<p>Ok heres the problem, I go to an International school in India and I want to apply to top schools. However my GPA is a 3.14 and I am in like the middle 50% of my class (i have 45 kids in my class, only 17 do the diploma and in that im like ranked fifth, out of the other 28 kids less than 6 take more than 2 APs)</p>
<p>here is the list of schools:
University of Pennsylvania<br>
University of Chicago<br>
Dartmouth College<br>
Northwestern University<br>
Vanderbilt University<br>
Georgetown University
Middlebury College
University of Southern California<br>
University of Michigan</p>
<p>Do I realistically stand a chance at any of the schools?</p>
<p>BTW here are the rest of my stats</p>
<p>IB Diploma: 38/45 (lowest) its more around a 40/45</p>
<p>AP's: 2 5's in microecon and calc ab (btw i didnt take the classes so it doesnt show on my transcrpt)</p>
<p>ACT:32</p>
<p>ECs:
250+ hours community service
Varsity swimming, and team captain
MUN. I went to an international conference in china, they only send 10 from each school from grades 9-12, so like a few 100 kids
Rotary Club
Student Coucnil
Me and my friends made a school newspaper which discusse controversial topics</p>
<p>Does all this mean nothing in the face of my GPA and rankinig?</p>
<p>What situation? Unless I’m missing something, I don’t see anything that explains why your GPA doesn’t accurately reflect your achievement. I think you need to make a more realistic list.</p>
<p>You need more safety schools. I would apply to maybe a couple of the schools you listed (U Chicago, Middlebury, and Vanderbilt) but realistically, applying to all of those schools that you listed, especially the Ivys would be a waste of time. There really is no excuse for your low GPA, and besides that, I don’t see anything else about you that sticks out. Your ECs are good…but it won’t cover up your GPA and rank.</p>
<p>Explaining your situation will put you over the top. Plus, an IB diploma looks very strong. You should be a fairly good candidate, even for Ivies (if you apply to three or four, you could probably get into one?).</p>
<p>You need to understand that the US schools will not know what your IB score is until too late for a decision, so it won’t help you. They will probably not pay much attention to your predicted score. Right or wrong, US schools will look at IB test scores the same way they look at AP scores: primarily for placement, not so much for admission. They will focus on your GPA and your standardized test scores.</p>
<p>It’s best that you apply to UK schools then. US schools are more focus on GPA. Even good SAT with 3.6/3.7 GPA from top 100 US News High school get rejected from multiple schools. This is not just one person but it happens to a lot of people. Unless you have a hook, like URM, your GPA should be around 3.8-4.0 to be competitive. Only U of C is not as stats conscious but you still have to have high GPA. Most schools will discount low SAT if you have high GPA.</p>
<p>Well, it’s not quite as simple as Columbia Student suggests, but 3.14 is not a highly competitive GPA by US standards. To offset it, you would need some extremely unusual achievements. (One note: it is possible that some secondary schools have extreme grade deflation, and at such a school maybe a 3.14 is a very high grade. If this is the case, you will need to find a way to convey this information to colleges, probably requiring the assistance of the guidance department of the school.)</p>
<p>i assume that you’re taking ib full diploma program with predicted grades of 38/45. does 38 include bonus points? with 38 predicted grades excluding bonus points, you have a much better chance than just 36 or 35. but are you doing both gpas and ib full diploma program together?</p>
<p>anyway, i strongly suggest that you’re trying to improve your predicted grades to about 39, excluding bonus points which will provide you a much better chance. many good uk schools will accept around 37-39, excluding bonus points as the minimum requirements. most elite schools understand the scoring of ib diploma program very well. don’t be discouraged. many us elite schools including mit, harvard, upenn, stanford, give credits for those hl subjects with 6 or 7. check the websites of schools that you’re interested in.</p>
<p>but you still need to improve your standardized test scores. perhaps you should consider taking sat tests that might give you better chances. you need to make sure that you have good essays and tech recs.</p>
<p>as for your college list, i suggest that you include cornell for the ivies. i’m sure you have decent chances on at least a few good schools on your list.
add a few more safeties so you have good overall balance.</p>
<p>“many us elite schools including mit, harvard, upenn, stanford, give credits for those hl subjects with 6 or 7”</p>
<p>Yes, they give credit for placement, but they don’t have those scores when they are considering admission. In the US there is not (as far as I am aware) the situation of conditional admission based on predicted IB scores. The IB scores you already have from your junior year may help you , of course, if they are high, but you will need to rely on regular grades and standardized tests for your other courses.</p>
<p>i’d say you have a chance at michigan. But I applied to a bunch of schools this year with a 3.18 and got rejected from villanova, UMCP and waitlisted at William and Mary and Wake Forest so I’d say a def no on most of the other schools.</p>
<p>Don’t kid yourself about the grade deflation part. I’ve seen kids graduated from top boarding schools such as Exeter, Andover, etc.. with GPA 3.5 uw and got into schools such as USD, NYU, JHU. Your ranking is also very important. Top 10% of your high school is better.</p>
<p>i’m sorry but i think i need to say a bit more. every year int’l students attending ib full diploma 2-yr program apply to ivies/elite schools in us, having no gpas but only ib predicted scores bc actual scores will come out after the final exams in first half of may. based on predicted scores or a levels etc., colleges can review the students application and notify them of either ed mid-dec or by may 1 for rd. of course, these students still need to take sat 1 and sat subject tests if required. some int’l students are new to cc and i don’t want them to be confused or discouraged by some inaccurate info.</p>
<p>there’s a big difference between ib full diploma 2-yr program having 3 higher level (hl) subjects and 3 standard level (s) subjects plus tok and cas, and individual ib subjects taken. ib full diploma 2-yr program is perfectly fine for admissions requirements for all top tier schools in us.</p>
<p>for reference, we can check websites of, i’m pretty sure, all ivies/elite schools clicking admissions/int’l students and we can find most of info there.
my son and i had been thru all this process. when he applied to us (engineering) schools, he used predicted score (41 plus bonus points), sat 1 and sat 2 subject tests (math & physics) in his college applications, and no gpas. he was accepted to u michigan, cmu, cornell and upenn (which were the only two ivies he applied). he will be going to u penn this fall.</p>
<p>come to think of it, i’m not sure if you’re taking the gpa system as main study program and take individual ib courses as additional. but since you said you have a predicted score of 38/45 (thus bonus points already included), i must then assume you’re taking ib full-diploma 2-yr program. so what is the case?</p>
<p>At IB schools in the U.S., typically letter grades are given in addition to IB scores. Perhaps his school is like that. If that’s the case, I have to think that U.S. colleges will focus on those grades and not on the predicted score. Obviously, if there is nothing but the predicted score, they would have to rely on that, and, as dconcerned says, on standardized tests. Dconcerned, did the US schools give a conditional admission based on the final IB score being close to the predicted score, as I understand schools in other countries do?</p>
<p>yes, you’re right, some schools in us offer both ap/honors program and ib courses for their hs students and grades for ib courses are also given. i’m confused bc microblaster said he goes to int’l school in india; so i thought he was taking full ib.</p>
<p>for most int’l students doing full ib are not offered grades (except maybe at int’l american schools). for comparison with aps and a levels, ib score of 6 is equivalent to a. in the us, schools offer an unconditional offer to ib students but have a general statement that they have the right to withdraw the admission if the student scores found to be significantly lower than their submitted ones which is not really considered conditional and which i think is applicable to admittees in general. uk schools still offer conditional offer asking students to meet at least the minimum requirement.</p>
<p>as a matter of fact, i found out a few years ago at exeter bs when my other son was studying there that us schools have the right to give any student admission even without hs diploma as long as other requirements (sat scores, ecs, essays etc.) are met, which really surprised me. you’re right most other countries (commonwealth in particular) do give conditional offer to ib students. in case of my son, he was given conditional offer at uk imperial college with minimum ib score 39 vs his predicted 41.</p>