Okay so my grades have been relatively good since freshman year, all A’s and B’s my sophomore year both semesters with a 3.5 cumulative GPA. My problem is my anxiety, I’ve been seeing a therapist for 2 years now and it wasn’t until fall of this year that things got REALLY bad. It wasn’t until after first semester that I got medication and a 504 plan, my semester grades had C’s D’s and an F. No one at my school will really help me, I got the 504 plan but that doesn’t save my grades. I really have my heart set on the University of Washington but I’m watching all of my dreams slip away. What can I do to fix anything on my transcripts, and if I can’t fix transcripts what can I do from here on out to help my chances?
Same thing happened to me in my Junior year. It was disastrous. I got a D in precalculus and a C in Statistics. I mentioned my anxiety problems in all of my applications but apparently no one cares. It was clinically diagnosed and I was also seeing a therapist.
I’m a senior now and I just got my ninth college rejection in the mail today. Must be a coincidence – it was from University of Washington. I really hate to break it to you but the one thing I learned is that GPA is the most important factor in admissions. My extracurriculars and test scores were very good, but my GPA suffered because of my anxiety. And colleges couldn’t care less.
It’s important to remember that every year college admissions get tougher and tougher. University of Washington is such a competitive school now, more than it was before.
HOWEVER, you still have a lot of options. I was accepted to Purdue and four other decent schools, but Purdue is most likely where I’ll be going. But you should still apply to UW or any other schools you want to apply to and see what happens. Just do your best from now on. Good luck.
I happen to be in the opposite scenario from you. My freshman and senior year I was dealing with a lot of problems with depression and anxiety which caused me to have very low grades and I spent most of my time visiting therapists and psychiatrist trying to find the help I needed. I finally did and now that i’m in my junior year I’ve been working on my grades and gone from a C/D student to and A/B one. My advice for you is to just take everything one day at a time, you can only do so much and overwhelming yourself just hurts more. Right now I am working with a college admissions counselor outside of my school that my parents have hired, she is aware of my struggles, and a piece of advice from her that you may want to keep in mind is that when you are applying for colleges, don’t mention any struggles you have had with mental health. While it is a significant part of your life, very few colleges would want to accept someone who they don’t know will be stable throughout their years in college. Instead translate your struggle with anxiety or whatever it may be to something like a job. For the time being just try to do the work you can, and try to not fail any classes. In my state you are able to retake classes online and the higher grade of the two is the only one that shows up on your transcript. If that is available for you, you may want to consider it over the summer for your classes with the lowest grades. Also, for next year you may want to try taking easier classes. I went from taking three and four AP classes to only one and it has helped enormously.
Very good suggestions.
I have social anxiety problems, and while my GPA is awful, I think my lack of extracurricular activities will hurt me the most. If your GPA is already suffering, then make sure you have enough EC’s at the very least.
When you apply to colleges, I’m pretty sure that they ask you whether your grades were affected by any exceptional circumstances. I don’t know if anxiety/depression would count, though, but they may.
On the Common App, you can explain the circumstances in the “Additional Info” section. Admissions people told my daughter to make sure she does that (her brother is mentally ill and it’s been really hard on her).
bump No advice here,but I have a friend in the same boat.
I’m in the same situation and I have no idea what to do about it either. All I can do is wish you good luck:/
You can talk to your GC, they may be willing to put a note in their recommendation, especially if with medication & accommodations your grades improve.