Hi! I’m currently a sophomore in high school and I know I still have a bit of time until college, but I’m getting really paranoid. Can students with average grades get into Colgate?
Here’s a breakdown, by the end of high school, I’ll have:
Freshman year: 4 honors, 1 regular (93 overall average) *unimportant electives
Sophomore year: 2 honors, 2 regular and 1 AP (they forced me to drop into an regular earth science class because they didn’t offer honors) *unimportant electives
Junior Year: 2 honors, 1 regular, 2 APs *electives of college marketing, college accounting & business management
Senior year: 1 honors and 4 APs (taking 2 math courses: Precalc honors and AP stats) *electives of contemporary business SCALE class, DECA
*I always get around a 92-94 overall average (3.9-4.0?)
EC:
Red Cross (secretary, sophomore year) (President senior year)
English Honor Society (secretary senior year)
Science Honor Society
Math Honor Society
Global Honor Society
Business Honor Society
DECA (qualified to states, but could not afford it)
Key Club
(probably will have more board positions)
My dream school is Colgate University, I WILL BE APPLYING EARLY DECISION
I’m Asian and from New York.
I’m aiming to get a 29-31 on the ACT, but who knows what could happen. I know I can get pretty good recommendations and can write a decent essay.
I feel like my class rigor is average (especially having those regular classes) so do I even have a chance at getting accepted into Colgate?
You haven’t even completed sophomore year or provided test scores; nobody can chance this early without a single score. You’re GPA will probably change next year due to APs, so I would ask for a chance midway through junior. Considering you couldn’t afford to go to DECA states, can you afford Colgate? Gotta look at the tuition, not just the school
Go read Cal Newport’s “How to be a High School Superstar”.
It really looks like you’re resume padding, otherwise your course load looks pretty average. You should start studying for your ACT’s then come back and make a new chance thread after you’ve taken them.
It also looks like you have a focus on business and marketing, but I’m not sure. Any way that you could emphasize your main focuses’?
The best way to get into a top college with average grades is to take Cal Newport’s advice. Seriously, read it. Or at least read: http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/02/18/want-to-get-into-harvard-spend-more-time-staring-at-the-clouds-rethinking-the-role-of-extracurricular-activities-in-college-admissions/ .
If you’re aiming for Colgate don’t take more than one of those business electives. First, make sure you have one each of the five core courses, each year -English, math, foreign language, science, social science. Try to have 4-5classes out of 7, each year, that are honors or ap. Try to accelerate to get to calculus -honors or ab- senior year.
Your current plan looks good for Bentley and Bryant.
Business is not seen as “academic”. Colgate will want to see a mostly “academic” schedule, and one “vocational” class is okay, but too many of them weakens the course rigor, which is very important for Colgate and other Top 50 colleges.
Getting to Calculus (+ perhaps doubling up with AP Stats) would be more important.
@MYOS1634 Oh, I’m doubling up on 2 business courses because otherwise, I would have a free/study hall which wouldn’t look as good to colleges. You can only take 3 APs as a junior (I can’t take any science APs until senior year because you need to complete 3 lab sciences) so I’m only taking 2. And yep, for senior year I’m taking: AP Bio, AP Lit, AP Gov and doubling up AP Stats and Pre-Calc honors, along with a business scale class.
Is there nothing else you can take - it’s not possible your HS offers only “business elective” or “study hall”. What about ceramics, art history, photography, broadcast journalism, current events, economics, sociology?
Yes, “free period” wouldn’t be good.
Don’t forget you’ll also need a foreign language, to Level 4 (I’m not seeing it in your schedule but you may have skipped it in your list).
Schools like Colgate and Hamilton, which are very good for economics majors, will be interested in your understanding of the world (world history/European history in addition to APUSH, AP Econ, AP Human Geog if offered, etc.) and math to the highest level you can get to.
If you’re really interested in business, you could take an intro to business class at a local college over the summer.
