I’m a junior in high school and I had a bad year this year and am ending up with a few B-'s and and the rest are A/A-'s. I’m getting really worried right now. I feel like because of these B’s that I won’t get into a decent college. I don’t have the best of GPA’s (3.3) and I really want to get into college. Mostly because I don’t want to feel like I’m doing nothing useful in life. Do I still have a chance of getting into college?
Thanks
There are a few thousand universities and colleges in the US, and hundreds of very good universities and colleges.
Is your GPA weighted or unweighted? If you have a 3.3 unweighted GPA, I would take this to mean either that you have A’s and B’s but more B’s than A’s, or you have A’s, B’s, and C’s, but not very many C’s. Either way this would allow you to go to a pretty good university.
There are occasionally threads on college confidential for students (and their parents) with GPAs in the 3.0 to 3.4 range or so. You should be able to find one and get some sense for the types of schools that are likely to make sense for you.
You will also want to think about your budget. What can you and your parents afford? Also, you might want to think about what sort of school you would prefer (such as large versus small) and what subjects you are most likely to be interested in studying.
You can absolutely get into college with a B average. Please don’t panic. Look at the Colleges That Change Lives (CTCL consortium), and like the poster above said, check for threads here on CC about colleges for B and C students. You probably can’t get into the top 40 or so universities in the US, but that still leaves hundreds. Think about what you want to study, figure out what your parents can afford, maybe what part of the country you’d like to live in, and if you’ve taken the SAT or ACT test and want some suggestions, people here might be able to give you some ideas of where to start.
Thank you guys for responding! This helps so much
Realize that the majority (yes majority) of students in the US have average GPA’s and go to average state schools. The average ACT in the US is 21, and in states with better educational systems the average is 25. So when you read on here of students with perfect GPA’s and literally perfect 36 ACT’s they are a very rare and small group. It can make you feel like all is lost but I assure you many kids with B averages go on to do just fine.
The other day I noticed my dermatologist attended our state university (which any B student can easily get into). Same with my dentist. If you read on CC you can start to believe that only top colleges will result in success but sometimes I think “average” state schools are sort of hidden gems. You can get a bachelor’s without a lot of debt and then can focus on going to a more well-known graduate school.
ABSOLUTELY.
This site is not indicative of the general pool of applicants.
Take a look here: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1995005-time-for-another-thread-for-b-and-c-students.html#latest
and here: