

Help me break in to Carnegie Mellon - reddog9287
http://www.iwanttogotocarnegiemellon.com

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jwise0
You probably stand a pretty good chance, depending on your in-school
performance. But, here are some things to consider (from a CMU alum) --

You probably were the most "with it" person at your high school. When you
arrive at CMU, this will not be true -- not by any factor of your own, but
because there will be many folks with a _huge_ diversity of experiences. There
will be people who have done what you have. There will be people who haven't,
but have done something else just as cool. There will be people who haven't
done either, and will power their way through the curriculum anyway, taking
every opportunity to learn new stuff on the side.

Be ready for that, because it'll be a big hit to take. (For me, it sure was.)

But, the other side of it is this: absence or presence of past experience, in
a structured class environment, need not necessarily be a predictor of
academic performance. There is all the reason in the world to bring in a
diverse assortment of people from wide backgrounds. You have a very strong
classical "rounded high school" background, to be sure; but, make sure you
understand also that there is much more out there than the classic rounding-
out of extra-curriculars! There is a whole wide world about us.

Either way, your site is certainly interesting. I'm not sure how much it will
influence our dear admissions department, but best of luck to you!

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reddog9287
Thanks for your advice! I will keep that all in mind :)

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btgeekboy
I apologize if this is harsh, but here's what I see.

Start by moving the first section's text up higher, so it doesn't start
obscured by the background.

Then, remove the annoying JavaScript from the downvote button that prevents
you from clicking it. (You might also consider not using Facebook's thumb icon
for this.)

Finally, reconsider why you want to attend CMU. "Code" is what 1st year
students learn. Computer Science is what 2nd, 3rd, and 4th year students
study. You've not told us how you will benefit CMU, or how attending CMU will
improve you, but that you can write code. Good for you (sincerely) - but
that's not what a Computer Science education is all about. You want to learn
CS, but why? What are your goals?

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tom_bob
Let's be honest, how many of us really understood what Computer Science @ CMU
was before 15-251 ;)

Coding is the reason I was interested in Computer Science and I also happened
to like what Computer Science was after diving into the major. It's totally
fine for a high schooler to have this view, I think we forget what high school
us really looked like back then. It's almost impossible for most high
schoolers to understand all of the theory and mathematics that comes with the
major.

From a current CMU student, best of luck to you Alex!

~~~
reddog9287
Thanks very much!

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reddog9287
So I noticed that some people figured out that I didn't secure the voting very
well. Haha, I guess going forward I'll use a csp and lock it down to one vote
per ip

~~~
reddog9287
Finally got some time to secure this and voting is accurate now!

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woodenstick
This is really, really impressive. From a current CMU SCS student (who also
went to crazy lengths to get in here!), I hope to hell you are accepted!

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reddog9287
Thank you very much!!

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woodenstick
Did you apply ED to CMU last November?

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reddog9287
Nope, this is my first time applying to the school

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the-swa
Imagine a future where college acceptance is decided by the internets... and
how happy all of the cats will be in that future.

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sakp
Good start but you should start learning how to prevent someone flooding your
site.

~~~
reddog9287
Yeah, I'm more of a frontend developer, and I have just started very recently
getting into a little backend so I'm sure I'll learn this with time, thanks
for your response!!

