College Advice for Younger Olympians

[Paradox21]

I was eager to leave Minnesota

Why would you ever want to leave this wonderful place? I mean, it's not like we have snow in April or anything that drastic.

Oh, obviously that would NEVER happen... Sorry, but I like wearing shorts.

Sorry but wanting to wear shorts is not a valid reason to leave Minnesota.

[caseyotis]

Sorry but wanting to wear shorts is not a valid reason to leave Minnesota.

I'll say it is

I know my desired major might change, but at this point, I'm pretty sure it'll say in the realm of either veterinary medicine or English (or maybe education, if I decide to follow that dream of being an ELA teacher).

[quizbowl]

If you're not having fun doing the college apps, you're not going to have fun at said college.

[rant]

I think this entire conversation is pretentious.

[/rant]

[Kokonilly]

Sorry but wanting to wear shorts is not a valid reason to leave Minnesota.

If you're not having fun doing the college apps, you're not going to have fun at said college.

lolwut

I think this entire conversation is pretentious.

[insert joke about a UChicago student saying this]

[Infinity Flat]

I think this entire conversation is pretentious.

[insert joke about a UChicago student saying this]

Pretentiousness is a social construct.

[RandomPerson]

There are plenty of good schools that are far less expensive though. Depending on where you live, your state university might have a very good program in your field. I can't speak for all majors, but for engineering, there's many states with top-ranked programs, as well as many states with good programs that may not be at the top of the rankings.

THIS

I'm going to my state school right now, and while it may not have the big name of other schools *cought*Stanford*cough*, the chemical engineering program here is top notch, which is mainly the reason I'm coming here. Not to mention cost is great as well. A good number of my professors actually went there for grad school btw.

When I was looking at schools, I met with the undergrad adviser of the ChemE program here, and asked him about the rankings on US News and World Report, and he basically said for most engineering rankings (and maybe all rankings), if you're in the top 5-7 range of the ranking, the programs are pretty much all the same in terms of academic rigor and excellence. So for example, me going to the U (of Minnesota, for those who are unfamiliar with MN jargon), despite the fact that it isn't the top Big Ten school, because I'm in the ChemE program, I'm pretty much in a program that rivals those of Berkeley, Stanford, etc., at a much discounted price. So definitely don't count out your state school. You might find a hidden gem.

Also, I really wished I did more during my summers. I did pretty much nothing Freshman and Sophomore year, although partially this was because my family went back to Asia both years. Junior year, I ended up helping out in a ChemE lab, which may not have impacted my college applications, but it definitely helped me get an "in" at the U, as now I'm working in the same lab. But find something worthwhile to do during the summers that you enjoy.

Sidenote: I never studied vocab for the SAT. Still got a half-decent score.

Yeah, I'm a bit jelly of you/Minnesota. Our public schools in New York aren't really outstanding for engineering the way that state flagships elsewhere are. (Sure University of Buffalo, Stony Brook, and Binghampton are decent, but they're not proper flagships).

I'm a ChemE as well at Tufts University. Our ChemE department is unranked and our over engineering department isn't ranked well. lolrankings. I'm pretty sure rankings for engineering are based on the university's graduate school, not undergrad. And tufts doesn't focus on graduate engineering at all. So I'm not concerned.

Hopefully I'll make it into a good grad school .

[2Melt4]

Did everyone that applied ED or EA have their other applications ready to go in the event you did not get in or did you wait?

[lumosityfan]

Did everyone that applied ED or EA have their other applications ready to go in the event you did not get in or did you wait?

Even though I haven't gotten results back from ED or EA, what I'm doing is doing the majority of the applications for the other schools but then putting them on hold. But - I'm not submitting the applications until I know for certain whether I got into ED or EA.

[Unome]

This needs to be brought back.

Should I include event supervising experience for Activities on the Common App? Should I separate different parts of Science Olympiad? (e.g. competing, tournament organizing, etc.)

[maxxxxx]

This needs to be brought back.

Should I include event supervising experience for Activities on the Common App? Should I separate different parts of Science Olympiad? (e.g. competing, tournament organizing, etc.)

Since you really don't get enough space on the CommonApp to include that you might want to make it separate and do your best to differentiate it from competing(like, make it look like a completely separate activity). Colleges know that people are going to try to buff up their activities so you need to make sure they are very distinctly different so it doesn't just get brushed aside as something unimportant.