<p>My GPA is not great, and cumulative hovers around a 3.5. However, I have shown an upward trend with my GPA when it comes to school. When Senior year begins, can it help my case if I end up getting near a 3.8 or 3.9 unweighted for the first quarter/semester? Will colleges see that as me improving myself consistently? SAT is 2300 just in case. I wanted to apply to Columbia SEAS early. It's pretty hard to get near a 4.0 in my school. My school doesn't rank. Some other colleges are CMU - CIT, Berkeley, UIllinois-Urbana, Georgia Tech. Assume EC's are excellent. Thank you, and have a beautiful day.</p>
<p>Your situation is exactly one of the reasons some people decline EA/ED – the boost in GPA, assuming top grades 1st Semester Sr yr</p>
<p>Yes, it’ll help your application a bit if your first semester of senior year demonstrates an improvement. It will have a negligible impact on any early admissions programs, though, unless you’re deferred. Colleges won’t receive your first-semester grades until after EA/ED decisions are made. Thus, since you’re anticipating an improvement in your GPA in your first semester of senior year, I’d suggest applying RD.</p>
<p>As for it being hard to get a 4.0 at your school, that’s something to keep in mind as well. GPA has to be interpreted in the context of the school–a 3.5 at a difficult school is different from a 3.5 at a school where half of the class has a 4.0.</p>
<p>The first semester senior year grades will not help at all in the admission decision at Illinois or Berkeley (or any other UC) since they base decisions on grades through junior year and do not want you to even provide senior year grades before being admitted. For the others if you apply for early decision (Columbia or CMU or early action (Gtech), they also won’t help. However, each of those uses first semester senior grades for regular admission and can provide some help.</p>
<p>Keep in mind:</p>
<p>Nearly all competitive applicants at columbia and cmu will have 3.8+'s senior year. 4.0’s senior year are a dime a dozen – partly because students get a reality check when they start thinking about college.</p>
<p>So it won’t give you an advantage, but it’s much better than keeping up with your 2.5</p>