<p>I'm a high school Junior who's thinking about applying to USC Columbia. My (projected) cumulative GPA is around 3.7 unweighted/4.1 weighted. I live in Florida, go to a decent private Catholic high school, and I'm in enrolled in all honors and AP courses except math (I take Algebra 2 now). I haven't taken the ACT yet, nor have I taken any SAT Subject tests (I plan on taking Biology and Spanish). I plan on taking those tests in June. As far as extracurriculars go, I'm in NHS, the National Spanish Honor Society, and I was the president of the Astronomy club last year. I've kind of hopped around on the rest by joining the Science Olympiads, Chess club, JV Volleyball team and JV Basketball. </p>
<p>Any advice, tips, anything that would increase my chances of getting into (preferably) USC Columbia, but if not, any of the USC schools? Any thoughts on how my chances stand right now? </p>
<p>Have you taken the regular SAT? You definitely should take sat subject tests to use when applying to colleges but you don’t need them for USC. If your SAT or ACT scores back up your GPA you should be competitive. Look at money matters page off of admissions website. There you will see the range of SAT scores needed to qualify for scholarships that will also give you in-state tuition rates or a reduction on OOS tuition. Did you take the PSAT…NMFinalists also get good money at USC.</p>
<p>Hi there! I haven’t taken the regular SAT, I only plan on taking the ACT. And thank you! I took a look at their scholarships for out-of-state applicants, and they kind of intimidated me lol. While I am a good student, I wouldn’t consider myself a leader of my school or community. Man, I really wish I could just re-do high school. Thank you, scmom12! :)</p>
<p>If you are a junior I’d seriously consider taking ACT before late spring. If you don’t like your score you’ll have more chances to bring it up and May dates might conflict with AP review. You don’t want to have to stress in the fall about needing to bring a score up to get to your favorite school in the fall of your senior year.</p>
<p>I know that you do not plan to take the SAT but some students can see great differences in their scores between ACT’s and SAT’s. You will have no way to know which test you will excel at without taking both. My daughter who is in college said that most students do their best on the SAT’s towards the end of junior year. </p>
<p>I agree with scmom12 that you should test sooner. It will give you an idea of which you are better at. Then you could focus your studies on that test for retesting towards the end of Junior year.</p>
<p>I agree with the above but I think taking it at the start of your senior year is beneficial because you have a chance to study over the summer without worrying about keeping up your grades. All three kids in my family did their best on the ACT they took in Sept of their senior year</p>
<p>vryproudmom has a really good point that sometimes the results between the SAT and ACT differ. What some students do is to take both, and initially not have either sent to any colleges, then when they get their results, they send whichever one has the best score, and ignore the other.</p>
<p>You also might want to note many of colleges will super score the SAT but they will not do this with the ACT but check with the colleges you plan to apply to</p>
<p>Hey, thank you!
I took the PSAT in 10th and didn’t get the score I expected for a number of reasons. Some people think that the whole idea of testing anxiety is a big joke, but I assure you that it is real. That’s my biggest problem. I have Barron’s practice ACT book and after seeing the format of it, I have realized that I’m MUCH more comfortable taking that test. I think what I’ll do is take my tests in April and then retake them again in the fall. Thank you all very much! :)</p>
<p>I would highly consider taking both tests. I did and I ended up doing much better on the SAT than the ACT, even though everyone told me the ACT was better.</p>
<p>It can’t hurt as far as USC goes. They use your highest scores. So if one test is better than the other, then they’ll just use the higher one. They also super-score the SAT and only use math/critical reading.</p>
<p>Also, most people that I have known do worse on the PSAT than the SAT. I know you can theoretically add a ‘0’ to your score on the PSAT to get an SAT score, but that’s not entirely accurate. Most people I knew, including myself ended up scoring a good 50-100 point difference from the PSAT to the SAT. I only scored like a 53 and a 55 on my PSAT’s, but received a 600 and 630. It was a huge difference.</p>
<p>I think if you go through these forums, you’ll see how much I love USC. Honestly, it was really a surprise for me. I kind of forced myself into going there very last minute because of financial reasons, and now I couldn’t be any happier with my decision.</p>
<p>Of course there are highlights and downsides to everything, but for the most part, I’ve had an extremely positive experience at USC.</p>
<p>I’m not sure, but test anxiety may be similar in nature to performance anxiety that many people get when speaking in public. Even some actors and musicians with many years of experience get it, it never goes away if you are prone to it.</p>
<p>What happens is that the “flight or fight” syndrome kicks in, and people who have performance anxiety will overproduce adrenaline. Back in caveman days, that extra adrenaline saved many a person from being eaten by a tiger, but for someone who needs to calmly perform in front of an audience, or possibly sit down a take a test, it’s terrible. I know, because I have it. I normally have nerves of steel, but if I have to speak in front of a group of more than a dozen or so people, I can’t do it. adrenaline can only be “worked off” by physical activity, so when you can’t do something very physical to work off that adrenaline, it manifests itself in very unproductive ways, such as making one shake, or possibly a hotflash, and it can actually cause some people to pass out.</p>
<p>You might want to see a GP doctor about this or even a specialist. Seriously, anxiety has ruined the career of many a promising person. There are non-narcotic non-addictive prescription drugs called Beta Blockers that when taken in very small doses will prevent your body from producing too much adrenaline, and there are also other techniques for reducing anxiety, like I know one person who while sitting in a chair will grab the seat of the chair and try to pull the chair off the ground (which I know is impossible), but that physical effort relieves him of the adrenaline.</p>
<p>The ONLY reason that I didn’t go to law school was because of my performance anxiety symptoms when speaking in public. I once had a job where I had lots of opportunities to speak in public, I volunteered over and over, thinking that if I did it enough that the anxiety would go away, but I never got over it one bit.</p>
<p>By the way, my son also attends USC and he also loves it (well, most of it anyway). Like AUGirl, it was also origionally his second choice college.</p>
By the way, how do you like USC?</p>