I go to a really famous, rigorous prep school. As academically competitive as it is, people don’t really talk about their grades, but I’ve always figured that mine (I have about a 3.65 UW GPA) were about average, probably below average in my group of friends (who are all really intelligent and driven). My grade just got access to Naviance, and I see that some of the very top schools (Stanford, UChicago, Columbia, etc.) all have average accepted GPAs of around 3.6 or 3.7 from my school. The scattergrams show that acceptances are pretty evenly spread, but the vast majority of acceptances to these schools are in the middle, around my GPA. Does that mean I, an Asian female with a 2300, stand a chance applying to the very top tier of colleges? I had not really previously considered that I might get into schools like these, but these stats make me feel a lot better – or should I not get my hopes up, because the GPAs are probably skewed by athletes, etc.?
I totally feel ya. Our school uses naviance too, and in almost all the scatterplots I fit in the acceptance range. However, the schools you are interested in are very competitive. So while the stats might be accurate, the people who have been accepted with the lower end of the stats may just have a hook or better essays or something that rocks their application.
Surely, you have a chance with your great stats. However, for those schools you really can’t rely on stats to get in, so try and find some interesting ec’s or internships or anything that can really make you special from all the other applicants, not just another “smart” student.
If those acceptances are mixed in with rejections in the same general area of the plot, then it may be (for your school, at least) that you are in the GPA / test score zone where it then becomes more about other factors like extracurricular achievement, recommendations, essays, etc…
Naviance stats may or may not be particularly accurate with regard to your specific school. Depends on if the stats were accurately and consistently entered by your school. Meaning, your school’s stats might be very accurate because there likely one person responsible for inputting the stats for only your school as it is not part of a large school district. My D’s school’s Naviance stats are often inaccurate and incomplete because the entire school district (5 very large schools with graduating classes of 500 plus kids each) inputs data. The data is entered by a guidance counselor at each individual school, some are counselors are diligent about inputing the data, others not so much. We found that Naviance was largely inaccurate for many of D’s choice universities. I genuinely hope that your school maintains accurate stats and inputs them consistently.
Naviance will give you a very good idea of what range the school accepts. When you get to Stanford, the Ivy’s and a few more it gets pretty random even from feeder schools. The tier slightly below those - Vanderbilt, Rice, Caltech, Cal etc. are a lot more straightforward. At my son’s school those schools accepted 100% of applicants above a certain GPA and HYP rejected everyone in that upper range.
Also Naviance results go back to 2009 (for the current class) and things change. Since there are no guarantees I would just apply and hope for the best. Just make sure you have matches and safeties.