<p>I am currently a junior - and I have a 3.56 GPA (unweighted; 4.04 weighted) right now. I am also in the IB program....I had a rough sophomore year so my grades dropped terribly. I believe I have challenged myself for the most part with IB classes and extra APs and such. I'm very worried about my GPA. I feel like no college will accept me - considering I really wanted to go a great college like Duke or at least in state colleges (and get a good scholarship). Is it possible that I can bring my GPA up to 3.8 by the end of this year or college applying time? I will take extra classes over the summer and possibly dual enroll (summertime). I just want to redeem myself, get a good GPA and I want to get a good scholarship to a worthy school!</p>
<p>P.S. If anyone has other tips, or advice, please let me know (you can PM more details too!)</p>
<p>First of all, a 3.56 GPA is not bad. Sure, you’re not going to get into an Ivy League with a 3.56. But who ever said you had to go to an Ivy League to be successful? I have a 3.44 unweighted (probably less when you take my core curriculum unweighted), but I’m not letting it hold me back. I’m trying to get into the best college I can realistically get into for my undergraduate degree. From there, I plan on going to a top university for my masters and PhD degrees. No one ever said you had to start at Columbia or Brown or Vanderbilt to be successful. Lots of people stay only within the state schools for their entire education experience and still are successful.</p>
<p>What I’m trying to say is that you can never give up. My junior year grades were significantly higher than my sophomore year grades,and brought my cumulative up a whole point. I don’t think you can get it all the way up to a 3.8 by the end of junior year, but you don’t need to. There are still a ton of good schools that will accept you, and I’m not just talking about schools that people say are good but aren’t really. I’m talking quality. Ever heard of the “Ivy-reject” schools? Those are a great place to look as they offer quality education with a competitive environment and still have the notoriety of a big-time school like UPenn or Princeton.</p>
<p>I wish you the best of luck! If it makes a difference, I’m checking out University of Rochester (my first choice), Purdue, and Case Western as my main three colleges. Those are all highly regarded schools that you can achieve so much at. PM me if you have any more questions/concerns.</p>
<p>That’s true, I guess it’s better to start off with somewhere that’ll either pay you more or generally costs less and then spend more money for masters. Do you know which GPA state colleges particularly look at (weighted/unweighted)?</p>
<p>What’s your state (to give you an idea of what state colleges look at, we need to know the state)
Duke is unlikely but what do you like about Duke? There are lots of qualities shared by many universities, so that we’d list enough similar schools you’d have a pretty good array of choices.
3.56 isn’t bad and the IB curriculum/rigor will help you. </p>
<p>Florida! And I haven’t been to Duke, but it looks very pretty, and is regarded as a good school. I’d like to go to a school with value, but I guess going to a state college then working hard to go to a prestigious school for med (hopefully) is also a good option. I just want to raise my GPA to satisfy myself. </p>
<p>Hm, there are hundreds (literally) of very pretty college campuses where academics are strong.
With that GPA, you should be aiming for FSU/UCF; UMiami would likely be possible too (similar to Duke), as well as American and Tulane, SLU as a safety. Other options farther away but with basketball (you didn’t mention basketball but some people like that at Duke) would be Creighton, Gonzaga, Butler. Run the net price calculators on those and talk about the results with your parents.</p>
