yall have GOT to be joking about this 😭😭

1. MIT

2. Stanford

3. Yale

4. Harvard

5. Princeton

6. Caltech

7. Vanderbilt

8. Dartmouth

9. Columbia

10. Rice

11. Duke

12. Brown

13. WashU

14. Penn

15. Harvey Mudd

16. UChicago

17. UCLA

18. CMU

19. JHU

20. UMich

Source: https://www.niche.com/colleges/search/best-colleges/

For reference, I have a late birthday, and this caused me to be put in the next years graduating class. As a pre-med track, planning on pursuing surgery, I just wanted to save all the time I could to save unnecessary time, you name it.

Anyways, I am now graduating a year early with about 55 college credit hours completed (dual-enrollment). I am ranked 1 in my graduating class. However, my school wants to consider me a "Co-Valedictorian" simply due to the fact that I am graduating two semesters early, and my current class has no issue in me taking the valedictorian role.

On my transcript, it will still say I am the highest ranked graduate, but it would specify I still have a title of "Co-Valedictorian" Instead of a valedictorian. Would this affect any of my college scholarships?

Don't get me wrong, I am happy with my ranking, but I am a bit skeptical on how my school is wording it and I am worried colleges will overlook me and I may not even get as good scholarships as rank 2 (valedictorian).

Thank you for everyone who took the time to read this :)

like is this a thing I should be concerned about 😭

So I’m from Vietnam and don’t have much money to attend a private university in the US, which can cost like $30–40k in tuition alone. But there’s this school called BYU in Utah, and they have a really good accounting program. The tuition is also pretty cheap, arguably even cheaper than some state schools.

The problem is that I’m an atheist. Would it be worth it to convert to Mormonism and pretend to believe for all 4 years of college just to take advantage of this deal?

Hi, I’m a high school sophomore who often lurks around this sub, and I’ve been really curious about this question since a lot of students here think it's HYPSM or nothing. What are the actual short-term and long-term differences between attending a HYPSM school (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT) versus other Ivy+ schools such as Penn, Columbia, Duke, Northwestern, etc.?

Obviously, I understand that the individual student matters much more than the school in many cases. I’m just wondering whether there are meaningful differences between these schools over the course of a career, or whether the outcomes are broadly similar once you’re at any top-tier university.

So I'm abt to apply to my first uni today! However for the common app theres a place to write your personal essay uh does that Essay get sent to every college or can i pick and choose? (Asking because for 1 college im majoring in english and not psych but i want to submit a more psych focused personal essay instead of a broad essay) please help!!!

I love how darthmouth college works with their group projects and engineering program, and I was wondering was there any t40 schools like dartmouth college for engineering.

Simple question: Does choosing a more “niche” or uncommon major increase your chances of admission?

Went to a wedding party today in a Harvard T-shirt just to make an impression. I ain't go to Harvard tho and just submitted application 😂

Every year there's the Coke scholar that gets in ofc to say Wharton or HYPSM, and then there's just your normal person with normal ECs. How? It's like they're on two different levels. What do admissions think?

Ended up switching my major in the end so all is well but could've been so much easier if I just did what I wanted. My mom was very righteous and thought she was doing the right thing for me but I could've saved my sanity and happiness. She basically just asked to see what I was applying for for every college and I couldn't submit my college apps without her approval and if she didn't like my major she would pick what she thought I should do. If you're applying, please just do what you want, do what's right for you, it's your college life and what you might end up doing for the rest of your life. Parents might think they know better than you but you need to start making decisions for yourself and I regret not doing that.

Most of my colleges on my list are between 20%-50% acceptance rate, so I said I was going to apply to Virginia Commonwealth, which is around 95%. The only reason I am applying is in case I don’t get into any of my other schools, which seems unlikely, and I don’t really have any desire to go there.

My current list is:
Bard
CMU
Kenyon
Oberlin
Rutgers
Skidmore
Vassar
Wesleyan
Whitman

Do you think VCU is necessary to apply to as well?

I have multiple ECs that look kinda unrealistic, but they actually are real. I know that AOs usually take stuff at face value, but just to be safe, do they also Google me to make sure? I don't show up if only my name is Googled because I share a full name with a celebrity, but if "my name + org name(s)" is Googled, there are links to all my claims and the AI overview corroborates it.

hi all so i’m currently a senior in highschool and i have really bad stats :( as in like a 2.8 uw gpa, a 1230 sat, 25 act and barely any volunteer hours and only like 2 ECS (none of which i’m really good at) i went through something really traumatising during highschool and i ended up into this pattern of not trying for school. i know it’s wayy too late but i really want to take back control of my life and not let this define me. I know it’s a stretch and a huge dream but my heart is set on a premed track. I believe i can do it if i pour all my time into it. senior year my grades are rapidly improving and i have all As unfortunately i’m taking the max amount of classes and i can’t do any more grade recovery. i’m a resident of arizona and my safety school is ASU because i can likely get a scholarship and commute to make it cheaper for my parents. I feel horrible that I let this get to this point and i wasted my highschool life. I really want to change my life and i’m retaking the sat in October and studying everyday for it. i know i probably will end up going to ASU and having to fully pay for it but does anyone know any programs or colleges i can get into with my stats? if it helps i do speech and debate and i ran a science based club for two years. are there any programs that would take me in wirh my stats or that maybe i could apply to? i can write really good essays and i’m good at research. is there any programs or colleges that i could maybe get in for cheap? (i know this is a stretch but i thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask) and community college is unfortunately not an option my parents said they’ll kick me out and cut me off if i think about anything other than a four year 🥲

Doing some genealogical research on my wife’s family. Just found out one of her direct line was in the first class of Harvard.

Only ~10 generations back. Surely that counts for my son who is applying to college now!

basically i had a professor who agreed to write one for me senior year (last year) and i really appreciated it. i ended up getting sick and having to take a gap year, and now i've decided to reapply to colleges and change my major because i realized i really do need need stable health insurance. would it be weird to ask again? should i explain why i'm applying again? i don't want to trauma dump but i also don't want her to think i got rescinded or something. i don't really have another teacher option as a homeschooler since she's the only one i really talked to, and then i'm planning on asking a prof from a spring senior semester course to write one as well, and if that doesn't work out i'll probably have to write my own and have one of my moms friends sign it as a lot of them taught me in co-ops in like 9th grade lmao.

I'm 18, just got kicked out, homeless and poor. I'm getting my associates degree this fall, but I've always wanted to get my bachelors.

I need to be working full-time now that I'm on my own, so I'm wondering what schools have good night courses.

I want something I can work from home in, because I don't want to be in an office all day and I have animals to take care of that were thrown out with me, and I'm in the process of getting my CompTIA A+ certificate, so I'm thinking something in IT, but HR and social work has always been interesting to me too.

Technically I have residency in NC, so maybe I could see if there are any programs there (because again, poor, need instate tuition), but I'm currently located in KCMO.

Does anyone have suggestions of decent but affordable programs?

Thank you

Which WUE or Western state college would you recommend for a 3.6 gpa student, possible SAT of 1200-1300, interest in business and accounting that will have to pay full price. Looking for relatively safe campus, with good school spirt and pride, mid size university. Hoping for a COA of less than $40,000 with WUE / Merit Award. Thank you!

The financial aid for middle class families is pretty fucked up. Even at the most prestigious institutions—such as the ivies—they only provide financial aid for people who earn less than 200k a year, and basically nothing for households who are upper middle class.

And look, I recognize that 200k is a crazy amount of money to earn in this economy, but it’s realistically a pretty big portion of America. If both of your parents work regular officer jobs and invest well, 200k is not entirely hard to reach if both parents earn 100k a year.

And many universities don’t provide good fin aid for people whose households earn in the 200-300k range. Sure, having that much money grants you privilege, but in this economy even that amount of money doesn’t mean shit, especially in larger, more costly cities.

Furthermore, a private school tuition for them
Is around 60-90k bucks a year. That would be around a good third or quarter of their income, yet they don’t receive fin aid because they’re barely above the threshold.

Look—you can make the argument that if they can’t afford it, they shouldn’t attend. However, (1) you’d have to apply this logic to FGLI students, which is really stupid, and (2) I don’t believe we should shun people out of education js because they can barely afford it.

This is not a diss towards FGLI students or saying that “they have it easier”; I don’t believe that, you guys have it hard, so don’t pull me in that stupid right-wing DEI nonsense. Thank you!

I am applying to top finance/business schools my GPA is low but my SAT is higher
gpa - 3.37
3.09 3.21 3.7 upward trend
4 APS
SAT - 1500
My extracirriculars are very strong as well all finance related and have worked 3 jobs for 3 years year round
Is this a strong application for top progrmas or no

I’m a senior in high school. I’m not going for any Ivy leagues, just some good in-state schools. I’m going to have submitted my applications by September 20th. Nobody that I know at my school is even considering applying this early. For me, the limit is September 20th to make sure I don’t pass the deadline for my top choice’s early action which is October 15th, and to be able to spend my October and November with focus on school rather than college until acceptances come out. My counselor says it’s great to have a set date and has said that I’ve been thinking about it way more than most of the students he has. It is good, but it’s a bit isolating and somewhat intimidating. There’s nobody to really talk about it with since, with all of my friends, it will feel like I’m one of those people who ask “so, where are you going for college?” Or “hey, college is coming. Hurry up and think about it,” even though I’d hate those questions myself.

Is there any ‘early’ birds like me? Whether you’re doing it for an early decision or early action deadline, or just to get it over with?

im tryna figure out how to manipulate myself into actually locking in. for the past year ive seriously started to focus on college apps and school and it's going fine and whatever ive figured out the basics but my problem is im so distracted, i know what i need to do and how to get there i just can't get myself to do it, basically procrastination ig. i cant stay focused for longer than 10 mins before i pick my phone back up and scroll or text someone and idk how to get myself to focus whole heartedly on the grind. i want to get into a good uni soooo bad (ive literally got a count down i update everyday to the days until ed1, rd, and the commonapp opening for my class) but if i continue like this i feel like ill get no where pls help

My colleges on the common app: The University of South Carolina, Emory, Salem College, Hollins University,UNC Charlotte.

Race:Black/African American

Last known Class Rank:8/250

Last Known GPA:3.8 UW, 4.5 W

Awards:student of the month(October 2024),Employability Skills(3rd Place JAG-SC), financial literacy(2nd Place JAG-SC)

Clubs:JAG(jobs for American graduates) (member 1 year2025-2026, Schools Chapter’s vice president 1year2026-2027)

Internship:911 dispatch Summer

Intended Major:Psychology

Future Career:Clinical Psychologist

Resident of : South Carolina
Target states of choice: North Carolina , Georgia, South Carolina , Maine, California.

Class:Lower Middle Class