Chance me:
USC
UNC Chapel Hill–In state
NC State–in state
Ohio State
NYU
UW-Seattle
Western Carolina University-in state
intended major: spanish and public policy
minor: women’s and gender studies
extracurricular activities
- student council 2014-2017
- senior class student ambassador 2017-2018
- youth council member 2016-present
- students for education reform internship Summer 2017
- volleyball manager
- national technical honor society
- national honor society
volunteer work
- blood drive
- candy bags for cancer walk
- mentoring students for quiz bowl
- reading buddy
- classroom cleanup
- tutoring
Class rank: 5 out of 284
GPA: 4.35 weighted
3.5 unweighted
GPAs WILL DEFINITELY go up after junior year.
IB Diploma candidate
- my teacher believes that I possibly scored between 5-7 for IB Philosophy
First generation college student
I’m really worried about my ECs because I didn’t really find a true interest in activism until my junior year, which is explained through me joining our city youth council and students for education reform. But I plan on explaining that through my personal statement.
Although, i’m active in school and I do really well in my classes I don’t have many awards except for A or AB honor roll. and that’s also another worry of mine.
So, are you an incoming senior? What’s your SAT/ACT? Also, how many AP/IB courses are you going to take? How many are offered in your school? Answer these questions and we might get some more insight.
That GPA is rough for your higher reaches, and I hope you can get it up. First Gen is nice in some situations. ECs/Volunteer work should be good enough for most of your schools (USC might want better). You might hear otherwise from posters below, but I think you’ve got an ok shot at UNC Chapel Hill with their major in-state bias if your ACT/SAT scores check out.
Also to ask, what can your parents afford? Is money a major player in your decision? Do you think you would qualify for financial and and have you ran the NPCs for these schools yet? Good questions for us to ask.
Incoming senior, I took the SAT back in 2016 and didn’t do so well on the math section. I scored a 24 on the ACT, and again the math section is what made my score lower than I wanted. I plan on retaking I really just wanted to get a feel of it. I’m also doing SAT/ ACT test prep during the summer. And retaking both at the beginning of the year.
As far as my IB classes i’m taking 8 currently:
IB History of Americas HL
IB Biology SL
IB Philosophy SL
IB Math Studies SL
IB Psychology HL
IB Language A: English HL
IB Language B: Spanish SL
IB TOK
I’m taking every class available with the exception of art and chemistry. Everyone of my classes are 2 parts except for IB Philosophy. So I will only have room for one class next year. It will probably be an AP class.
And yes money is a huge factor in my college decision. And I definitely qualify for financial aid. I haven’t been able to run NPCs because I don’t have all of my family’s information.
I also did prom committee this year, I could add that to my extra curriculars.
Are you an URM? If not, try to increase that ACT score to at least a 27 and then apply EA to UNC this fall! I think you can get in
Ok. I think you can safely trash Ohio State, NYU, and UW-Seattle; they will require you to pay out-of-state tuition and will probably not be so nice on financial aid (in-states usually aren’t). I ran the NPC on Washington just to test it out, and they would probably have my parents take out almost $30K in loans as an OOS student (much less everything else). Might want to consider replacements for those.
As above, try to increase your ACT and do well with the GPA. Get it up as high as you can, and your chances of UNC will increase. 28-30 would be where I would strive; it won’t guarantee your admission, but it won’t be impossible. It is a great school, and will likely even give you a lot of stuff if you are financially needy. Your course load is intense, and the major you are applying for isn’t known to be uber-competitive. You could do well with it.
By the way, USC . . . if you can apply to USC, you can apply to a bunch of other top private schools that meet 100% of need. I don’t think you have a reasonable chance there without at least a 31-32, with a top 10% of the class unweighted GPA to boot. If it is your dream school, apply. Heck, throw your application to a few top (easier to get into) LACs that aren’t overly competitive; the odds are against you but if you get in and are financially needy, they would be really nice.
EDIT: URM? If you truly are, bring your ACT score up and apply to CSU and several other less selective LACs. If you can get up to it, a 28 might be enough to get you into Trinity College or maybe Reed if you get lucky. Kenyon might be ok, too.
Best of luck