So I am in a conundrum, Freshman and Sophomore year I did not take serious enough. Now that I am looking more into Colleges I realized that I am doomed in my choices. I want to know which schools (UC & CSU) I have a chance in .
CSU SLO
UC R
CSU LB
UC I
CSU SJ
UC D
I did have some family problems my Freshman and Sophomore year but I do not know if I should include them in my Common App, it was a major reason to why I had such a low GPA.
MY STATS
ACT - 17 (I’ve been taking ACT Practice Tests and I’ve been getting above a 26 every single time)
PSAT - 900 (I’ve been also taking SAT Practice Tests and I’ve been getting above 1300)
UW GPA - 2.9
W GPA - 3.4
Freshman Year GPA - 2.4
Sophomore Year GPA - 3.0
Junior Year GPA - 3.5
I have had a “good” upward trend for my GPA. Mostly because problems stopped the summer of Sophomore and Junior year. My projected GPA of Senior year will be a 3.8 or higher because I will be taking 4-5 APs in which I will get possibly get As for 4 of them.
ECs : Hmong Club (3 years); 2 years of being the club’s treasurer, Technology Club (1 year); treasurer. Worked at a community center for 2 summers. I have a Instagram page with a decent amount of followers (photography, I don’t know if I should mention this.)
Thank you in advance I know my stats aren’t the best.
Assuming you’re instate in California?
You must retake the act or sat before you can make any plans. Are you registered for the may and June sessions?
You also need to calculate your UC GPA.
CSU 's will only use 10-11tg grade GPA. Csu’s are strictly GPA*test score, so the higher your score the better your odds. UCs including Riverside and Merced, will need strong essays so checknout the advice on 'essay hell’s dedicated to UC essays.
Finally, it’ll also depend on what major youre interested in.
Not trying to be rude but your stats are much lower than every UC and CSU, honestly tbh community college prob lol or maybe just retake ACT and study for it and try much harder junior & senior year, get good recs and create unique extracurricualrs and then u cld prob get in somewhere
assuming you are able to get your SAT into the . 1200 to 1300 range, UCM is a maybe - the other UCs are probably nots - Worth an ap but, consider them reaches. CPSLO and SDSU are also reaches. CSULB will be a coin toss, depending n major. SJSU, probably, unless you apply as a CS major.
Other CSUs to consider - Cal Poly Pomona, Chico, Sonoma, Fullerton, Northridge and depending what you want to study, Fresno, Sac or Humboldt.
I think you should mention that you had family issues and maybe use Barron’s ACT books and try to take practice ACT’s every week (it raised my score a lot). If you do this then you have a much better chance. Also, you can always write great essays which will help a lot
Cal States only use CSU GPA and test scores, so family issues can only be addressed in your UC essays. As stated by @NCalRent, other than UC Merced you can count out the rest of the UC’s.
Freshman admit rates for UC GPA of 3.00-3.39 capped weighted UC GPA and not major specific:
I would focus on non-impacted campuses such as Bakersfield, Channel Islands, Dominguez Hills, Stanislaus and East Bay for a safety CSU. From there, look at Sac state, Fresno State, Cal State LA, San Francisco State and Sonoma. I think CPP, Fullerton, Northridge would tough unless you can significantly increase your test scores of if you are local.
Community college with a guaranteed Transfer to 6 of the UC’s or ADT/AST for the CSU’s are also a good option if you are unhappy with your choices.
Some Private schools to consider would be University of Redlands, University of La Verne, Saint Mary’s, Cal Lutheran, Cal Baptist to name a few.