My kid (CA resident) wants to apply to a school with a good International Relations department and good business department, so that he can major in IR and minor in business/marketing (for practical reason). Can you recommend any school based on your kid's actual experience of attending that particular school? So far, the below is the list my kid and I came up with. My kid's stats are: 3.9 unweighted, 4.3 weighted, 33 ACT (35s in Reading and Writing), 221 SI index score in PSAT (he has a chance at being National Merit Semi Finalist), pretty good scores in SAT II Subjects, AP tests and good to very strong extracurricular activities that are related to IR major. He also speaks two languages fluently and conversant in two other languages. We feel that his strongest asset is his unassuming personality and responsible character. He tells us that he thinks out of around 450 students in his class, he falls among top 30 to 40 but definitely NOT in top 15, academically speaking; he matter of factly says there are many academically smarter kids in his school than himself.
Our attitude is as long as he gets into either UCLA or UC Berkeley (we expect him to get accepted at UCSD and feel like he has as good chance as other applicants to get into UCLA or UC Berkeley), any other acceptance is a bonus and a crap shoot. Honestly, we feel he has as much chance to get into Georgetown as UC Berkeley because it seems to me that UC Berkeley likes to accept out of CA applicants more than CA residents. We just want him to be happy and not care too much about making lots of money, but he has not given up on an idea that he can make lots of money, even though we emphasize that doing what he likes and helping people should be the primary focus.
UCLA
UC Berkeley
UC San Diego
Georgetown
U of Penn Huntsmann Program
Stanford (My kid says he would feel happy if he just gets wait listed because in his opinion Stanford is the toughest school to get accepted)
Brown
Harvard (just so he can say he applied and got rejected from)
Also, any hint on improving his chance of acceptance, such as contacting a professor, would be appreciated. So far, we did visit campuses of UCLA, UC Berkeley, Stanford and Georgetown.
Thanks in advance.
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