Absolute bare minumum GPA for acceptance

<p>@Paul13375,</p>

<p>Only a short while ago, you seemed fairly gung-ho to begin the new school year and face up to the challenge of turning your grades around and becoming an excellent student. Now you seem to be suggesting that perhaps you don’t want to travel down that path, that you have three days to make up your mind whether to focus on academics (and football) or not.</p>

<p>Sounds like you’re giving up.</p>

<p>I gave you the reasons why a liberal arts education is worthwhile. But if it’s only just about the money, or the status, or the power, fame, glitz or glory, then maybe college isn’t for you. Go to technical school, get a skill or a trade, and go from there. A 2.6 GPA should serve you reasonably well in such a pursuit.</p>

<p>^ Not really, I am simply weighting all of the choices that I have. Right now I’m on the Harvard path, however I just decided to react to some post right after yours. If I am going to give up, wait 4 days until the first projects start to roll in. Asking a bunch of questions is not giving up, I call it intelligence gathering. </p>

<p>Really the only other concern that I have (as most advice is negative ofc like always, except yours notjoe and gibby, and everyone else who is trying to help), is whether Harvard truly is worth all the hard work, which many folks tell me that it is, so I guess I have my cards laid out for me.</p>

<p>Posters, mind if we start talking about plans, rather than making each post a bashing contest. Let’s start with a good turnaround, you experienced adults can then give me advice on steps I need to be doing, as it’s going to be a fun journey.</p>

<p>P.S, notjoe you went to Harvard, honest question, will it be worth it to bust my you know working to get there? Will I find what I seek in this college. Oh, and are the nerdy girls cute over there…</p>

<p>Look - if your situation is real - that is, if you have some kind of “projects” lined up that would be the start of a business for you - f’ high school and get started. You can always get your GED. If you are 16 or over, you don’t have to school, and if you are younger, tell the HS you are homeschooling until you make your mint.</p>

<p>You do realize that if you are going to be CEO of a company right away, that two years of business experience plus a GED would be more likely to get you into Harvard.</p>

<p>Nerdy girls don’t go to Harvard. Nerd girls go to MIT. </p>

<p>Interesting proposal, I will be off for today, I’ll comment on any other posts first thing tomorrow.</p>

<p>@Paul13375,</p>

<p>To clarify, I didn’t go to Harvard. Both my sons are there.</p>

<p>@Paul13375, If you decide to the start-up route, how are you going to finance your venture? If you are unable to attend college unless you receive full financial aid, where will you get the funds to start a business?</p>

<p>I wonder if you could tell us a little about your background. Perhaps if we knew a title more about you, we could understand why you have this burning desire to be a CEO.</p>

<p>Well my background is nothing to important. I always loved to make an impact, burn my name in the books of history has always been a goal. I always wanted to be a scientist, however as I got older I learned that in order to get the funding required to innovate, I had to butter up to a corporation or something above me. I hated being commanded, it has got me into a lot of trouble in school with teachers thinking I am undisciplined etc. I say I just don’t like being lead by you. Therefore my goal is to have a huge organization that rivals the likes of Rockefeller and Carnegie, and have my own group of people that I can change the world with.</p>

<p>I also have many ideas for improving the state of my current country, and I hope to implement them as soon as I can run before any problem arises that we can’t fix. I also absolutely hate my current school system, with teachers telling and brainwashing us students that if you do not go to college, you will be a worthless person (impression we get). So I also want to work hard these next 2 years, as I had around 67 teachers tell me that I won’t make it to Harvard, so of course I’ve got to prove them wrong, and if that does not work out, tell guidance that 200,000+ with 10 years of college is not the maximum you can make. It can go a lot higher, 1,000,000,000+ is more like it :D.</p>

<p>@Paul13375,</p>

<p>I think that @Falcon1’s question was, how are you going to fund your start-up business[es]? If you don’t have the funds to pay much for college, or to fund your own science research, what funds will you use to get your start-up off the ground?</p>

<p>^^ Yup, exactly. I was also trying to gain some insight into what kind of environment/upbringing OP came from but I guess that was more because I feel this need to try to understand everything he’s posted from a persecutive of his background. However, I guess it’s really not my business to figure him out. We’re all just here to give whatever helpful guidance we can.</p>

<p>@Paul13375 Good luck with everything. Realistically, from everything you’ve posted about your academics, so far you are not a viable candidate for Harvard. I’ll have to take it at your word that you are a superstar recruitable D1 athlete, so perhaps if you can bring your GPA up quite a bit and have terrific test scores, you’ll have a shot at getting in (sounds like you’ll have a problem with your recs though). The last thing I’ll say is that Harvard won’t give you anything that you don’t already possess (talent, drive, intelligence, work ethic, honesty, integrity, etc.). If you possess these qualities, you can be successful after attending just about any college. I wouldn’t forego the chance to attend college (not just for the education but also for all the wonderful experiences and life lessons that college has to offer) just to try to start a business and become a CEO/mogul. You do realize how impossibly long the odds of you doing that are without any money and a college degree right? </p>

<p>“perspective” not “persecutive”</p>

<p>I haven’t been around in a while but I thought I’d pop in to see if anyone needed any concrete suggestions for living in Cambridge as I live in the area (my son has now been away from Harvard for over 3 years). I have leafed through this thread, and basically, OP, my suggestion is that you get off of CC for at least a year, pay attention to your schoolwork, try to be a little bit zen by living in the moment (or at least in the same year that you’re in), and be a 15-year-old!!! Uggh. You will have to dedicate a large portion of your time with college insanity in your junior and senior years; don’t ruin your sophomore year with college worries and woes!</p>

<p>paul13375 if you have any chance of getting into Harvard then Harvard is no longer Harvard.
My son who probably does have the stats grade and ACT wise couldn’t get in. </p>

<p>“So posters, our debate will be to see where this ambitious 15 year old is going to end up, Harvard, or leading a large group of employees at age 18”
I’m betting that the large group of employees that he will be leading at the ripe age of 18 will be McDonald employees. I’m also betting that his posting is a joke that we are all playing a part in.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I’m afraid if you read through all of his past posts you will see that he is completely serious. Speaking of which, I just read over his thread about getting a LL from Harvard. The fact that he got two D’s freshman year and only had a total of 6 minutes of playing time on the football field (yet is talking about being recruited) makes me believe that he is, unfortunately, totally delusional. </p>

<p>Because of it’s name, does Harvard receive a disproportionate number of applications from students like Paul?</p>

<p>I wonder how many? For a qualified applicant, it would be interesting to know.</p>

<p>^^ Probably not, most applicants are not so oblivious to the admissions statistics and whether they are competitive or not. With something like 36,000 high schools, that means there are 72,000 valedictorians and salutatorians alone (give or take 10,000). There are plenty of qualified applicants both nationally and internationally to reach the total of 35,000 that Harvard receives.</p>

<p>Of course, there are probably a few kids who throw in an application as a flier but they would have to be willing to waste both the money and the time of writing Harvard’s supplements and they would not likely be applying early because it would limit them from applying early to other schools where they are more competitive.</p>

<p>I did know someone from my child’s class who applied to Harvard. She had a 28 on the ACT, close to a 4.0 and she and her parents really thought she had a chance. She obviously got a rejection letter and another one from our state flagship U of Michigan and she is now attending Central Michigan.<br>
So I think that chances for viable candidates are a bit higher than 5% but it’s anyone’s guess as to what that stat really is for them.</p>

<p>@riverbirch,</p>

<p>At least up until now, the young fellow who started this thread has been counting on being recruited as a football player, and thus is relying on the overall lower academic standards to which athletes are held. The difficulty is that although as a group, recruited athletes at Harvard have lower test scores and grades than their non-athlete peers, they’re still a fairly smart bunch, individually and overall.</p>

<p>My sons’ high school regularly sends recruited athletes to Division I schools, and most years, a student or two to an Ivy or two as a recruited athlete. Although these kids aren’t at the top of their classes, they’re still darned smart kids with high GPAs and darned good test scores. I can think of two young men from my younger son’s class (which graduated this past May) entering their freshmen year at Ivies as recruited athletes. These are not kids with 2.6 GPAs. In fact, both finished their high school careers on the school’s list for highest honors for GPA.</p>

<p>Paul needs to be worried about starting on varsity in high school. Highly likely he will be on the sidelines unless his school is so small that everyone plays.
I don’t even know why I ended up on Harvard’s forum…boredom I guess. Somewhat entertaining in a disturbing way.</p>

<p>I’m still not sure if Paul is an exceptional ■■■■■, or an incredibly ignorant teenager.</p>