<p>Hi, I'm a high school Senior and I'm not in or out of college yet. I just want to come here and ask people whether or not graduate school admission commitees will feel the prestige of the schools as if students are coming from elite colleges with a 3.75+ GPA compared to someone from a SUNY with a 3.75+ GPA. I have a bad feeling that I will end up in a SUNY and graduate from a SUNY. But my goal is to go to a very competitive graduate school (Boston College, UPenn, Notre Dame, or GWU). I was wondering if the less competitive school in a state with less opportunties offered than those at elite colleges will be weighed heavily when applying to those (listed-elite) graduate schools? (Usually, I think that the State students are wait-listed more than someone coming from Top 50 Universities from the US Rankings even though you qualified very well from a State College).</p>
<p>Just do as well as you can at whichever college you can get into. GPA is a major deciding factor in graduate admissions and they want to see high grades. You are correct in thinking that a 3.75 from an elite, prestigious college will give you a better shot at graduate school than a 3.75 from a state school. That is because it is harder to get into those elite schools and harder to maintain high grades as opposed to easier state schools. However, if you feel you’d have a better chance at making high grades at a state school, you might want to consider just going there because a 3.75 from a SUNY school will help you more than a 2.75 from an elite school. Why do you feel you’ll end up at a SUNY school? If you have low high school grades just get into the best school you can and start making it count from day 1 so graduate schools will look at you favorably. Good luck!</p>
<p>Well, I’ve already understood that a high GPA at State school is definately better than a mediocre GPA at an elite school. Because I already know that if there’s alot of 3.6ers from top schools applying to graduate school and some SUNYs with a 3.75ers, that may actually lower my advantage of getting in since people care so much about “images.”
I’m just usually a very lazy kid to work for a high GPA and SAT scores. I don’t like HS that much so I don’t really use my full potential.</p>
<p>You have a long time before you need to consider which graduate schools to apply to and so on. Just focus on getting into the best college that you can (highest ranked, best known programs etc.) and if you get great grades that will give you the highest chance you can have of getting into a graduate program. Admissions vary by program but are intensely competitive, so there is no room for laziness. You will have to find motivation and start getting As from beginning to end.</p>
<p>I won’t be getting into a high ranked college due to my grades and I said that I would end up in a State school for my undergraduate career. I’ll definately look foward for an honors degree and high GPA for graduation. But I’m just trying to compare the prestige schools of which students are coming from, and it will be in the grad school adcoms eyes.</p>
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<p>End that now. </p>
<p>If you don’t learn to work while in high school, you will be crushed by college, especially your first year. Yes, you can get into a good grad school from a SUNY with a 3.5 GPA, provided that you do everything else right. However, you cannot afford to be lazy. </p>
<p>BTW, GPA isn’t everything when it comes to applying to grad schools. Read some of these threads, particularly Graduate Admissions 101, to see what it entails.</p>
<p>Ditto, if you’re generally a lazy student, you’re not going to do well. Break the habit when you can otherwise it’ll become much more difficult to do so later.</p>
<p>If you haven’t taken a rigorous courseload in HS, you’re going to find college quite challenging in terms of maintaining a high GPA. Unless it’s Basketweaving.</p>
<p>So I visited the graduate 101 admission forums about the “prestige institution.” So I’m going to suppose that SUNY kid vs Columbia kid applying to a graduate school later on, which “prestige of the undergraduate college” will not be that important?</p>
<p>When two students are equal, the one that went to the prestigious university usually wins; however, students are rarely equal. </p>
<p>Get to college and take advantage of the educational opportunities. Have fun, but not at the expense of your work. Cultivate working relationships with professors. Get involved with research/scholarship in your department and elsewhere over the summer, if possible. If you do everything right, you will do well. Will you get into those schools? No one can answer, not even four years from now.</p>
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<p>I’m going to echo Momwaitingfornew. If you can’t manage a high school workload because you can’t be bothered, you will sink fast in college. I skated through high school and then got slammed my first year in college because suddenly I had to actually study for classes and I didn’t know how. I had to learn how to study and budget my time on top of being thrown into college level classes. And believe me, there is a huge difference from high school classes and college classes.</p>
<p>Your concerns about the prestige level of your undergraduate institute will seem insignificant if you don’t have a decent GPA. Use this last bit of high school to learn good study techniques and habits.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t write things off just yet Eagle, I was fairly lazy in secondary (high) school but got through with good grades. However, once I went to college, I just didn’t want to be lazy (I picked a double major, both of which I found extremely interesting) and my marks soared.</p>
<p>Ensuring you choose a program you actually like is a good antidote for laziness.</p>