<p>@sgopal2 </p>
<p>First of all thanks for your response.</p>
<p>I thought colleges valued SAT and ACT the same? And no I just used some books and self studied the AP courses during breaks and weekends. </p>
<p>As for my low grades, I don’t have an extenuating circumstance (family death, drug use, etc.) but I know that I wasn’t reaching my potential. I’m young for my grade (and I know that’s not an excuse) but I didn’t really even hit puberty until end of freshman year, so I was a really immature underclassman and did not take school all that seriously. Of course, that’s coming back to bite me now.</p>
<p>Do you think I have a shot at these schools?</p>
<p>@serverguy It made me sad too!</p>
<p>Also, I’m not sure what the logic is behind taking the SAT again. The ACT and SAT are weighed the same. You don’t have to take the SAT just to make it reach the corresponding score you have on the SAT. Colleges know that some students excel on one exam, and don’t do as well on the other. You don’t need to retake anything. A 34 is great that’s what a college will care about.</p>
<p>@dreamer1997: definitely have your GC mention your lack of maturity and how it affected your grades for first two years. Explain somewhere how you learned from the immaturity and how you became better.</p>
<p>SAT/ACT are not the same, despite the fact that they accept both. The ACT is more of a measure of how much you keep up with your homework, whereas SAT tests how good you are at figuring out things (esp the reading and more difficult math problems). All things being equal, they prefer to see a high SAT score over a high ACT score. You already have a good enough ACT score, try to get the SAT higher.</p>
<p>^ OP’s ACT and SAT scores match up near perfectly (although the ACT Math score was lower). There is no preference for one test or the other test, however, schools may have difference emphasis in different section scores. So some school may view OP’s ACT score better while others the opposite. Anyway, both OP’s test scores are in good balance with no section below 700 or 30. It would be good if OP can improve either test score, but the comparable score in both test and a weak GPA may suggest OP has already reached a plateau in test scores. I think to improve the cumulative GPA by 0.1 by working hard in the next semester and demonstrate a good upward trend may be more helpful than getting a slightly higher test score. Note that some schools recalculate GPA without freshmen grades or without subgrades. That may make your GPA look better.</p>
<p>Yeah I will definitely talk to GC about my GPA</p>