Chance me please (Notre Dame, U Michigan Ann Arbor, U Washington Seattle, UCSD, UCLA)

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

I am currently a junior at a large public high school in Arizona. Aside from being big, my high school has also been known for its academic prestige (more than half of my districts National Merit Finalists were from my school). As for me, my stats are far from being the best compared to a majority of my classmates, but I still want to see what my chances are for getting accepted into top notch schools (please share any thoughts, any opinion is fine).

note: grades for my junior year listed below are not final (obviously :/) and are still subject to change.
U/W GPA: 3.57
W GPA:4.57
Test Scores: (again not final)
SAT: 1450/1600 (this is what I got on a practice test after about 3 months of continual practice, and my score on the official SAT when I take it in March should be similar according to my tutor)
ACT: N/A

Course Load (Freshman year)
Honors Mandarin 3: A
Honors Geometry: B
Honors English 9: A
Honors Biology: B
Honors World History and Geography: A
Academy Tennis: A

Sophomore Year (My sophomore year GPA is what I am concerned about the most when applying for universities as it is the lowest so far out of my 2.5 years of high school)
Honors English 10: A
AP Human Geography: B AP Score: 4
AP Biology: B AP score: 3
Honors Algebra 2: B
AP Chinese 4: A AP Score: 4
Honors Chemistry: B (Yeah surprising right?)

(note: I chose to take Pre-Calculus at my local community college over the summer because I did not want to take it as a class)
Junior Year
AP Chemistry: B (should be able to raise this one up to an A by the time junior year ends)
AP Physics 1: B
AP US History: A
AP Calculus BC: B
AP Psychology: A
AP Lang: A

Senior Year course-load (projected)
AP Lit
Linear Algebra
AP Physics C
AP Gov
AP Art History
AP Chinese 5

If I manage to get straight A’s senior year, I would assume that my GPA would rise thus giving me a better shot at schools like Notre Dame and U Mich.
Extracurricular: 2 years of Quizbowl, 1 year of Model UN, 3 years of Red Cross, 3 years of tennis, 1 year of National Honors Society
Awards: AP Scholar, 4.0 GPA Award
Hours: I am very active in my church, as I have served over 100 hours in my church’s concession/fundraising stand. I have also served around 20 hours at my local after school children’s day care, and a combination of 10 more hours from fundraisers and community service events in my area. I would also like to add that I will be volunteering at a microbiology laboratory in my dad’s laboratory overseas in China over the summer of my junior year (not sure if including that on my college apps would help or not).

2

Anyone?

3

Your SAT is right around admission median of UMich, but your GPA is pretty much out of their admission range. It would be a high reach for you.

4

UW-Seattle has a something like a 2% OOS acceptance rate, also EA schools don’t factor Senior year GPA that much into their decisions

5

@billcsho thanks for the reply! I agree with you that my GPA is out of the admission range but I would like to hear an opinion on whether or not U Mich cares about the rigor of an applicant’s classes and if they’d consider that when applicants apply.

6

@babzy1 Ah I see, kind of disheartening since I thought the Udub acceptance rate was suppose to be high haha but yeah thanks for the reply.

7

Washington’s acceptance rate in 2016 was 63.7% for residents and 38.8% for nonresidents (45.3% overall). I have not seen final numbers for 2017 but expect they are similar.

Your SAT looks good, but according to the UW’s 2016-2017 Common Data Set, the average unweighted GPA of enrolled freshmen was 3.79.

Still, you have have a solid academic record, and in a holistic review, I think you have a good chance of acceptance.

Good luck!

8

UMich considers both GPA and course rigor as most important. Basically, you need to take rigor courses and received A grades in most of them.

9

@UWfromCA Ah I see :slight_smile: thanks for the insight

10

Do you have access to Naviance? It is a better predictor than asking people that aren’t very familiar with your school.
Also, keep up the SAT prep. I have a son that was admitted with a similar GPA and a 33 ACT, so don’t give up hope.

11

@wheatonmom Ah I’ve actually never heard of Naviance :confused: but yeah in that case I’ll try to check it out, thanks! Your son getting in also gives me hope too so thanks for that as well :slight_smile: