School: Large public school in Fairfax county (top county in US)
Ethnicity: Asian
Freshman Yr: 3.3 UW, 3.7 W
Sophomore yr: 2.88 UW, 3.38 W (LOL)
Junior Yr: 3.67 UW, 4.17 W
Senior year: 3.62 UW, 4.4 W
Overall: about a 3.38-3.4 UW and 3.9 W as of right now
not really an excuse, but the reason I did so bad is because of my ECs which I will probably explain in essays/interviews
Courses:
9: World 1 Hn, Eng 9 HN, Geometry HN, Biology HN, Chinese 1
10: AP World, Eng 10 HN, Alg II HN, Chem HN, Chinese 2
11: US History HN, AP Lang, Precalculus/Trigonometry, Physics, Chinese 3, AP Human Geo, AP Psych
12: HN Gov, AP Lit, AP Calc AB, AP Physics, AP ES, Chinese 4, AP Micro/Macro
some of these were online classes through the school county so I had more time to figure skate
SATS:
1: Just took, I am guessing a 1300?
2: Taking next month, my current practice scores are around a 1400, and will NOT be submitting this score to Columbia
ECs:
will be joining the Math HN Society
will be joining History HN Society
Figure Skating (talking about this in my essay)
Senior lady double gold medalist
Member of the Skating Club of Northern VA
5 time Regional Competitor
several medals at local competitions
10 years of figure skating dedication
train 10 hours a week during school season and 20-24 hours a week during competition season (June-October)
60 hours of Volunteering
Math Honor society volunteer hours as math tutor
-assistant teaching for learn to skate (ice skating program). this includes teaching ages 3-50
Mount Vernon Adaptive program figure skating instructor: teaching children and teen with mental illnesses how to ice skate
Work
3 years ice instructor for learn to skate program
about to become a private lesson instructor (more professional version of the group lesson instructor)
Hooks
1st gen college student
Sibling legacy (Columbia)
Interested Majors:
Im sorta all over the place. I wanted to do something with Business/Economics/International Business and political science/government, but just recently I got really interested in Physics! I am probably just going to choose the easiest one to get into haha.
Columbia ED
Northeastern EA
Northwestern
Chicago
Vanderbilt
Middlebury
USCalifornia
Emory
Notre Dame
NYU
Boston U
Boston College
Hamilton
Colgate
I never got to visit any colleges so that’s why I am applying to so many…also yes I am applying to a safety
please don’t hold back on the criticism!
I honestly think your chances are slim at every college you listed. You’ll have to lower the standards so you have some safeties in case the schools you listed don’t play out.
A 1300 SAT plus a below average GPA (at most of those schools) makes all of these schools unlikely. On the EC (I’m guessing figure skating) comment about your grades, colleges do not want to see you prioritizing ECs over your grades.
If you get your SAT up, you may get into one or two.
Are you good enough to be recruited in figure skating? I’m not sure if the schools you listed have a team, but with your current scores and going into business, that could help you maybe get into some.
@jpgrainer actually you cant be recruited for figure skating): but I am good and will send a portfolio maybe. I was actually planning on starting at communications
Boston U, BC, northeastern, colgate, and Hamilton are all really big on figure skating (has skating groups of 40 I think?) so I was really hoping that would boost my resume for those schools!
To be honest, You need to face reality, you have 0 chance at all these schools. Your stats are far below reasonable and ur SAT doesn’t make up for it. I will bet you $500 straight up you will not get accepted to any of these colleges on your list. send me verification if u do and I will happily pay up. Have a nice day
@Jpgranier that makes sense. But I do send my weighted score because my school doesn’t do unweighted, so IDK what theyre gonna do about that.
but I am not sure about what you are saying about the 25% mark, because I looked at a website which has the school stats of the number of people in my school who got accepted/rejected to a college, lowest accepted/avg accepted for each the early and regular decisions, and there are schools which I meet the lower 25/50%. Like for NEU i meet right at the 50% (W GPA is 3.85 average for both regular and early). and Lehigh, which I was thinking about applying to, has a 3.94 W GPA average. So maybe my school deflates gpa? idk
@jpgranier actually yes you can, and they were surprisingly low! i thought i was going to die after taking my first SAT , gut it turns out that the lowest SAT for EA NEU is 1160, which is the score I started with before practicing SATs haha! and a bunch of schools in the top 20s-30s like emory have an average sat of somewhere above 1300.
Maybe your school is different, but I would still rely on class profiles. Emory the middle 50% of SAT takers scored 1430-1540. Chicago is 1450-1550 average SAT.
There could be plenty of reasons why the system you are looking at does not match the overall class profile.
Grades and scores may be self submitted and students put in incorrect information.
The scores don't represent just this past year. They could date back and as schools have grown older, they cant keep up with the amount of students applying (which is why acceptance rates at prestigious schools go down every year).
Your school is very prestigious and have close connections with these schools.
A theory of mine (not sure if it is true) is that students who do not qualify for financial aid are more likely to be accepted because they can afford to pay full price. I assume your schools is generally wealthy.
Lots of colleges don’t look at Freshman grades, like Stanford. What you have going for you is an upward trend So to Senior year for GPA, and that’s in your favor. You should take the SAT again and try to get your scores up if possible. For Columbia and Chicago, you have to crack 1400.
You’re Asian, so you are in the most competitive demographic. Most top colleges have quotas for 14% of the class for Asians. So 7% for boys and 7% for girls. If you are an Asian girl, you will be in the toughest demographic as you are competing against other Asians of the same gender and Asian women have the highest GPAs and SATs.
You have some things in your favor and some against. Write the best essays of your life and identify some leadership positions in your ECs. You definitely are in the ball park for Hamilton, BU, Northeastern, BC and Colgate. Use your ED card well. Good Luck and don’t despair. Continue to put your best foot forward and hope for the best. You’ll be fine. Most importantly, find a school you love and make it known with an enthusiastic application that explains how you’ll be a good fit for the school. That goes a long way!
I’m pretty sure you would have come across collegiate figure skating related resources during your research @camwow, but here you will find one in case you haven’t: