I was in your shoes as well, 2350 SATs, 40+ college credits, 4.0 GPA + all the standard extra curricular leadership/community service stuff + a few unique things like being on national radio & tv.
I didn't apply to any Ivy. I thought about MIT but decided not to apply because my brother went to a *IT and for a lot of reasons hated the whole "only guys on campus in engineering degrees" atmosphere.
I'll give you four reasons why a "lesser" school will wind up making you MUCH happier
1) Focus - those schools are not super focused on engineering. You are second fiddle to the business and humanities - always. That applies for all the Ivy's, tufts, amherst, (not sure about mcgill)
2) Legacy - based on the 10 or so people who went from my high school that I knew prior to my college choice, non were happy with their classmates. A lot of the kids who get into ivy are children of alumni, and thus are not as qualified as you are, so your classes are a lot weaker than you would expect.
3) Money - If you can get into one of those schools you can get a full ride at plenty of BETTER technical schools. I got a full ride+, meaning tuition, books, housing, to 5 of the top 20 schools in my major (mechanical engineering), and I only applied to 5.
4 (and most importantly)) If you really are smart and know your stuff. your undergraduate degree does not matter. One of two things will happen to you after college, you will successfully start your own business and your credentials won't matter, or you will get a graduate degree.
It seems to me that you have the list of the north eastern top 10 schools and applied to them without digging deeper into the list of colleges and finding the true engineering gems. Start with US news & world reports rankings for comp eng/comp sci or whatever you want, they are not perfect but they are a good place to start. Then visit them and decide for yourself. Setup private meetings with professors/deans. The group tours done by students are utterly useless. It doesn't matter what the dorms look like or how well manicured the lawns are. Ask if undergraduates are involved in research, what the study abroad programs are like, what areas the school's research focuses on, etc. Specific questions about the program.
For me I had a list of 5 schools that lined up and narrowed them down by program quality, and then focus. For example I liked Penn State's aerospace engineering program, but their focus was on propulsion at the time and I'm not very interested in that. Where as the school I go to now focuses on fuel cells and robotics, both of which interest me. Those are the questions to be asking, not whether people will recognize the name of your school on a resume.
Also I would say that you MUST go to a school on a school day, observing the interactions between students tells you all you need to know about the place. I went to one school over the summer and loved it, and then during the school year people looked so "click"-y I didn't want to go there anymore.
The problem for you is this - transfer students are generally not offered scholarships. So you are a bit late to the party for applying and getting money. I would say nothing is as important as minimizing your college debt if you want to remain flexible to start a company. It might be worth applying scattershot to a bunch of schools before their deadlines and working it out later, or taking a half year off and do something to boost your resume and apply again. Normally I would say transfer but if you have a resume like that, you will get money else where so don't leave that on the table.
Sorry for the rambling but I'm between projects, good luck, email me if you have more questions. Just look back some day and say, the best thing that ever happened to me was getting rejected from the IVYs.
I didn't apply to any Ivy. I thought about MIT but decided not to apply because my brother went to a *IT and for a lot of reasons hated the whole "only guys on campus in engineering degrees" atmosphere.
I'll give you four reasons why a "lesser" school will wind up making you MUCH happier
1) Focus - those schools are not super focused on engineering. You are second fiddle to the business and humanities - always. That applies for all the Ivy's, tufts, amherst, (not sure about mcgill)
2) Legacy - based on the 10 or so people who went from my high school that I knew prior to my college choice, non were happy with their classmates. A lot of the kids who get into ivy are children of alumni, and thus are not as qualified as you are, so your classes are a lot weaker than you would expect.
3) Money - If you can get into one of those schools you can get a full ride at plenty of BETTER technical schools. I got a full ride+, meaning tuition, books, housing, to 5 of the top 20 schools in my major (mechanical engineering), and I only applied to 5.
4 (and most importantly)) If you really are smart and know your stuff. your undergraduate degree does not matter. One of two things will happen to you after college, you will successfully start your own business and your credentials won't matter, or you will get a graduate degree.
It seems to me that you have the list of the north eastern top 10 schools and applied to them without digging deeper into the list of colleges and finding the true engineering gems. Start with US news & world reports rankings for comp eng/comp sci or whatever you want, they are not perfect but they are a good place to start. Then visit them and decide for yourself. Setup private meetings with professors/deans. The group tours done by students are utterly useless. It doesn't matter what the dorms look like or how well manicured the lawns are. Ask if undergraduates are involved in research, what the study abroad programs are like, what areas the school's research focuses on, etc. Specific questions about the program.
For me I had a list of 5 schools that lined up and narrowed them down by program quality, and then focus. For example I liked Penn State's aerospace engineering program, but their focus was on propulsion at the time and I'm not very interested in that. Where as the school I go to now focuses on fuel cells and robotics, both of which interest me. Those are the questions to be asking, not whether people will recognize the name of your school on a resume.
Also I would say that you MUST go to a school on a school day, observing the interactions between students tells you all you need to know about the place. I went to one school over the summer and loved it, and then during the school year people looked so "click"-y I didn't want to go there anymore.
The problem for you is this - transfer students are generally not offered scholarships. So you are a bit late to the party for applying and getting money. I would say nothing is as important as minimizing your college debt if you want to remain flexible to start a company. It might be worth applying scattershot to a bunch of schools before their deadlines and working it out later, or taking a half year off and do something to boost your resume and apply again. Normally I would say transfer but if you have a resume like that, you will get money else where so don't leave that on the table.
Sorry for the rambling but I'm between projects, good luck, email me if you have more questions. Just look back some day and say, the best thing that ever happened to me was getting rejected from the IVYs.