The acceptance rate of Northwestern is said to be ten percent point one. What’s the average ACT and GPA of a freshman at NW? Would a higher ACT score make up for a GPA that isn’t bad but isn’t an unweighted 4.0 either? Please share advice/knowledge/experience. Also please don’t be rude!
25th - 75th percentile (enrolled, not admitted):
Critical Reading: 690-760
Math: 710-800
ACT: 31-34
% of top-tenth: 91%
http://enrollment.northwestern.edu/pdf/common-data/2015-16.pdf
The only thing I’d add, stats-wise, to the IWannaHelp’s post is that the other 9% of NU students come from the top quarter of their class in high school, according to the Common Data Set linked to. An average GPA is not given in that document, and I can’t find any data on specific GPA averages from any reliable sources on the internet; the only average GPAs are those on websites with self-selecting student populations - those where students who are looking for those sort of websites report their own GPA.
Also according to the Common Data Set, Northwestern considers test scores and GPA on the same level, the highest one, Very Important, along with class rank and rigor of secondary school.
As for the GPA / ACT tradeoff, none of us can say for sure here as only the admissions officers really know. Much of the admissions mess depends on other factors like high school quality, class rank, ECs, essays, letters of recommendation, and so on, further muddling things. Additionally, OP, the way you described your ACT scores and GPA makes it unclear as to exactly how much of a make-up there would be between the two, especially given the difference between many CC posters’ and many regular applicants’ views of what “good” means.
Sorry if that came off as rude, I didn’t mean it to be. There’s just so many fuzzy edges in the applications process that it would be hard to give you a concrete answer.
One more thing: it’s NU, not NW. Best of luck in you application, if you do decide to go for NU!