u/sophie_royale

Demographics

• Gender: Female
• Race/Ethnicity: Asian (Indian)
• State: CA (Bay)
• School: Competitive, Public
• Grade: Rising Senior
• Intended Major: Cognitive Science
• Hooks: Bisexual (not sure if that counts as a hook though)

Academics

• Rank: top 3% (within top 18 b/c school of 600, would guess between top 10-15), school doesn't rank
• GPA: 3.95UW, 4.5W
• SAT: 1560/1600 (in 1 sitting and also my superscore)
• APs: 4 on French, 5 on World, 4 on Seminar, 5 on Research, 5 on Biology, 5 on APUSH, 5 on Lang, 4 on Calc BC (5 subscore)
  • Almost maxed out the number of APs allowed to be taken at my school, I was allowed to take 2 APs sophomore year (which I did), and allowed to take 6 classes each year and both last year (junior) and this year (senior) I've had 5/6 AP classes and 1 honors class (weighted)

Extracurriculars (kind of vague to avoid doxxing but can provide more detail if needed)

• President of school's Key Club; regional Lt. Governor overseeing 400+ students
• Stanford poli-sci lab research assistant
• Student trustee for school board
• National youth advisory board for online safety
• Stanford-affiliated digital wellbeing education program, was on a panel at a major social media company
• Youth research coalition studying social media & adolescent mental health in collaboration with Department of Public Health; invited to a conference to present with Pinterest (fully paid) and work with other tech companies
• City youth advisory board; advise local government on youth issues
• Community-wide mental health leadership board; organize wellness initiatives & advocacy
• Have also worked with the big 5 social media companies

Programs (main ones I remember)

• ThinkNeuro
• Stanford iGEM Bioengineering Research Program (10% acceptance rate)
• sci-MI Neuroscience
• ASDRP
• Kode With Klossy
• Girls Who Code
• CDC Public Health Academy

Awards (very few)

1. About 4 national/regional/state level journalism awards (fairly impressive I think, not naming specific awards to avoid doxxing)
2. Service awards for 150, then 200 hours in one semester
3. French National Merit gold award Level 3
4. John Locke shortlist (will update in October w/ specific award)
5. A few regional DECA/FBLA awards, not very impressive

Other:

• 2 published papers (one full-length from APR in a good journal that's also in a preprint that put it on Research Gate; the other is a short lit review I wrote during a summer program with some other students)
• Not sure how essays will be, not going great right now but I'm hopeful I can get them all up
• From the Bay Area which kind of freaks me out b/c the competition from there is intense

Schools (only included reaches + targets):

UC Berkeley, UCLA, Northwestern, Rice, Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton (considering REA), Brown (considering ED), Duke, Georgetown, U Michigan, Tufts, WashU, UCSD, UCI, UCD, UCSB, UNC Chapel Hill

Thank you!! I know I'm probably cooked but can't help but hold out hope lol

i've posted this before but im specifically trying to pick between brown ED and princeton REA now pls lmk which you think i have a better shot at

i'm curious about the boost for ED vs REA. i know what both of them are and how they work, but i don't understand why people say only ED gives you a boost and REA doesn't, even when a school's ED acceptance rate is extremely similar to another school's REA acceptance rate (and both are far higher than the RD one).

i know that the acceptance rate for both is greatly inflated because of legacy students and recruited athletes, but what i don't get is why only ED is still considered to have a boost for non-hooked applicants while REA doesn't.

for instance, yale's REA acceptance rate is ~11% and columbia's ED acceptance rate is about 10-14%. using specific data for the class of 2024 (7 years ago because this is the last time princeton released REA data and a lot of other schools also stopped publishing), princeton had an REA acceptance rate of 15.6% and brown an ED acceptance rate of 16.7%. i know a lot has changed in the last 7 years, but i'm just confused as to why ED would give you more of a boost beyond REA when comparing direct acceptance rates.

i also know that ED is binding so it's protecting colleges's yield rate, but once again, the similar acceptance rates should still indicate similar chances and boosts, if any, right?

please help!! i'm so confused

i created a research poster at a summer program last summer and wasn't able to publish it earlier because of issues with contacting the group. i'm trying to publish it now, ideally before college apps are submitted, and was wondering if anyone knows of any like journal-type thing or conference where i can submit the poster to, preferably before oct/nov (early apps + uk) and definitely before january?

i know that not publishing wont be the end of me or anything, but i just put a lot of work into it and was hoping to submit it or present it somewhere, so if you know of any conferences or places to submit posters for high school students that would be great. thank you!!

Demographics

• Gender: Female
• Race/Ethnicity: Asian (Indian)
• State: CA (Bay)
• School: Competitive, Public
• Grade: Rising Senior
• Intended Major: Cognitive Science
• Hooks: Bisexual (not sure if that counts as a hook though)

Academics

• Rank: top 3% (within top 18 b/c school of 600, would guess between top 10-15), school doesn't rank
• GPA: 3.95UW, 4.5W
• SAT: 1560/1600 (in 1 sitting)
• APs: 4 on French, 5 on World, 4 on Seminar, 5 on Research, 5 on Biology, 5 on APUSH, 5 on Lang, 4 on Calc BC (5 subscore)
  • Almost maxed out the number of APs allowed to be taken at my school, I was allowed to take 2 APs sophomore year (which I did), and allowed to take 6 classes each year and both last year (junior) and this year (senior) I've had 5/6 AP classes and 1 honors class (weighted)

Extracurriculars (kind of vague to avoid doxxing but can provide more detail if needed)

• President of school's Key Club; regional Lt. Governor overseeing 400+ students
• Stanford poli-sci lab research assistant
• Student trustee for school board
• National youth advisory board for online safety
• Stanford-affiliated digital wellbeing education program, was on a panel at a big social media company
• Youth research coalition studying social media & adolescent mental health in collaboration with Departmnet of Public Health; invited to a conference hosted by NAMLE to present with Pinterest (fully paid) and work with other tech companies
• City youth advisory board; advise local government on youth issues
• Community-wide mental health leadership board; organize wellness initiatives & advocacy

Programs (main ones I remember)

• ThinkNeuro
• Stanford iGEM Bioengineering Research Program (10% acceptance rate)
• sci-MI Neuroscience
• ASDRP
• Kode With Klossy
• Girls Who Code
• CDC Public Health Academy

Awards (very few)

1. About 4 national/regional/state level journalism awards (fairly impressive I think, not naming specific awards to avoid doxxing)
2. Service awards for 150, then 200 hours in one semester
3. French National Merit gold award Level 3
4. John Locke shortlist (will update in October w/ specific award)
5. A few regional DECA/FBLA awards, not very impressive

Schools (only included reaches + targets):

UC Berkeley, UCLA, Northwestern, Rice, Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton (REA --> dream), Brown, Duke, Georgetown, U Michigan, Tufts, WashU, UCSD, UCI, UCD, UCSB, UNC Chapel Hill

Thank you!! I know I'm probably cooked but can't help but hold out hope lol

im a rising junior aiming to build up awards (currently have basically none) before app season and since im planning on majoring in cog sci, thought this would be a good competition to enter. i was wondering if anyone has done it before and/or knows about how prestigious it is?

although i've registered, i will be traveling during the time of the test, only found out about it on july 1st and registered (the last day to register), and haven't started studying yet (test is on july 11), so i only want to do it if it might actually contribute strongly to my application assuming i do well on it (which i know is a huge assumption considering i havent studied or anything yet, but if it does seem like it will, i'll try to lock in as much as i can beforehand.

if anyone has any recs for other psych/cog sci/neuro competitions i can submit to and receive results for by the RD deadline that would be great also. thank you!

i'm not sure whether it's better to ED to brown or REA to princeton. i definitely liked princeton more (my dream school, 1st choice, didnt use to be until i just visited and realized how much i liked it) but i know that REAing doesn't give you the same boost as ED does, and i liked brown plenty too.

i come from a very very competitive public hs and rank in the top 9% (dont have a ranking bc school doesnt publish), asian, female, have a 3.9 uw gpa and a 4.4 w gpa. no awards, lots of APs (waiting on scores), ecs are mid but have been invited to conferences + presentations for big name companies. no passion project/business/nonprofit as of now. i 100% know that these schools are extremely high reach and i have no delusions about getting in, but i just want to know what your advice would be on which to do. thanks!

i know there's been a lot of posts about this but i just logged into my portal and saw that it now says the interview opens june 30th instead of june 26th, with the same deadline of july 5th. i didn't receive an email regarding the interview yet, but does anyone know if everyone gets an interview and what it is about? ive heard conflicting things about it being for everyone, only for shortlisters, and only for suspected AI users. i'm a little worried about why my date opening changed today. thank you!!

I know this has been discussed a ton but I was wondering what the interview is about/how it works? It showed up in my portal after receiving parental consent but I didn't get any more info about it and I was wondering if 1) everyone gets an interview, 2) what the interview is about, 3) just how the interview works in general, and 4) if the interview impacts shortlist/prize decisions. Thank you!

any tips on cutting down college lists? i have way too many schools on my list and while i've researched college size, location, etc, its hard to find honest reviews of what the school is actually LIKE (social life, environment, academics, what the people are like, what the teachers are like). if anyone has any tips on cutting down a list please let me know! would really appreciate it

im a rising senior and i feel so much pressure to come up w a passion project. for context my major is cog sci, if you have any ideas please lmk!! currently my top idea is creating an app of some sort but im not a very strong coder so im looking for alternatives. thank you so so much!

does anyone know if theres still any hope of getting off the sra waitlist? im really hopeful but i also know that it might be time to let go. if anyone got off the waitlist recently please lmk!! im so worried

i'm trying to get a paper published i wrote on a psych topic and i want it to be published by october. i've narrowed it down to a couple of research journals that match all of my criteria (accept psych, not many changes required, will definitely be published by october), but i need help deciding which of these to submit to based on prestige + other factors (for instance, does a DOI matter?) please help!

• Critical Debates in Humanities Science and Global Justice (lower acceptance rate so somewhat worried about not getting accepted; seems to have cleaner look than some of the other options though, also accepts undergrads i think, no DOI)
• National High School Journal of Science (high acceptance rate, slightly more well-known, need to make 4 more figures but i have a plan, only high school students, more direct science than psych, no DOI)
• American Journal of Student Research (not sure about acceptance rate, accepts college students too, provides DOI, most expensive of options b/c $500 if accepted)

some other ones that also match my criteria but i removed because they didn't seem as good to me:

• Journal of Research High School
• The Schola
• Journal of Secondary Psychological Studies

please let me know if you have experience with publishing in any of these journals or any thoughts you might have! also any journal recs that accept psych + high school students + will 100% be published by october would be great. thank you again!

for anyone still on the sra waitlist, did you receive an email asking if you would still like to remain on the waitlist? and if you did, did it let you submit it multiple times? i'm concerned because i submitted my response but it still let me resubmit the survey and didn't close or provide me with a "you've already responded" message when trying to resubmit unlike the first survey which asked if you wanted to be placed on the waitlist at all. please let me know if you've also had the same experience or not. thank you!

for context, i am a current junior and i go to a super competitive public hs. i have all As and maxed out possible APs + honors, 1560 sat, and great extracurriculars. however i got 2 Bs last semester due to illness + family issues. i also currently dont have a summer program but have an internship + on the waitlist for one, however, i had some great ones last summer. will having 2 Bs completely ruin my chances? planning on applying to yale, princeton, columbia, brown, and maybe harvard at the moment. thank you!

i know that colleges get a list of the course names to know what classes were available to you when you apply, but do they also see the class descriptions?

im deciding between AP CS A and Adv Comp Sci-H at my school, and i was initially not taking AP since its hard to get an A in at my school, but im going to be mostly applying early. however AP CS A focuses on Java and Adv Comp Sci-H on python, which is another reason why im sticking with Adv Comp Sci-H for now, but i wasn't sure if colleges would even see the description + know i took it for the python skills or if they would just think that im taking a less rigorous course load. thank you!

im waitlisted for track 6 and really hoping i get in does anyone know what the chances are for getting off the waitlist? also did anyone who is waitlisted send a LOCI or contact admissions (and if so did you get in)? manifesting 🤞