Will I get in??

Noone can predict if you can get in -- Especially to those schools. Harvard once said if I recall correctly that they could fill their class up a few times over with people who never dropped a grade in an exam and had perfect admission score tests, but don't - to make their class a bit more diverse. That's probably true for Princeton and UC too and almost definitely for MIT.

Generally, you'll need to be outstanding, if not for the amount you've done, or something specific you've done (Either very, very pointy, or very, very well rounded, seems to be the general advice) but honestly noone can tell you if you'll get in apart from the admissions officers at the end of December/February/March the year you apply.

Take as many A-Levels as your college allows (Providing you can handle the workload of course; don't overwork yourself!) in sixth form since many of them state that they expect you to take the most trailing courses available and research well in advance what tests and specific requirements you'll need to meet.

Take my advice with a pinch of salt since I haven't been admitted anywhere and I'm waiting on responses but having gone through the process I feel like I can at least weigh in a little; hope it helps!

Good luck to you though!

Thats really helpful. Where did you apply, what were your extra curricular that you did.
I was wondering if learning to code would help my application as it would be another thing that I could do.
Are there any other ECs that I should try to do?
Thanks

I applied to Brown, Colby, Cornell, Harvard, Harvey Mudd, Northwestern, Princeton, Rice, Stanford, Vassar and Yale. I actually applied for Engineering at Rice, but ArtSciences at the rest of them.

My extracurriculars were just what I've done; I hadn't done anything special for the application per se: I just presented myself in an honest light. That said, my biggest one actually took up my primary essay and that was teaching myself to code at 10/11. Since, my ECs have been attending school clubs, making a chess club in my college which has a desolate scene in terms of clubs (We have two comic book clubs, my chess club and a christian club), attending a week-long programming event called Young Rewired State, reading (a lot, including academic books of my own accord), and just generally investing a huge amount of time into studying computer science, since that's long been my passion.

Other ECs I wrote about including making quiet a sizeable sum of money from server administration and entrepreneurship, that I'm partway through making a web business to fill a hole in the market, I volunteer for a few hours every few weeks to teach kids to code in a local bank (I founded the event to do so), program games and played an instrument through Y7-Y10.

So generally I'm quite a spiky computer science applicant -- I've delved into some of the degree level study quite a bit but I also mentioned my passion for mathematics a lot and how they interlink.

That said, teaching yourself to program isn't necessarily going to be a significant positive unless you show them how you're a better person because of it. I think the only reason it helped me is that I've been teaching myself for a long time and have done quite a lot of things with it. A lot of people get taught in year 12/13 so I wouldn't expect it to set you out of the crowd too significantly unless it's something you've very passionate about and are willing to pour in hundreds of hours of work into getting very good at.

I would definitely suggest trying to get some leadership roles sorted out -- They reallllyyyy like those, from what I've heard. That said, I have some scholarship nomination from Cornell's admissions folk and the only leadership things I've done are set up a casual in-college chess club and running the thing where I teach kids to code. It's definitely an unpredictable system; you can never know what they're looking for and at the end of the day it does very much come down to luck of the draw, even for applicants with stellar academic results.

I hope this helped in some way - Feel free to inbox me or keep replying, I'm always willing to help out (If only to procrastinate the computing coursework I have to do for a little longer)

That makes a lot of sense. I think I want to study economics at university and so I was told that starting investing with my own money would be a great way to start to set myself apart from the crowd because I can say I have made x amount of money... Is this the kind of thing that they are looking for??

Relevant ECs are definitely good -- But the most important thing is to do things that make you happy. They don't want drones that worked on things for years just to impress them. They want to see your personality light through the application. If you'd enjoy that it's definitely a good idea!

Thanks. I think that that would be fun because it would earn me a bit of extra cash, get me some experience in that field, and also make my application look good!
Can I ask what kind of SAT score I should be aiming for for the universities that you have applied for? Have you heard back from any??

I am writing to tell you that the college's selection committee, which includes faculty members and deans, was very impressed with your application and has nominated you as a Pauline and Irving Tanner Dean's Scholar
...
Although the Ivy League schools will not officially notify students about admission until early April, it may help you with your planning to know that we are very interested in you. It is quite out of the ordinary for us to mail a letter such as this to an Arts and Sciences applicant; however, we are sending this letter to those who have been nominated as Tanner Dean's Scholars.
...
We hope this advance notice of our high regard for your application will encourage you to learn more about the College of Arts and Sciences at Cornell.

I've had an email from Cornell which says (extracting the relevant bits):



After I emailed them back they replied



So it sounds very promising I think it's basically the closest they can say to "admitted" without breaking the agreement they have with the other ivies not to release decisions before the appointed date.

I had a 33 in my ACT split across 35 in math, 33 in reading and english and 31 in science (The ACTs curve for science marks is awful ) and in my SAT IIs I had 800 in Math II and 760 in Physics. According to the ACT's comparison, my ACT result is effectively equivalent to getting about 1460 in the SAT I.

My ACT wasn't super outstanding but I did it in one take along with all of my AS exams so I think they may have also taken that into account. I sat my SAT IIs twice however; but only because the first time I bubbled on the wrong page (Cue facepalm).

I would strongly aim for very good scores -- Especially for mathematical subjects you'll want 800 or as close to 800 in Math II and another relevant SAT II, since 800 is quite common for Math II.

In terms of SAT I / ACT, most colleges release their 25/75 percentiles for their enrolled student body. I would highly recommend trying to get at or above the 75 for any college you apply to -- That means you'd be one of the best quarter of students if you were admitted so you have a strong competitive edge there. That said, it's not necessary by any means. Plenty of people get admitted with lower! (Ergo up to 75% of them getting admitted with lower!)

I won't hear back with conclusive replies from any until the end of march though.

Thats amazing, well done. I don't know Cornell, is it good?
I have done all of the questions on the college board website and got all of the maths ones right. When I go to the USA in the summer for holiday I may see if I can visit Harvard because it will give me something to aim for as I may be going near anyway.
Would you recommend buying the study guide for the SATs as well?

Hi Guys, I am currently studying for my GCSEs and my predicted grades are:
Maths: A*
Biology:A*
Chemistry:A*
Physics:A*
English Lit:A
English Language:A
Electronics:A*
Geography:A*
Spanish:A
P.E.:A*
I REALLY want to study at Harvard/Princeton/MIT/UChicago etc.etc. and I was wondering what else I would have to do on top of these grades at GCSEs.
For A Level I am doing Maths, Physics, Economics and Geography and am hoping for top grades in these too.
I am going to volunteer at least 2 hours a week all of sixth form, what else can I do and do I have a realistic chance of making it into one of these unis for economics.
Thanks guys

Check out http://www.fulbright.org.uk/

Prepare for the new SAT to be launched in 2016

If you've the financial resources, attend summer school at the Ivy of your choice (you may even earn credits towards your degree)

The majority of students applying to these top colleges will have taken SAT prep-courses offered be e.g. Kaplan either online, in person, or with private one-on-one tutors. A prep book is the absolute minimum you should consider doing, and it is highly recommended to do more.

Well it's in the ivy league so it's at least well known there - it depends what you mean by 'good' though; whether that be reputation or difficulty of academics or what.

I would recommend a study guide -- I found finding SAT II past papers really tough (I think I found one?) and if you're anything like me where you need to see the format of a test or exam before taking it then you'd benefit a lot from getting one with mock papers in it - they're usually very close to the real thing.

In terms of online forums and resources for help, you're better off looking at the US version of TSR, college confidential: www.talk.collegeconfidential.com

There you'll find American students who have gone through, or are going through the process; there are also a number of very helpful posters regarding access to financial aid. People on TSR tend to know very very little about US financial aid policies and process.

Regarding the SAT, you can find a prep courses from Kaplan here. Having used Kaplan for graduate admissions testing (and scoring 99th percentile), I highly recommend them.

No, the SAT and usually SAT II subject tests are for undergraduate admissions.

Graduate testing, just an fyi, is, depending on your subject choice, the GRE, MCAT or LSAT.

Is appears as though you're graduating in 2016? In which case the changes won't apply to you.

If you are graduating in 2017, when you should be waiting to start your preparation anyway. Kaplan will likely have appropriate courses available by then - college board will have released example SAT questions to test prep companies so that students can be best prepared to take the new test.

You should take SATs at the end of summer or beginning of fall during your final year. If you're class of 2017, this means around Aug-Oct 2016. You should start preparing in May or June of 2016 so that the test-taking methods and concepts are fresh in your mind.

You certainly could, though students usually take it earliest around May/June, if I remember correctly. This would give you time for multiple re-sits (though anything beyond two sittings is generally looked at as questionable).

When I was admitted to university, SAT II was not universally required by these elite universities. So, I cannot comment too much.

SAT II tests subject-specific knowledge. I imagine that there are prep books that can give a general guideline as the breadth of information to be tested.