked my averages into the high Bs (and none of my teachers will bump me up, even if it is by 1 fucking point).

My course load is the hardest available at my school. I'm currently taking:

• AP Statistics
• PreAP Spanish III
• AP World History
• PreAP Pre-Calculus
• PreAP English II
• PreAP Chemistry
• AP Computer Science

Along with mandatory classes in "SAT Prep" and "Health Science" (my school is for health professions), though they are both 4.0 classes unlike the rest of my schedule.

Extremely weak extracurricular wise. This is what I have:

• Playing the Tabla (Indian drums I guess for ~3 years)
• Karate Black Belt (~10 years)

Yeah, I know, not a lot. Hopefully, my club proposal for Quizbowl will go through and then I'll be captain/president. I'm also doing Science Fair (ISEF, Siemens, STS) when the time comes to give me a sort of edge over other people in my class.

My dream college is probably Rice University, which is really close to my house and has a great Computer Science program, and University of Texas at Austin for similar reasons.

If all else fails, I'll still have Smogon University, right?

tl;dr: shit everything, help ;-;

e: forgot to mention, but I'm currently in an internship (I guess) for a postdoc from University of Houston, so there's that. Working with him for science fair and whatnot.

Smh. Pwnemon gave the best advice you could get for your case. Do not do anything in high school just to get into a college. What I'm sensing is you're putting too much pressure on yourself and that the more you push yourself (SAT prep, quitting Smogon, more extra curriculars) you are going to burn out. And burning out is NOT pretty. I mean seriously, what's the point of adding an additional extracurricular or AP class or internship when you already have the grades and the test scores to get into pretty much anywhere you want?

Take a deep breath. Enjoy high school. Don't beat yourself up. You'll be fine.

Also look at Oklahoma if you get National Merit. My friend got a full ride there.

 

[toshimelonhead]

Hey! I'm an HS freshman from Ohio, and I'm hoping to get into a really competitive college. My GPA is currently ~4.1, and I got a score 211 on my PSAT. One thing I've been wondering about is what I could do at this age to give me a "leg up" in college admissions? I'm sure there will be plenty of candidates as qualified as me—or more qualified—if I ever apply for an elite college, so some other things to work on would be appreciated. Thanks!

Things I've done / am interested in:

• Taekwondo black belt: ~5 years of training
• Basketball: I'll probably end up making varsity as a sophomore / junior, and could go for a basketball scholarship
• Latin: got 11th out of ~700 7th-12th grade competitors at the Ohio Junior Classical League Convention (hah nerd!)
• Theater: acted through middle school, also did some camps and extracurricular activities
• also applying for my school's big annual math / science scholarship this week

Thanks!

Looks good to me so far. Like the activity list as well. Focus on finding lots of schools you like instead of worrying about an "elite college".

 

[henry]

2270 on sat but 3.4 GPA... smoked/partied too much to bother with high school. Took 6 ap classes.

anyone applying to Rutgers? Already got in and will probably go.

Anyone have advice on where else I should look? Live in nj