<p>I just learned that my school ranks by quartile. (AAST)
At the end of freshman year I had a ~3.7 which isnt bad
but then i screwed up soph year badly cuz of family probs and had a 3.3 for a combined 3.5
At the end of this year I estimate I'll have ~3.9 to give a final avg GPA of 3.6
3.75 is cutoff for first quartile
so this puts me in second quartile (25-50%)</p>
<p>Does this screw up my chance at any competitive engineering school like Cornell, Caltech, Columbia, MIT, Penn?</p>
<p>What would I have to do to get in? I am going to have pretty good recs.</p>
<p>Edit: o yea i forgot to say. my SAT's are going to be around 2300 with phys/chem/mathii at ~800</p>
<p>thats gotta be the worst ranking system ever.</p>
<p>that sucks so hard. Go and complain, because that is just awful. I can understand quintles, deciles, maybe even top 20's at the extreme. But top 25's thats just near insane.</p>
<p>It doesn't matter. If your school ranks by percentiles, you are screwed even more. Top schools rarely accept any under top 10% (~ every 1/10 is under 10% from a school that ranks)</p>
<p>Being in the 3rd percentile (i'm being generous here) will kill any chance you have</p>
<p>the school is very competitive though...
my recs are going to be excellent, sats around 2300
i might make physics or math olympiad on top of that too this year...
o well if i wont get into cornell.. hope i get scholarship to a lower school</p>
<p>i know this kid who had ~C avg who got full scholarship to WUSTL; he was an MOPPER and physics semifinalist</p>
<p>25%-50% is referred to as the third quartile, not the second. Second would be 50%-75%. Is this what you mean, or did your school actually put you in the bottom half?</p>
<p>o sorry if i wasnt being clear..
I am in the top 50% of all students in my grade
meaning my rank would be somwhere between 1-50 in a group of 100 students.
also my school is AAST so I hope colleges will also take that into consideration</p>