<p>This is something I posted earlier in CC. Here are the drastic improvements I have made :).</p>
<p>Hello, I'm a Freshman going into my Sophomore year. I go to a competitive public school, I had a rough semester of Freshman year and have since tried to improve. These are the improvements I have made.</p>
<p>The reasoning behind my 3rd quarter grades being on the lower side is I found my motivation about halfway through the 3rd quarter. As you can see in the 4th quarter significant adjustments to my study habits were made. Next year I will be taking AP European History and numerous honor classes. I plan on doing very unique charity work (Plan on traveling to foreign countries and such) I already have some trips planned out but decisions are not final. I want my hook to be volunteer service. Is Harvard in my future? I'm also interested in Columbia, Cornell, UC Berkeley, UCLA , Northwestern , Duke , University of Chicago , UPenn (Already visited! LOVED IT!), Brown , Yale , and Stanford.</p>
<p>Does your high school use Naviance, or do they have a similar electronic system of tracking college acceptances? If so, look at the schools you are interested in, and see what the average GPA has been of students accepted to those schools. Can you attain that GPA if you work really diligently over the next 2 years? If you don’t know the answer, ask your guidance counselor. </p>
<p>At some high schools, an overall GPA of 93+ is needed for the colleges you listed, no matter what a student scores on their SAT/ACT. That may or may not be true at your high school. Ask your GC!</p>
<p>Okay , we do use Naviance however school is not in session but I will email my counsellor asking how to access my Naviance account. When you say an overall GPA of 93+ is needed for the colleges I have listed are you trying to say if I don’t have a 93 or higher gpa my high school won’t allow me to apply? Or are you asking that is usually what a college is looking for? I understand my chances for Harvard are quite slim considering the fact that people with perfect score are rejected however my eyes aren’t set on Harvard. In fact I’m more interested in attending Brown, Cornell, and Penn although it’s not easy to get into those schools either. I was speaking to one of my cousins who got into Penn and he suggested that I visit colleges and schedule Campus tours to show interest, would that actually benefit me, do colleges actually check if you’ve visited their campus? I live close to Cornell so I wouldn’t mind dropping by once in awhile :). My apologies for replying so late.</p>
<p>"…are you trying to say if I don’t have a 93 or higher gpa my high school won’t allow me to apply? Or are you asking that is usually what a college is looking for?"</p>
<p>I don’t think a high school can restrict a student from applying to any college, but generally, schools such as HYPSM are looking for the very top students and that means they are looking at student’s with GPA’s north of 93. It’s going to be about the same at all the colleges you mentioned including Brown, Cornell, and Penn. For example, in Brown’s class of 2016, 39% of accepted students were either valedictorian or salutatorian at their high school, and only 3% of accepted students were not ranked in the top 10 percent of their class. </p>
<p>FWIW: I may be wrong, but I don’t think anyone of the ivy league schools track a student’s interest because a student’s desire to attend has no bearing on their decision.</p>
<p>I understand that, but an upward trend can also shift an Admission Officer’s opinions about a lower GPA compared to other students admitted into those schools am i wrong?</p>
<p>Please make sure you add some more realistic matches and safety schools to your list…I know it’s early for you but do not set yourself up for failure and disappointment come application time. Good luck!</p>
<p>In an idyllic world, you are correct, an upward trend can shift one Admissions Directors opinion. But, in the real world of College Admissions, the entire committee of 40 admissions directors and faculty gets to vote on all applicants – and it’s one person, one vote. And with so many well qualified applicants, its very difficult to get the majority vote when you have a lowish GPA. For an entire committee to give you a nod with a 93, there would also have to be a lot of “wow” factors in your file (recruited athlete, Intel semi finalist, performed solo at Carnegie Hall etc).</p>