I’m currently a rising sophomore at a prestigious community college honors program. I had pretty good stats in HS, but unfortunately I attended a poor HS that provided very little help in terms of the application process. I’m first-generation so it was a very confusing process and in the end I decided to enroll at community college to save money and gain the support I needed to transfer.
Here are my stats:
High School:
GPA: Nearly a 4.0
Rank: 3
ACT: 30 as a junior ~hope to get up to the mid-30s after studying, and since it’s been 2 years
-Took nearly all APs (9) and honors
Had a variety of extracurriculars including President of Science Honor Society, Secretary of National Honor Society, Art Club, Science Olympiad, etc.
College:
GPA: 3.8
-Have taken 6 honor classes so far and have maxed out 18 credits each semester
-My extracurriculars as of right now is Freshman Senator and Sophomore Senator (elected to be), Treasurer of our Transfer Club, Writer for school newspaper. I hope to pick up a few things this year to strengthen my application.
I’m interested in pursuing Computer Science, but I rather like the liberal arts feel. I’m interested in colleges such as Barnard and Brown, but unfortunately for me…they’re need-aware. I’m on the lower income side and need a good amount of financial aid to attend school. Getting aid is a priority. I prefer mid-sized schools, but not something of huge importance. I also want to stay in the Northeast-- I’m from NY. My absolute safety school right now is Binghamton as in-state.
I’d appreciate suggestions for colleges to look into (keeping in mind a hopefully increased ACT score). Mainly looking for match schools with a few safeties, but I’m open to reaches as well! Any other recommendations to improve my application would also be greatly appreciated!
My rank is 3 out of around 240 I believe? Our class was larger, but only 240 or so were ranked.
I don’t have a huge background in Computer Science, just the classes I’ve taken this year in college. For that reason, I don’t have any clear job aspirations as of yet because I want to explore more disciplines in CS first. I am going to join a new App-Making Club on campus this year though.
Most colleges will not require you to furnish high school transcripts or test scores if you are applying with two full years of college credit. I don’t recommend re-taking the ACT or SAT now. It is assumed that a college student will perform better, and no college will be impressed with an increase.
How good is the Transfer Advisor at your CC? Does that person have much experience helping the top students get into the types of places you have on your list?
@woogzmama I understand that most colleges do not require such, but since I’ll be applying to Tier 1 schools this won’t be the case
@happymomof1 I know the transfer advisor at my school quite well, but he doesn’t really deal with such students. We also have a new Honors Program Director this year and she therefore doesn’t have as much experience. Thank you for the recommendation! I’ll definitely be contacting this person soon!
See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQObYymnB6s for Jack Kent Cooke Foundation on “why and how to transfer from a community college to a selective four-year college or university”
Cornell does have an articulation agreement with my college, the only problem is that since I’ll be applying for Computer Science I can only apply to their engineering, or arts and science school. The agreement at my school is not valid for engineering and I’d be more interested in their college of arts and sciences, which is harder to get into…I think? But still a viable option to consider!
Thank you for the video! I’ll look at it shortly. I actually hope to apply to the Jack Kent Cooke Transfer Scholarship went it opens:)
Don’t cut schools off your list just because they are need-aware. You are a competitive applicant. If Brown or Barnard want you, they may well admit you and offer aid.
@Hanna Thank you It means a lot to hear that from you. I think those are my top choices and I will end up applying; it’s just I’m just worried that since those are also both very competitive schools I’ll look less desirable comparatively to someone who doesn’t need as much aid. Do you have any suggestions for what I can do to kind of ‘cutback’ on that disadvantage by looking more desirable in other areas?
Keep that GPA up as high as possible while taking a challenging schedule of courses. Use your electives on subjects that you enjoy AND that look tough on your transcript. Just as an example, hard languages (Russian, Arabic, Chinese, etc.) are a great way for a STEM major to show mastery of the hardest liberal arts topics.
