Applying to different major at mit

Answered

Your best bet is to apply SCREA on Nov.1 as an undeclared major. Besides your accomplishments in debating, there is nothing on your resume that supports that you were involved in political activism, campaigning, fundraising, or doing behind-the-scenes work for getting people elected into public office. Most people reading your post would consider you a STEM-y applicant vs. a humanities one.

Why should you apply early? I wouldn't apply early because the admit rates are higher because they really aren't. In the last cycle, they only accepted 4.7% SCREA vs. 4.01% for the total pool. For international applicants it was brutal. Only 1.37% were accepted which is 123 students out of 9165. So if you get your SCREA decision in Mid-December can still make various last-minute adjustments on where to apply RD if you don't get in.

Reading what you posted, I and other CV members or CV experts might focus in on some areas that put you at a disadvantage upfront.

1. Your EBRW test score at 700 is on the low end under the 25th percentile. Perhaps you have time to improve your score slightly.

2. Both your UWGPA and WGPA are on the low end as well. Remember that MIT wants as many people to apply as possible because it makes their admit rate go down and allows them to cherry-pick from a huge variety of applicants. Their marketing literature says successful admits have 3.5 GPAS or better but most college advisors or experts will share that their GPA average is +/- 4.17/4.30 Scale so that means nearly all As and A+s.

3. It's great that you self-studied for 5 APs to show course rigor. Kudos to you. Nevertheless at MIT, you will get no college credit for any of them because they discontinued giving math credit for 5s in AP Calc A/B/C and your 4s in the other 3 subjects will not earn any credit either. It does show you applied your intellectual curiosity to learn these subject to a sufficient level. Since MIT is really a very STEMY school all Freshman cohorts have to take all their STEM core like Maths, Physics, etc all over again when they matriculate. It's not that they don't trust that their incoming class is brilliant but they want to mandate a core curriculum like Columbia so everyone speaks the same language and has gone through the same process to earn a degree. You didn't mention whether you earned a certificate in 18.02 1x. Did you?

I will part you with this advice.

1.) Colleges are a business. You may not be what they need in their class that year as a priority so don't take it personally.

2.) Their assessment of you is only relative to their needs to fill a class, not based on your true value as a human or your accomplishments and talents.

3.) They may see a weakness or Achilles heel in your application that you or other colleges see differently or as a net positive.

4.) What is often not published or buried deep in admissions documents is that is it extremely difficult for International students to get accepted into Ivys and Elite colleges. I was able to find the 1.37% admit rate for last year's class but many Ivy's and Elites do not publish their International acceptance rates. I just read a book this week by a former Dartmouth admissions director and she stated that a Dartmouth, it was 2% when their admit rates were hovering around 10%.

5.) Make sure you select your college list carefully and have both Hard Reaches, Reaches, Hard Targets, Targets, and a couple of Safety Schools. All of these should be schools that you actually want to attend and feel you would thrive and be happy at. Attending undergraduate college is only a chapter in your life, not something that is the end all be all, not something that defines you as your potential. I know plenty of successful adults who did not get into their 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th choice schools but made it work for them.

Good luck with your admissions journey.