Demographics: Male, White, California (Bay Area), Public School (660 class size), 2 grandparents went to Northwestern

Major: Computer Engineering or EECS if they offered it (MIT and UC Berkeley)

Standardized Testing: 1570 SAT (770 English, 800 Math)

Hooks: In state for UC System, had 2 grandparents that went to Northwestern

Academics

• GPA: 4.68 weighted, 4.0 weighted
• Ranking: School doesn’t rank
• AP’s / Honors (AP’s are bolded with score) - Got 5’s on all but 1 exam (spanish got a 4)
  • English: AP Lang (5), 11 -Honors American Literature, 12
  • Math: Geometry Honors; Algebra 2 Honors; Trig Math Analysis Honors; AP Calc BC
  • Science: Chemistry Honors; AP Physics 1 (5); AP Physics C Mechanics Electricity and Magnetism
  • History: AP European History (5); AP US History (5); 1 AP Gov / AP Macro
  • Language: Spanish 2 Honors; Spanish 3 Honors; AP Spanish Language (4); AP Spanish Literature
  • Computer Science: AP Computer Science A (5); 11 - Advanced Computer Science; Java script course Dual Enrollment at community college

Awards / Distinctions

• AP Scholar with Distinction
• Scholar Athlete Award (for having 4.0 GPA the 1 year I played tennis sophomore year)
• Academic Excellence Award (Nominated by teacher for helping peers in class)
• California Scholarship Federation Participation

Extracurriculars:

• Volunteer Intern (10th/11th/12th): Founding member of part of team that rebuilt system architecture driving floats at local parade and modernized technology at parade
• Marching Band (9th-12th): 80 person band. Am Drum Major this year (highest leadership position in band)
• Unpaid Data-science Research at State University (11th summer) - Didn't publish anything but still created presentation for a school event / set foundation for project to continue in the future
• Avid Tutor (12th): Selected by teacher to be tutor in this class. Help first-gen students with college applications, homework, study skills
• Botball Robotics (9th,11th,12th): Key member of robotics team
• Computer Science Club (11th, 12th): Created a project / idea and lead a team of 5 in the club to complete the project
• Data Science Club (11th): Participated in the club, learned about data science
• Piano Independently (9th - 12th): Have played the piano throughout high school independently (not in a band). Perform in local recitals, publish some pieces to youtube (don't get significant views or anything though)
• School Buddy Volunteering (11th, 12th): Met weekly at lunch with a special needs student and provided them company
• Summer Camps (10th): Participated in business class at Stanford Pre Collegiate Studies, Cal Poly Epic Camp (Arduino / Engineering), AI Camp (AI)
• Tutoring (9th): Tutored underprivileged elementary schoolers over zoom after COVID hit

Essays/LORs/Other:

• Essays: No crazy hooks or anything like that but I think they show some good qualities of mine
• Letters of Rec:
  • English Teacher: she liked me and i did well in her class
  • Math Teacher: was prob top 5 student in her class last year
  • Counselor: Large public school so she doesn't know me well but had me fill out a form about myself so idk, probably mid
  • Adult at my Volunteer Internship: He leads things there and knows me very well, his letter should help give my work there / engineering ability some credibility

Rejections:

• Princeton
• MIT (Deferred then rejected)
• Carnegie Mellon
• UC Berkeley
• University of Washington
• Vanderbilt

Waitlists (please let me know which ones I should consider staying on!):

• Northeastern
• Cal Poly
• UC San Diego
• UC Irvine
• UCLA
• Tufts
• University of Michigan
• Cornell
• Duke
• WashU
• Northwestern

Acceptances

• Oregon State
• RIT
• RPI
• Drexel
• Iowa State
• UC Davis
• San Jose State University
• WPI
• Case Western
• UIUC
• Georgia Tech

Where I plan on committing:

• Georgia Tech

Thoughts:

To be honest, I expected to do better. Given my stats / ecs, it definitely feels like I underperformed / did badly with college admissions (but Georgia Tech definitely saved my results from being awful). Nevertheless, what waitlists do you think I should stay on (considering my major is computer engineering)? Any advice on what I can do to increase my chances of getting off these waitlists? Also, among these schools, do you think committing to Georgia Tech is the right choice? Any thoughts on my admissions results as a whole?

Waitlists I currently plan on staying on ranked by me (schools I would go to over Georgia Tech)

1. Northwestern
2. Michigan
3. Duke
4. Cornell
5. UCLA