<p>Hey, for those who have been accepted ED, what kind of grades can we get for this semester and next grades? I don't want to get my offer taken away, but I don't want to be working my butt off for no reason. Thoughts? Info?</p>
<p>oh yeah someone answer this PLEASE....all my friends are urging me to stop getting straight A's and god the temptation is powerful. would that be as monumentally stupid as i suspect? i heard that until midyear one should keep the same grades but afterward its ok to slip a grade or two.</p>
<p>Will Columbia need to see both our mid-year grades and final grades at the end of the year?</p>
<p>If you get a few B's, they're not going to revoke your acceptance. Don't get any C's and you'll be fine.</p>
<p>the more general advice is to have a valid reason for everything you do.</p>
<p>If you slack off in your classes because you're smoking weed before every class, you're in a lot more trouble than if the slacking is because you're taking time on some side projects or community service or other practical pursuits. Volunteer to help the Principal with something, and then if and when you get a shape-up letter (and that's a big if), have him write something to columbia on your behalf.</p>
<p>You won't succeed at columbia if you can't self-motivate. If the only thing driving you to get A's was the fear of your parents or fear of rejection, you're gonna be in some deep water come August. So don't turn off the "work hard" switch just because the pressure's off for the moment. It's okay to turn it off because you're putting a higher priority on other things, like your science fair experiment or your music composition or even your sports team if they're really good.</p>
<p>Another example: working a paying job. If Columbia comes to you and says "why'd you get a C in physics second semester?" and your answer is "because I need a bunch of money to pay for your goddamn school, my parents don't have enough, and i'm working my butt off. here's my bank statement showing that i've been saving it all, now stop being so snobby", they'll be much more likely to respect that.</p>
<p>So yeah, it's ok to back off a little. if you get B's, you won't be on anyone's radar. But you can do even worse than that if you have a good reason.</p>
<p>My school organizes time into 4 big blocks. Next semester, one of these blocks is going to become, for me, half block A.P. English Lit review, half block A.P. World review. However, I'm not learning much from World since the class sucks and I know that the teacher of the Eng. review won't do anything academic. Since I know these courses won't be of value to me academically, and I know Columbia won't accept either A.P. score - </p>
<p>would Columbia care if I dropped those two review blocks for a block of independent study of art?</p>
<p>(p.s. I am also taking A.P. Spanish, A.P. Physics / A.P. Calculus, and Photography or a college class)</p>
<p>they may not care (they may not even look closely enough to notice), but in terms of the two APs you're talking about, English Lit and World History (i'm assuming it's world history you're talking about), Columbia will give you nontech elective credits if you get 5s. At least, I got 5s for European History and English Lit (and English Lang and US history) and the credits from that were a key difference in me being able to drop classes and take a lighter schedule.</p>
<p>Yup, just checked my transcript. Received total of 15 AP credits, 3 from Bio, 6 from English (3 Lang, 3 Lit), 6 from History (3 Euro, 3 US). That's basically a semester for free right there - well, in general credits anyway. You can't use those to fulfill major requirements but they count towards the 127 you need to graduate, and count as nontech electives. And trust me when I say I wouldn't have gotten the grades I did without that slack built in.</p>
<p>will they only accept those 5s? blah.</p>
<p>Denzera, I know there's a cap to the amount of credits you can get -- can you choose which APs you get credit for, in the event you have more than the cap? I don't wanna take much science in college, and I got a 5 on bio</p>
<p>do AP credits actually count towards core requirements? in other words, can i fulfill a math requirement with AP stat and calc?</p>
<p>technically, Columbia does not give a damn about students...it would not care if your grades were B's for finals, as long as they are not blatantly bad and glare at the admissions officer when he glances over it. Just do your homework and decent quizes and you're good to go!...</p>