<p>I was wondering what the chances of acceptance at my top college choices would be, considering my very "average" stats as a student. </p>
<p>Stats:
GPA-3.4 unweighted, 4.2 weighted
SAT-not yet taken
SAT II-Writing 560 <em>cringe</em>/Literature-taking this Sat.
PSAT-1100
Will haven taken 8 AP's by the time I graduate/ the rest Honors</p>
<p>Extracurriculars/Clubs:
Scholars Club-historian
Academic Team
Church Youth Group
Key Club-secretary
School Newspaper (editor in chief)
Aik-jut-su Martial Arts-3rd stripe belt (4 yrs)
Jui-jut-su Martial Arts-brown bet (10 yrs)
Toyama Ryu, Japanese Sword-(4 yrs) </p>
<p>Community Service:
Church-40 hrs.
Shelter for Abused Women and Children-24 hrs.
Learning Connection and Youth Haven this Summer-? hrs. </p>
<p>Junior Year Grades:
AP Eng. Lit-A
AP Govt-A
AP Macro-B
Alg II/Trig. H-B
Journalism IH-A
Spa. 4 H-A
US Hist H-A
Chem H-A</p>
<p>Senior Yr. Sched:
AP Environ.
AP US
AP Eng Lang.
AP Spa. Lang.
Precal H
Physics H
Journalism II H
Comp. Prog. I H</p>
<p>All my stats as you can see are terribly mediocre. I am taking a Princeton Review SAT prep course to hopefully improve my SAT scores to at least a 1200. </p>
<p>Possible colleges:
Reach?
Emerson College
NYU
Northeastern
Match?
Boston University
Fordham
Safety:
Pace University</p>
<p>Are these schools of my reach? Can anyone recommend any similar safety schools? I would like to attend a school with an excellent literature and/or journalism program in an urban area like Boston, New York, DC., etc. Also, can anyone recommend ways to sort of "beef" (lol) my resume?</p>
<p>Thanks a bunch for your time and sorry for the exhaustive post.</p>
<p>Perhaps you could look at Syracuse University - Newhouse? Not that it would be your first choice, but they have an excellent journalism program.</p>
<p>Thanks for all your responses. I will look into those two colleges further. Actually, someone else recommended Syracuse a while back, commending their journalism program as well, so I'll deff check it out.</p>
<p>Hehe... The benefit Furman has over Syracuse is the weather. Furman is in Greenville, whereas Syracuse is in Syracuse. It's cold in Syracuse. It's warm in Greenville. It's cloudy in Syracuse. It's sunny in Greenville. Greenville has fresh mountain air, flowers, wildlife, and country music. Syracuse has guys who cover themselves in orange paint. See the difference? :P</p>
<p>I think that BU is also a reach. It has gotten very popular. Syracuse's excellent J school also would be a reach.</p>
<p>Possibly American U (D.C.) and U Maryland (which is just about a half hour subway ride from D.C. ) would be matches. Temple U in Philly also might be a match. It has a decent J school, though IMO not as good as the excellent J schools at Amerian and U Maryland. </p>
<p>Getting some work published in a professional newspaper (a good place to start is a local weekly) and/or doing an unpaid internship at a professional newspaper and/or winning some awards for your articles in your school newspaper would add "beef" to your application. </p>
<p>Thanks Adan and Northstar. lol, I can deff. see the benefits Furman has over Syracuse, but I'm looking to go up north so I guess I just might have to suffer through cold weather and people covered in orange paint :P</p>
<p>Northstar, you're probably right about BU thanks for the resume boosting tips, I going to get to work this summer on all of them :D</p>