Greg

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Greg’s Story

Greg spent much of high school being super focused on the things he loves: robotics, coding, and ancillary activities related to each. In my work with Greg, I learned that he likes to focus on one thing at a time, in addition to his school work. For the most part that was robotics. But when COVID hit and robotics activities stopped, Greg turned his attention to a different burgeoning interest: film photography.

My work with Greg involved exploring possible colleges and broadening his scope of activities. We developed a strong list of colleges for him to explore and apply to, ranging in chance of admission. At the top of his list was Carnegie Mellon.

During his junior year, we explored possible summertime activities. In addition to ongoing pursuit of photography, we found a summer program at Carnegie Mellon that was all about his academic interests:  Computer and Electrical Engineering. This full-credit college class took a lot of his time and effort. And he loved every minute of it. Summer classes mostly do NOT have an influence on admission to that same college, but I think doing very well in that class, and really engaging with the material, helped his admission results.

In between his summer class, Greg worked hard on his personal statement essay. Greg fought through mental blocks and some procrastination, and with the help of his family setting up specific time at home to work on the essay, he came up with a good personal statement. Greg’s supplemental essay for Carnegie Mellon talked about his initial love of radios and current experience with programming.

While Greg’s college list consisted of the bare minimum 6 or 7 colleges, as the process carried forward, Greg realized that Carnegie Mellon was really his top choice. Greg converted his approach to apply via their binding Early Decision process, and he was accepted!

Student Facts

Interests and Extracurriculars

Robotics Club, Photography, Web Development

Academics and Tests

Excellent but not perfect grades.  Excellent but not perfect test scores. Rigorous classes.

Descriptors

Data-driven Strategic Thinker, Numerical Code Breaker, Number Analyzer, Three-dimensional Thinker, Investigative, Solution Oriented, Logical, Brainstormer, Sequential Thinker

Perfect-Fit College List

Carnegie Mellon, MIT, UC Berkeley, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, CU Boulder, and others.

Outcome

Accepted under binding early decision to Carnegie Mellon University. Per the binding agreement, Greg withdrew his other applications.

 

Note: This is a description of an actual student-client of Bell College Consulting.  All aspects are real and accurate; however, the name and photo have been changed to protect the student’s privacy. The photo is used by permission from Philip Wang’s page at https://www.thispersondoesnotexist.com and uses the underlying algorithm created by Nvidia.