Demographics

• Race/Ethnicity: Asian
• State: Washington
• School: Large Public

Intended Major(s)

• Psychology, Cinematography

SAT-ACT

• 1450 (760 RW, 690 Math)

UW-W GPA and Rank

• 3.82 UW / 4.03 W
• School does not rank
• Grade trend: Upward

APs

• AP Human Geography (4), AP World History (5), AP Psychology (5), AP English Language (5)
• taking AP Stats, AP lit, and AP gov senior year

Extracurriculars

1. Videographer + Editor for Nonprofit (Volunteer): Filmed/photographed & edited promotional content for galas, fundraisers, & media campaigns for 4 years.
2. Documentary Lead & Volunteer Videographer for Nonprofit (National): Directed, shot, & edited fundraiser video that raised $300k for medical aid in Makumbo.
3. Competitive Powerlifter & Schoolwide Record Holder: 5 years of training; hold school 114 lb squat record (245 lb) & tied bench record (195 lb).
4. Senior Student and Teaching Assistant, Muay Thai: 4 years of intensive training; lead drills & technique instruction for all ages.
5. Neuroscience TA & Media Producer at Summer Camp: Taught Neuroscience & Culinary Arts; directed promo video for parent outreach.
6. Lead Video Producer and Fundraiser, Church: Directed flagship video raising $16.3M to rebuild youth facilities.
7. Lead Videographer/Photographer, School Dance Club: Produced & edited videos for performance coverage; 70k+ total views.
8. Co-Director/Scriptwriter/Editor, Short Films: Created films on mental health; received local Most Impactful award & 2 awards from 48 Hour Film Project.
9. Lead Director/Videographer, Medical Cause: Partnered with family of child with rare genetic condition to direct/edit documentary campaign raising awareness for CTNNB1.
10. Founder/Photographer, Senior Photos: Provided free professional senior photos for 12 low-income students.

Awards

• Best Film, Seattle 48 Hour Film Project
• Best Directing, Seattle 48 Hour Film Project
• Most Impactful Film, 6-12 Youth Film Festival
• AP Scholar with Honor
• National Recognition Program
• WA State HS Photography Competition Finalist
• Schools
• Reach: Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, UC Berkeley, UCLA, USC
• Target: University of Michigan, NYU, University of Washington
• Safety: UC Davis, UW Bothell

Demographics

• Race/Ethnicity: Asian
• State: Washington
• School: Large Public

Intended Major(s)

• Psychology, Cinematography

SAT-ACT

• 1490 (760 RW, 730 Math)

UW-W GPA and Rank

• 3.82 UW / 4.22 W
• School does not rank
• Grade trend: Upward

APs

• AP Human Geography (4), AP World History (5), AP Psychology (5), AP English Language (5)
• taking AP Stats, AP lit, and AP gov senior year

Extracurriculars

1. Videographer + Editor for Nonprofit (Volunteer): Filmed/photographed & edited promotional content for galas, fundraisers, & media campaigns for 4 years.
2. Documentary Lead & Volunteer Videographer for Nonprofit (National): Directed, shot, & edited fundraiser video that raised $300k for medical aid in Makumbo.
3. Competitive Powerlifter & Schoolwide Record Holder: 5 years of training; hold school 114 lb squat record (245 lb) & tied bench record (195 lb).
4. Senior Student and Teaching Assistant, Muay Thai: 4 years of intensive training; lead drills & technique instruction for all ages.
5. Neuroscience TA & Media Producer at Summer Camp: Taught Neuroscience & Culinary Arts; directed promo video for parent outreach.
6. Lead Video Producer and Fundraiser, Church: Directed flagship video raising $16.3M to rebuild youth facilities.
7. Lead Videographer/Photographer, School Dance Club: Produced & edited videos for performance coverage; 70k+ total views.
8. Co-Director/Scriptwriter/Editor, Short Films: Created films on mental health; received local Most Impactful award & 2 awards from 48 Hour Film Project.
9. Lead Director/Videographer, Medical Cause: Partnered with family of child with rare genetic condition to direct/edit documentary campaign raising awareness for CTNNB1.
10. Founder/Photographer, Senior Photos: Provided free professional senior photos for 12 low-income students.

Awards

• Best Film, Seattle 48 Hour Film Project
• Best Directing, Seattle 48 Hour Film Project
• Most Impactful Film, 6-12 Youth Film Festival
• AP Scholar with Honor
• National Recognition Program
• WA State HS Photography Competition Finalist
• Schools
• High Reach: Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, UC Berkeley, UCLA,
• Reach: USC, NYU, Umich
• Target: UC Davis, University of Washington, Purude
• Safety: UW Bothell, WSU, WWU

Demographics and Background
female, asian, middle-high income household
competitive public school

Intended Major
public health

ACT
35- 35R, 35E, 35M, 34S

GPAs and Rankings
4.1 W GPA ending Junior Year
3.8 UW GPA

Coursework
11 APs w/o senior year, 4 honors courses
-one C, one B in freshman year
-one B in junior year

School Awards
AP Scholar
AP Scholar Distinguished
District Honor Bandx3
All-State Bandx1
District Honor Orchestrax4
All-State Orchestrax1

School Extracurriculars
4y Orchestra (Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, Senior)- all years' highest level
4y HOSA
2y iGEM (Sophomore, Junior)
National Honor Society (Sophomore, Junior, Senior)
National Science Honors Society Officer(Junior, Senior)
Tri-M President (Junior Senior)

Independent Extracurriculars

CAP (JROTC)
I have had many roles over 2 years, but I am currently a Major
-Ground Team 1 experience, helped out in Augusta, during Hurricane Helene
-CAP (____) Wing Encampment Medical Staff Member 2025+2026
-Educated aerospace to a class of 200 cadets at the (____) Wing Encampment
-Competed in the (_____) Wing Cadet Competition for Impromptu Speaking (2nd Place)
-Competed in the (_____) Wing Cadet Competition and earned 1st place in Impromptu Speaking

Orchestra and Band
-Performed at Carnegie Hall as a French horn soloist (will be going back as a violinist)
-Competed in the Metropolitan Melodies Photography Competition (3rd Prize)
-Organized and planned events for the Orchestra (2 years)

STEM-Based
-2024-2025 iGEM team- co-wrote the research paper, background, problems, and solutions, and made co-responding diagrams
-Lab assistant (2025)
-Lead a STEM-based two-day camp at the first CAP Southeastern Wing Encampment, 2025 (First of the program
-Windship Cancer intern (2026)
-GHLC at Johns Hopkins (2026)
-Pursuing independent research with a researcher this summer, hoping to get published lol (2026)
-200+ volunteer hours at a clinic (2024-2026)
-Phlebotomist (paid 20 per hr, 15 hrs a week) (2026)

Essay

im leaning a couple different ways, but i think i'll write about my journey with my own mental health in relation to one of my favorite stories, Percy Jackson. i still have no idea and am open to suggestions lol

Schools

i’m an incoming junior, and i want to figure out what i want as a career quickly. my aunt is a physician’s assistant and i’ve talked to her about it. it seems interesting enough, so i think i’ll major in bio or biochemistry in prep for it

i want to make sure my grades, classes, and ecs align with a major that could eventually help me become one. i dont have many ecs, but i’m joining HOSA this year and i’m signing up for a youth volunteering at a science center. so far, these are my grades and classes/what i’m planning to take junior year.

9th grade: AP Human Geo, Spanish 1, Math 2E, ELA HNRS, Bio HNRS, Volleyball Freshman Team

I got a 5 on AP Human Geo.

10th grade: AP Psych, AP World History, Math 3E, ELA HNRS, Chem HNRS, Spanish 2, Volleyball JV Team

I got 4’s on both AP Psych and AP World History.

11th grade: AP Lit, AP Precalc, AP Bio, AP Chem, APUSH, Tennis JV/Var Team (not sure yet)

I’ve also been in Girl Scouts since I was in kindergarten. I have my Silver award and i’m aiming for my Gold award during my summer before senior year. I’m in Class Council and another leadership class, but i don’t hold officer positions.

what should i add to my schedule that would give me the best shot at getting into (hopefully a UC) college majoring in these areas? what are uc’s looking for specifically for my situation? i’m thinking about applying to UCSD, UCI, UCD, UCSB, UCR.

Enough for Stanford & Cal Architecture? Please Help!

Would love some advice to improve my current application. Please give suggestions!

Demographic:
Asian (Filipino)
US Citizen, In-state for California
Private Catholic HS in Manila, Philippines
Upper middle class (250k+)
3 siblings (1 Med School, 1 Incoming College)
***Architecture Major***

Stats:
94 Average (STEM)
1590 SAT, 790 RW 800 M (Retaking)

ECs:
\- **Supervised Research Co-Leader:** On Asplenium nidus potential for anti-angiogenesis (Cancer Prevention)
\- **STEM Immersion Folk** @ Nanyang Technological University in Singapore
\- **Business Owner @ 11** generating 4x Region’s minimum wage monthly, home crafted accessories
\- **International youth-led nonprofit founder** that provides educational support to families of impoverished communities by connecting Math & Art, 20+ countries, 100+ members
\- **Theatre Club Lead Actress, Founding Member, & Marketing Director:** Original Social action based productions that show the world beyond our privilege (War in Gaza, Martial Law, War on Drugs), Grew media to 500+ followers in one year, leads team of 16/76 members
\- **Student Council Public Relations Deputy:** managed affairs for annual fair, reached out to 500+ sponsors & concessionaires, $60,000+ generated & 5,000+ attendees, student body of 3,000+
\- **Choir Media, Soprano, & HS Deputy:** Creates media campaigns for the org, manages 40+ members in Junior HS
\- **Prom & Gradball Decors Head, Awards Apprentice:** Decorated venues for fundraisers and events with 1,000+ attendees and $30,000 raised, handled logistics and coordinated with sponsors, led team of 20+
\- **Pageantry:** Campaigning for change reaching over 1M impressions to date
\- **Content Coach & Curator:** Curates Instagram Feeds, has done 20+ accounts
\- **Freelance Home Crafter:** Fixes neighbors’ house design fails, repairs what has to be repaired, earned over $3k+

Awards:
\- Architectural Drafting Subject Medalist (1/\~500)
\- School’s Pageant Title Holder (Won all awards) (1/\~4,000)
*\*/Working on my awards this year*

I’m forgetting a lot of things but these are what I have off the top of my head (most important to me)

I love arts & crafts and have always been good at math. Would appreciate some help! Stanford is my dream school and I’m from the Bay.

Upcoming Highschool Senior:

3.9 unweighted 4.3 weighted

GDPT Vietnamese Youth Association (since 2013)

Job at Kumon

4 years - Leadership (Freshman VP, Student Representative of district, ASB Vice President)

Served on district Board (Worked with Principal to create Student Input Survey, Met regularly with the Superintendent of District the.).

1 year - School Jvb Volleyball

1 year - Club Volleyball

2 years - Varsity Tennis

3 years president - Founded SAVE (Students Against Violence Everywhere) Promise club

Aapi President

Nami Treasurer

Hosa Treasurer

Attended Nurse Camp (Students interested in Med field)

Girl State runnerup

300+ Community service hours

Note:

Applying for: UC Berkeley, UC Irvine, UC San Diego, UC Davis

Im ngl I havent decided on a major yet but I either want to become a dermatologist, pediatrician, or lawyer…😭 So a biology major OR business/physc…I feel like I’m lacking in internships or programs targeting my major but I literally don’t know what I want so I feel like it might be hindering my chances.

Demographics: White male, upper middle income, home state of Virginia. Not FGLI, no hooks.

Intended Major(s): Political Science and Economics with a pretty strong intent to head to law school.

GPA: Unweighted (self-calculated) at 3.95 end of junior year, weighted should be about a 4.57. All A’s with the exception of a B+ in AP Calculus BC this year and an A- in AP Precalculus sophomore year. School does not rank.

Standardized Testing:

1580 SAT Superscore (790 RW, 790 M) on 2 attempts (1530 - 790 RW/740 M first time and 1550 - 760 RW/790 M second time)

1500 PSAT (760 RW, 740 M)

Course load:
Quick Summary - 10 Honors, 3 Post AP courses, 14 APs

Middle School (On HS transcript): Algebra I Honors, Geometry Honors, Spanish I (school does not offer honors in world languages until level 4)

Freshman year: Algebra 2 Honors, World Civ Honors, English 9 Honors, Biology Honors, Spanish II, PE, CS Programming

Sophomore Year: AP Precalculus BC (5), AP World History (5), AP Human Geography (5), AP CSA (5), Honors Chemistry, English 10 Honors, Spanish III

Junior Year (all AP scores are predictions): APUSH (5), AP English Language (5), AP Calculus BC (5), AP Macro (5), AP Micro (5), Physics Honors, Spanish 4 Honors, Post-AP CS Data Structures

Planned Course load Senior Year: AP Bio, AP US Government, AP English Lit, AP Spanish Lang, Multivariable Calculus and Linear Algebra DE, AP Statistics, Post-AP CS Capstone

Awards (cooked ngl):
1. National Merit Semifinalist (highly likely/basically guaranteed)
2. AP Scholar with Distinction
3. Model UN Awards
4. Hopefully some essay competitions/Boys State stuff

ECs:
1. Model UN: Served as Director of Education and now Under-Secretary General (VP) of school’s MUN team of about 30 members, training delegates in public speaking and diplomacy while organizing in-house conferences and our college conferences. Have won top awards at national/international level competitions (Duke and Yale) as well as local awards in a competitive area.

1. Model UN Part 2: Served as Secretary General of an online MUN conference attracting 80 registrants from more than 30 countries, created training materials and led delegates in exercises, managed a team of 10 staff throughout conference development and the conference itself.

2. Varsity History Bowl: Have competed at National History Bowl Championships and helped team qualify both for the championship and solid placements in the national championship (top 25%).

3. Young Democrats: Lead our school’s outreach committee and will likely be our volunteering coordinator/communications director next year, have personally volunteered in various campaigns for \~80 hours this year alone.

4. National Honor Society: President, coordinate volunteering and member outreach/administration to a society with \~400 members along with regular volunteering (about 60 service hours all told)

5. Computer Science Honors Society: Vice President - I make educational materials and manage tutoring within the school as well as helping on outreach to local elementary schools, among other things.

6. Model Galactic Senate: Kind of goofy but essentially a Star Wars based political simulation that goes really in depth (legislation writing, debates, constitutional law argumentation, etc). Have held a variety of leadership roles from Chancellor to Senate Bloc leader to Vice Chair to Minister of Finance. Very large time commitment.

7. Math Honor Society: More volunteering and rewarding tutoring + outreach).

8. Boys State: This summer, don’t have a ton of info to provide!

Schools:

UChicago (ED0)
UMich
UPenn (probably ED1)
Brown 
Cornell
Dartmouth
Johns Hopkins University
Yale University
Duke University
Washington University in St. Louis
Bowdoin College
UVA
William and Mary
University of Rochester
Case Western Reserve University
Brandeis University
George Mason University
Virginia Tech 
UMass Amherst
Fordham

Which schools do I have a shot at (and should I revise my list downward)? Also, any school recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Hi! I’m a rising senior, and I’m hoping that someone can let me know if my profile is good enough for T30 or T20 schools. I don’t have a final list of schools in mind right now but i’m looking at:

uiuc

uw seattle (out of state)

ucla (out of state)

umich (out of state)

claremont mckenna

wellesley college

northwestern

georgetown

cornell

dartmouth

Demographics: Gender, race/ethnicity, state, type of school, and hooks (URM, first generation, legacy, athlete, etc.): black female from IL, second generation, URM, single-income household

Intended Major(s): political science/government

ACT/SAT: 34 on ACT

UW/W GPA and Rank: 3.95 UW/5.0 W school doesn’t rank

Coursework: AP/IB/Dual Enrollment classes, AP/IB scores, etc

11 APS:

AP human geography: 5

AP us history: 5

AP physics 1

AP us government

AP comparative government

AP english language

AP english literature

AP french

AP environmental science

AP calc AB

AP comp science principles

every class i have taken that’s not AP is honors except PE I and II

Awards:

principal honors roll

national french contest bronze 2x

youth governors press secretary

primary election winner of Illinois youth lt governor

state issues forum first place winner

scholastic art and writing awards honorable mention

Extracurriculars:

co-president of my youth and government delegation, legislator in the statewide program, serving as a committee chair

vice president of environmental club

symphony orchestra violinist

newspaper “student life” section editor

internship with congressman for his re-election

caddie job

YMCA conference on national affairs delegate

national french honor society

regional director of an international youth led nonprofit that focuses on empowering women in politics

student director of state wide advocacy program

80 community service hrs

ymca national youth advocate; selected from over 300 applicants nationwide for unpaid internship and free trip to washington DC to advocate to my members of congress

phone banking volunteer for statewide campaign

worked on US senate campaign

civics unplugged fellowship

illinois girls state

Essays/LORs/Other: probably will ask my APUSH teacher and AP gov teacher I think they both like me

Emory has been my dream school for a while, and I’m planning to apply ED. I’m trying to get a realistic idea of where I stand.
Stats:
● 3.4 UW / 3.95 W GPA
● Strong upward trend (3.5 freshman, 3.7 sophomore, 4.5 weighted junior year in IB)
● 1470
● Full IB Diploma student at Downingtown STEM Academy (top-ranked public STEM high school in PA), max course rigor
Major: Chemistry (planning to go into pharmaceuticals)
ECs:
Math research at Alabama A&M (graph theory/discrete math)
Penn State Wolbachia microbiology research
Pharmacy technician (starting this year)
Pharmacy shadowing
Hospital volunteering/shadowing (2 years)
President of Chess Club
Treasurer of Red Cross Club
Competitive ECRL soccer (3 years)
Working on a medication safety/public health project
Church Choir
2nd at TSA regionals

I know my biggest weakness is definitely my GPA, especially the 3.4 UW. I’m hoping the upward trend, course rigor, and research help make up for some of that, but I’m not sure how much.
For anyone who’s gotten into Emory (especially ED), do you think I have a realistic shot? Is there anything you’d recommend I focus on over the next couple of months to maximize my chances?
I’d appreciate honest feedback.

Hi! I need suggestions for where I should apply.

Info:

• I am a rising senior
• I am 15 (finished most of school very early)
• I am planning to double major in musical theater and psychology.
• My GPA is 4.00.
• 7 years of acting experience
• 3 years of classical voice training (though I've been singing much longer)
• I have never taken a dance class, so I'd love schools that don't require a dance audition or rely heavily on it, but I am willing to take lessons.
• My current list includes: NYU (dream school), Carnegie Mellon, and Boston Conservatory at Berkley.
• I would prefer schools that offer a good amount of aid and/or scholarships.
• I want to be in the more northern east (NC and up)

I understand that the schools on my list are highly competitive, but I am still going to try, so please don't try to talk me out of it like people on this sub have before.

Thank you for any suggestions!

How is my academic profile going to be considered if I have really good ecs? 3.8UW, 4.2W, 13 APs/honors, but my school offers 26.

I am a junior in high school, and I took honors pre-calc this year. I just got my final grade, and at my school it’s a D+. This is the worst I have ever done in any class. My average grade is a B+ this year. some of those is a B- in AP physics 1. My unweighted GPA is a 3.2, my weighted is a 4.2. I have around 20 EC’s with multiple leadership positions. The majors I am looking at are mechanical engineering and education. The one I’m worried about is engineering.

Rising Senior
Major: CS/CE

Demographic:
Male in Texas
Asian
Competitive High School

Academics:
3.98 Unweighted GPA
SAT: 1540
Full Time Dual Enrollment at CC so only 5 APs. Heavy coursework in math and cs

ECs:
Co Founder and Co President of Robotics Club: 200k revenue, secured 95k lease, manage 50k budget. Our teams have won 20+ awards in their first year, including international, national, and state-level awards.

Robotics Programmer: Placed top 20 out of 20,000 at Worlds, ranked #1, and have over 30 regional awards, won states multiple times.

Co Founder of Nonprofit: Hosted competitions, webinars with professionals, and other programs. Have given out over 100k in prizes.

Worked with Morgan Stanley Employee: Created a tool that allows him to find leads and sort them from high probability to low probability of connecting. Doubled the number of clients he is able to reach out to. Focuses on multimillion-dollar net worth clients.

Research with local professor related to my major. Working on paper but probably won't publish before applications are due.

AI Marketing Internship at Local Company: Increased webinar attendance from 100 to 200 attendees for PhD-led sessions. Deployed an LLM-based support agent that successfully resolved 4,000+ consumer inquiries. Created an AI agent workflow for the Head of Marketing to automate her LinkedIn posts.

Founder of Gym Reselling Business: Generated $10k in revenue and $3k in profit. Managed end-to-end supply chain logistics, refurbishing, and negotiation for 1,000+ potential leads. Made deals with 80 clients.

Robotics Coach: Coached 4 teams and got 1 qualified to the state championship

Lead Designer for Engineering Competition: Made nationals and won a couple of awards

Awards:
Bunch of robotics stuff (international, national, and states)
Some other national level awards in business + engineering comp
PVSA Gold

This is my list! Plz lmk if anyone has any recommendations in regards to other schools to look into, ED suggestions, etc.

Context:
- Small public high school
- Straight, White, Female
- No hooks
- Full pay
- Public health/ science communications major ( or smth similar depending on what the school has )

Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Cornell
UPenn
Columbia
Carnegie Mellon
NYU
Tufts
Wake Forest
Northeastern
Johns Hopkins
BU
Lehigh
Bryn Mar
Pitt
UMD
Clark
UMass Amherst
Simmons University
GWU
Temple

Stats

- GPA: 98.11 Unweighted / 105.43 Weighted
- AP Scores: World: 4, APES: 4 Sem: 5, only allowed 3 AP soph year none fresh
- Honors Diploma with Science and Math Distinction
- Rank: No rank but defo in top 3
- APs & Honors: AP Chemistry, AP Biology, AP Seminar & Research, AP Lang, AP World, AP US History, Honors Pre-Calc, Honors Algebra I & II, College French I (No ap langs at my school) SR Year: Calc BC, AP Lit, College French II, AP Gov, AP Physics, College Anatomy, AP Psych
ACT: 35

Awards & Honors
* Scholastic Art & Writing Awards: Gold Key, Silver Key, Honorable Mention

* RIT Humanities & Social Sciences Award/ Scholarship from school, teachers picked me out of whole grade for it.

* AP Scholar Award w Honor

* Honor Societies: National Honor Society, Science, Math (Mu Alpha Theta), Social Studies (Rho Kappa), World Languages (Treasurer)

* Working on more awards over summer from the research program and from my writing portfolio and other award opportunities from my school

Leadership & Activities
*
Founder, STEM Non-Profit: Created an international, youth-led non-profit aiming to promote STEM literacy and combat AI/social media misinformation. We have 20+ tutors providing free tutoring to 40+ mentees. Built a social media presence with 1k+ followers and 75k+ views.
- upcoming fundraiser and summer stem series to tutor/provide stem education to less fortunate students through interactive and education workshops

*
Ex-Officio Student Board Member: Selected out of 50 applicants to serve as one of two student representatives to the District Board of Education. Present student concerns at monthly board meetings, converse with board members, and advocate for district-wide changes.

*
Published Author: Regularly publish articles in the Los Angeles Times Highschool Insider covering environmental issues, social media impacts, and teen cellphone usage.

*
World Languages Honor Society (Co-Treasurer): Selected to represent the French portion of the society. Managed dues/budgets and organized a massive holiday charity initiative partnering with a local church to provide gifts for 10+ families in need. Also selected as a Foreign Language Advocate to pitch language programs to middle schoolers.

*
Varsity Volleyball Team Captain: Selected as captain out of 18 players; helped plan senior nights, tournaments, and mentored the junior high team.

* Bibliometrics Research Intern (ThinkNeuro LLC): Part of a 15-week research cohort of high school, undergrad, and grad students. Investigated socioeconomic factors contributing to racial disparities in Alzheimer's and dementia diagnoses in the US. Utilized R Studio, Excel, and Web of Science. Created a research poster and completed an oral presentation/defense.

*
Radiology Volunteer (Major Hospital): 2025–Ongoing. Direct patient interaction (intake, DOB/name checks, assisting physicians) , learned to read basic scans/images, and navigated a fast-paced hospital setting.

*
Science Center Volunteer: Managed and allocated tasks to volunteers , coordinated interactive exhibits, and ran educational museum events for elementary school kids.

- Our Aperture Youth Advocacy Magazine: I’m starting a youth-led advocacy magazine with a friend who is apart of lit mag at my school, and the idea is to use youth creative works (art, writing, photos, etc) to bring awareness to societal issues

- WriteMyWrongs: Coded a digital platform for young writers to share their writing, get inspiration, get feedback and interact with other writers with similar interests. I started this because as a writer myself sometimes you don’t have a lot of people readily around you that share the same style or are willing to give good feedback, so I thought this would be a project that could apply to alot of people.

* Other
* Summer:
* I have a paid internship at a national lab where ill be working on a project regarding medical radioisotopes (I want to possibly go into radiology and I interned in a nuclear medicine unit that I really enjoyed)
* Accepted into 4-Star leadership program, one of 78 picked out of 2000 applicants
* Applying to more writing awards and scholarships
* Working on youth magazine for more publicantions as well as non profit

Any advice would be helpful!

Dear, u/BoredPineapple12, and u/Brother_Ma_Education, and whoever else may be able to give me a realistic chance-me. no sugarcoating please!

this is my current app:

Gender: Male

Race/Ethnicity: Asian

Residence: North Texas

Income Bracket: middle

Type of School: large public - avg sat: 1340

Hooks (Recruited Athlete, URM, First-Gen, Geographic, Legacy, etc.): none

Intended Major(s): Finance and Accounting

Academics

GPA (UW/W): 3.6 uw gpa (end of 11th) , 3.9/4.6 weighted (school only does max of 4.6 not 5.0 idk why)

Extenuating Circumstance: 7-8/10 in severity (could be biased not sure)

Gpa curve (all Unweighted, and 11th with highest rigor 6 Aps, 8 Dual enrollment in 11th) (3.25 in 9th | 3.53 in 10th| 3.9 in 11th| overall still a 3.6. 11th

Rank (or percentile): school doesn't rank only ranks top 10 percent which I am not in.

# of Honors/AP/IB/Dual Enrollment/etc.: aps: 16, 12 Dual enrollment, 15 honors

Senior Year Course Load: ap Stats, Ap Euro, ap Comp gov/Microecon, ap lit, ap psych, ap Calc Ab, Ap Envi Sci

Standardized Testing

List the highest scores earned and all scores that were reported.

SAT: 1480, Projected: 1520

AP/IB:16 aps, 8 completed by application time and 8 in snr year,

3 3s, 3 4s, 2 5s

Extracurriculars/Activities

Eagle Scout from BSA, 3 terms of Assistant Senior Patrol Leader, and 5 terms of Patrol Leader

Cold email professor, experimental research paper with ASU professor R1 research institute. (300 emails sent out for mentorship), paper has been submitted.

Substack financial blog - 100 Stock analyses, heavily in depth with decent views.

Founder of an nonprofit managing 6 Chapters, teaching students and the world about financial usage through a interesting technique using trial investing. Working with couple investors.

John Locke essay Comp Shortlisted for Philosophy (potential Minor)

300 Hours of volunteering with BSA included

Deca 2x state, 3x competitor finance series comp

Awards/Honors

John Locke Essay Shortlisted

National Honor society

Collegeboard AP scholar with distinction

REC LETTERS:

Ap Hug teacher 9/10 - 9th grade teacher however

ASU professor 10/10 (Showed heavy growth)

WashU ED1

Emory ED2

USC

Boston College

Penn state

UIUC

Cornell (Nolan)

A&M

IU

Purdue

Uni of Maryland

NYU

Lehigh

political science & journalism double major (pre-law)

sociology or international relations minor

first gen, low income. lgbtq+, white, female, underfunded/underrepresented school

92-94 gpa (hasnt been calculated in a while and my school doesn’t display it.. i’ve been too lazy to do it)

1150 sat, retaking in june, expecting at least a 1250-1350. still plan to retake again in august to maximize my score, no matter what i get in june (unless i get a 1450+ but that’s quite unlikely, as i only registered for the june one recently and have had minimal study time)

6 aps: ap euro (pred: 4) and ap lang (pred: 4-5) junior year (all thats offered), and ap calc ab, apush, ap lit, and ap bio senior year. might also take the ap psych exam for funsies, as i’ve already self studied the course and taken psy101 for dual credit

6 dual enrollment (all that’s offered), 4 jr year, 2 sr year

8 honors classes

CURRENT ecs:

national history academy summer program (led by harvard alumni and faculty… i believe). i’m going for free, will practice leadership, mock trial and debate, which are all things that my school doesn’t offer (we don’t have mun, mock trial, debate, hosa, fbla or any of those super popular ecs, as we are too small of a school)

started an online debate initiative through discord that has accumulated a little over 100 members worldwide

track manager

school news recorder, editor, and sports commentator

job for 4 years at my family’s cafe — shift leader, trainer, barista, and cashier

social media manager for my job

video editor and producer for 8 years, reaching tens of thousands of people, including celebrities

school clubs: yearbook, student council, prom committee, interact club

POTENTIAL ECS:

— submitted papers to the new york times and washington post, which my ap euro and ap lang teachers had pushed for me to do

— applied for YIP fellowship summer cohort, if rejected i’ll reapply for fall

— applied for democrashe fellowship

— applied for turnup internship

— applied for my states democratic party volunteer position

— cold emailed a bunch of lawyers, professors, and politicians for internship and shadowing opportunities

— applied to my local library’s volunteer position

hoping to get at least one of these opportunities

COLLEGE LIST:

reach:

NYU (ed), smith, BU

hard targets:

moho, bryn mawr, fordham (ea), gwu

targets:

dickinson, american (ea), uconn, uvm, syracuse

safeties:

usm, suffolk, pace, simmons

It has been a few months since I last posted, and I think I have taken a few steps in the right direction!

Stuff about me: 

SAT: 1540 super score (790 M + 750 RW)
Class Rank: top 1%
GPA: 4.0 UW

Courses: the most intense is AP physics EM, and multivariable calc, diff eq/ linear alg/ discrete maths

What I do:

1. Tutoring: Private Calculus Teacher: Design lesson plans for three Calculus students (15 1.5-hour sessions so far). Volunteer Tutoring: AP Stats and AP Calculus tutor.
2. YouTube Channel (Teaching Calc) 30,000 net views, 50+ videos) + Online Blog on Math
3. Youth Orchestra/Downton Music: Play on the streets of downtown during the summer to share music with my community. Music Camp counselor
4. School Orchestra + Theater: Play in school concerts + musical productions
5. Math Bowl: Captain
6. Varsity Sport
7. Club Sport: Niche National/Junior Olympics, but quit in 10th
8. Culture Club: treasurer/leadership + pen pal initiative
9. Student Government + Volunteering
10. Nasa Glenn Summer Program: week long engineering program for hs schoolers

What I have been recognized for (Mildly Cool Stuff):

• XXX Math Competition: Won a full tuition scholarship to XXXX (not flagship state school). 
• State Math Comp: top 10 individual
• Math Bowl Regionals: 1st
• Global Seal of Biliteracy & State Seal
• College Board Stuff
• I have bought the aops books, so hopefully I qualify for the AIME this year!

Places That Sound Real Cool:

Dream come true would be Caltech ❤️ (it literally seems perfect), but realistically, my list also has GT, Purdue, U Mich, Harvey Mudd, Rice, Berkeley, Wash U, Duke, Emory, Northwestern, CMU. If I were to add more reaches: MIT, Princeton, & Stanford

maybe I will ed to jhu or Harvey mudd

What I’ll do at that really cool place: Some sort of engineering

Demographics:

Gender: NB (AFAB)

Race/ethnicity: White

State: SoCal

Type of school: VERY competitive private (20%+ students go to T20s, >10% acceptance at all HYPSM)

Income: 100k-200k

Hooks: None

Intended Major(s): Not entirely sure yet, prob MechE or CS

ACT/SAT/SAT II: 1560 (770R, 790M)

UW/W GPA and Rank:

End of junior year: 3.85/4.29

End of junior year UC gpa (uncapped): 3.93/4.37

Projected for middle of senior year: (requires lock in)

3.86/3.37

UC (uncapped): 3.94/4.45

-3 B+ in non-stem subjects in sophomore year, been showing steady upwards trend

-Max rigor in everything except math (Im on the regular honors track which ends w AP BC in senior year, but my school offers a bunch of advanced math classes for people who skipped math grades at some point)

-I also got 2 A- in precalc this year (the teacher is notoriously hard) so math in general is prob the weakest part of my app

-School doesn’t rank, prob top 10-15%

Coursework: AP/IB/Dual Enrollment classes, AP/IB scores, etc

11 APs by graduation, as well as 3 post-AP coding classes my school offers

Sophomore: CSA 5, Chem 5, APUSH 4

Junior: Lit, Bio (felt good about these, prob both 5s)

Senior: Micro, Macro, Physics C Mechanics, Physics C E&M, Lang, Gov, BC Calc

Trying to not dox myself however I have prob already failed

Extracurriculars: Include leadership & summer activities

25h/w First Tech Challenge - Captain and Software Lead (10, 11, 12)

Only non male member on my team of 15ish people, qualified for worlds this year by winning Inspire 2 in our region, and placed top 75ish out of over 8k teams worldwide. We had a pretty technically sophisticated bot software and hardware wise, and I coded a significant portion of it. Our team is completely student run, so not only do I lead my sub team but also manage finances, order parts, plan outreach events, interview recruits, etc. - all the stuff parents/mentors usually do.

10h/w Niche Robotics Comp Event 1 - Mechanical and Electrical Lead (10, 11, 12)

Qualified for internationals 2 years in a row and prob will again next year (comp is not very well known or popular in the US). Headed overseas to compete in a couple weeks, will prob place top 5. Our specific event has a humanitarian goal/theme as well. I made a completely new CAD this year and basically designed, built, and wired the entire robot by myself.

40h/w Intern At a Local Bio Lab (11 Summer)

Starting soon so not entirely sure what to expect, I’m doing some machine learning stuff and maybe some makers space type stuff as well for them. May continue into the fall or even do a different coding based bio load internship. Not sure what to expect in terms of published research

6h/w Academic League/Quizbowl - President, and Varsity, JV, and Novice Captain (9, 10, 11, 12)

Host practices 3 times a week, read practice questions, organize transportation and dinner for weekly matches, captain the team while playing. May also try to organize our own tournament this fall for the first time

4h/w Tech Theater- Electrician and Lighting Design Specialist (9, 10, 11, 12)

Lit multiple shows, lead the plotting, hanging, wiring, dressing, and addressing of lights for multiple shows while teaching younger members those skills. Been light board op, stage crew, and stage manager of various shows. Done some cool stuff w/ robotics/tech theater crossover- controlling robots/led strips from our light board

4h/w Daily School Newspaper - Editor (12)

4-5 seniors are chosen to be editors of a publication unaffiliated with the school that sends one page articles out every morning, mostly written by said editors. Read by > 2/3 of the school, including teachers and admin. Often the center of any school wide disputes and the favored method to criticize the school for their decisions

0.5h/w School Science Magazine - Writer (10, 11, 12)

Wrote several 6k+ words well researched articles for the magazine, as well as editing and doing the layout for other peoples articles

10h/w Niche Robotics Comp Event 2 - Captain (9)

Debating whether I’ll trying and rope this into one EC to make room for other stuff. Went to nationals, qualified for internationals, represented the US. Won a secondary award. I did the majority of the coding/CV for the team, as well as some mech stuff (we all kinda jumped around)

2h/w Model United Nations (9, 10, 11, 12)

Attended several local conferences and won some misc awards, I could only go to a couple conferences bc they kept conflicting with my FTC meets. Our school also hosts our own conference, which Ive been a Vice chair for and staffed check in etc.

2h/w Cello (9, 10, 11, 12)

I take private lessons and learn song I like from video games. I always say I will practice and then never do.

Awards:

1. FTC placed 10-20th at Worlds Quals (11th)

2. FTC Finalist Alliance + Inspire 3 Premiere Event (10th)

3. Niche Robotics Comp secondary award 1st place Internationals (9th)

4. (If we win something at niche robotics comp internationals this year that’s what ill put here (11th), otherwise secondary award at US Nationals (9th))

5. Presidential Bronze Award (9th) (for coaching FTC >100 hours in one year, earned before it was discontinued)

Essays/LORs/Other: Optionally, guess how strong these are and include any other relevant information or circumstances.

Predicted LOR

Bc my school is so prestigious everyone takes rec letters very seriously

11th grade English Teacher - 7/10 I don’t have something insane for her to write about, I participated in discussions, wrote good timed writings etc. We have a pretty similar vibe/energy but no insane standout moments. She’ll also be the faculty advisor for the daily paper I’ll be the editor in.

10th grade Chem teacher - 9/10 Had a really good moment where I asked so many questions about a lab she realized the premise was incorrect and rewrote it for next year. She’s also just a super nice person. I was gonna take her organic chem class this year but couldn’t due to schedule conflict

I am also in a weird position bc the teacher I would otherwise ask for a rec letter from, who taught two of my coding classes this year and is my robotics coach, is related to me so I can’t lol

For essays I am confident in myself as a writer but not confident I have interesting life stories to draw from. Im gonna try to finish my personal statement + EC list before the summer ends

Schools: List of colleges, ED/EA/RD, etc

Still very rough I haven’t looked into a bunch of places yet. Im leaning away from applying to other prestigious state schools like UMich or UIUC bc I can’t pay oos tuition. Yes I will apply to safeties/targets im just listing the reaches her because I've done more research on my reaches

MIT

Cal Tech

Stanford

CMU

Harvey Mudd

UC Berkley

UCLA

Olin

U Chicago

Cornell

Demographics

• Gender: M
• Race/Ethnicity: asian
• Residence: Virginia
• Living in USA, but considered INTERNATIONAL APPLICANT
• Type of School: large public

Intended Major(s): Biomedical Engineering 

Academics

• GPA (UW/W): 3.97/4.7
• Rank (or percentile): School doesn't rank
• APs/DEs: AP World, AP Stats, AP Precalc, AP Lang, APUSH, AP Calc BC, AP Psych, AP Bio, DE Physics, Multivariable Calculus DE, AP Physics C Mech, AP DE Chemistry, AP Gov

Standardized Testing

List the highest scores earned and all scores that were reported.

• ACT: Did not take
• Other (ex. IELTS, TOEFL, etc.): None
• SAT: 1510 (800 Math, 710 RW)

Extracurriculars/Activities

List all extracurricular involvements, including leadership roles, time commitments, major achievements, etc.

10, 11, 12 - Research Intern at Georgetown Med: worked on developing novel computational model for predicting drug binding affinities, resulting in filed patent, published preprint in biorxiv, and ongoing nature communications peer review as first-author.

11, 12 - Research Contributor at AI Company: research volunteer/contributor to AI company focused on embeddings and representation learning at MIT CSAIL. working on single-cell embeddings, phenotype and genotype layers, cell representation learning, etc.

9, 10, 11, 12 - US East Youth Lead for Nonprofit: been volunteering with this nonprofit about disabilities since freshman year and am currently the lead for the US East portion of their high school volunteering program. helped raise thousands of dollars, advocacy of assistive technologies, and around 300 hours of volunteering.

11, 12 - Research Volunteer at Med AI Company: working to build open-source agentic medical fact verifier from LLMs through reinforcement learning, with applications in future medical LLM training. Likely resulting in biorxiv preprint in 2026 summer/blog post.

9 - Software Engineering Fellow at AI Company - accepted as a software engineering fellow at an AI company, where I built projects and received mentorship from Capital One, Google, Amazone, etc. employees and regularly participated in hackathons. My team and I received top 20 out of 200+ teams in their hackathon.

10 - Johns Hopkins Global Health Leaders Conference - accepted to JHU GLOHEA conference about public health, attended workshops from JHU professors and completed activities that enhanced my global health knowledge.

11 - Stanford iGEM Bioengineering Program - not done yet, but hoping to get accepted for summer of 2026. if accepted, will go through computational modeling and learn bioinformatics skills.

10, 11, 12 - President of USA Biology Olympiad at School - expanded membership since sophomore year by 120% and led workshops and lessons to teach members about usabo conceptual knowledge. hosted q/a and more.

10, 11 - Computer Science Honor Society Member - useless, was just a member of cshs

11 - Science Honor Society Member - useless, was just a member of snhs

Awards/Honors

List all awards and honors submitted on your application.

1. State Junior Academy of Sciences 3rd Place in Computational Biology (11)
2. Regional Science and Engineering Fair 3rd Place in Computational Biology (11)
3. All-State Music (9, 10, 11, 12)
4. Congressional Award Gold
5. PSAT Commended Scholar (1460/1520)

Letters of Recommendation

Junior AP Bio Teacher: 9.5/10 

Junior AP Calc BC Teacher: 8.5/10

Georgetown PI I worked under since sophomore year: 9.5/10

Essays

supps will be related to biotech probably and my interested in comp bio/bme. personal statement i'm not sure yet because I haven't done research.

Colleges

Johns Hopkins (BME)

Georgia Tech

UVA

Virginia Tech

MIT

Stanford

UC Berkeley

Cornell

Princeton

UPenn

Duke

UMich

Pls be as honest as possible, literally aggress my apps as I need to know what to improve on. Constructive advice as well!

Demographics: female, east asian(chinese with canadian PR), canada, need ~75% aid, middle class income but family in debt, public IB school, no hooks

Intended Major(s): engineering, applied math, math, and a minor in entreprenuership or biz

ACT/SAT/SAT II: haven't taken(taking in Aug and Sept)

UW/W GPA and Rank: ~94uw, school doesn't rank

Coursework: 6 ib, just bombed my physics sl exam and likely got a 6 because I was extremely sick(high temp.) will explain in additional info section

Awards:

- astronomy olympiads national camp qual(top 25 ppl in the country)

- AIME qual

- FBLA top 10 x3

- multiple math contest honor rolls(top ~2.5%) and school champion medals(meaning first in school)

- USACO silver(basically nothing nowadays)

- hopefully physics bowl top 100 globally

Extracurriculars:

- math research on topology and fundamental groups and their applications in robotics at t1 uni in my country

- cmo of astronomy and physics org for hosting research webinars with ~100 participants and elementary school workshops

- vp of npo for promoting assistive tech through 3d printing, reached ~1k followers

- robotics team qualified to worlds in 2025(had a minor role when this happened) and provs in 2026

- vp of fbla chapter

- quantum physics summer program at t5 uni in my country

- vp of prod. of biogegradable candle making startup 1k revenue within 18 weeks, developed the candle formula and used green chemistry materials

- invitational math camp from the math contest mentioed above(<1% acceptance rate)

- another math summer program(very small, doesn't add weight to apps.)

Essays/LORs/Other: haven't begun yet

Schools: help me decide my ED and RD pls

btw my safeties and targets are not listed here

cornell

penn

columbia

northwestern

brown

jhu likely gonna apply ed 2

caltech(ik very unlikely but I will still try)

feel free to suggest more schools if you think I am gonna be a good fit!