<p>^^ hunbun’s problem isn’t getting in. It’s getting in with substantial FINANCIAL AID. Big difference.</p>
<p>Hey, I’m a French student too, in ES (l’elite sociale) like you! Say, how did you explain your GPA in your common app? I have a 16/20, which translates to a 3.2GPA and might make me look really bad… Any additional info you have would be great, especially for financial aid! My parents make far more that 65k before taxes, but considering the tax rate and their unwillingness to pay, I’m ****ed.</p>
<p>You report your grades on the scale they are given. If you want to report a GPA at all, it would be out of 20 points. The international supplement lets you indicate an approximate grade equivalence. WES suggests the following equivalence: [WES</a> Grade Conversion Guide](<a href=“http://www.wes.org/gradeconversionguide/]WES”>Country Resources - WES.org)</p>
<p>ABOUT GRADES</p>
<p>I agree with @bar!um, put your GPA on a 20 scale.
But I have this link (qui vient du site officiel de l’Acad</p>
<p>Hey, thanks for all the info. Problem is, my parents make above 300k before taxes, but refuse to pay, since my dad did it by himself and thinks it’s a life lesson. He’ll only pay if it’s Harvard or Yale. For the commonapp translation, I think I’ll manage, since my english teacher agreed to do the translation so that I won’t mess with it haha. The school reports are kind of a problem, since it’s my counselor’s first time dealing with the commonapp, so I have to press him every so often. I’m 16 right now, but my home life is a little complicated, so I’d much rather leave as soon as possible.</p>
<p>I’m in Terminale right now, so I only have my first half of the bac, but grades are a problem (my bac grades are on average 3 points higher than my school grades) since my teachers are really harsh. Again, thanks for the link, I’ll make sure to include that in the additional info section. Hope we do well!</p>
<p>If you have a 16/20 GPA in Terminale, what PROBLEM are you talking about?! Haha, your grades are amazing!! I don’t remember what I posted earlier but as a matter of fact, I had a 14.5/20 overall GPA in Terminale. And I got a 17.3 for my bac. So you’re off to have a 18 or maybe 19 on your bac. That’s Harvard material! (with relevant ECs of course…).</p>
<p>Well, my grades are pretty unbalanced for one (I had a 14 average in science, and I got 18 on the science bac) and I REALLY suck at philosophy. Also, what school forms did you send? Your bulletins annuels or trimestriels? From which years? I had a slump in 2de with horrible grades, so I might not want to send that haha. So which are mandatory? Thanks for the encouragement.</p>
<p>What’s mandatory are transcripts from your last two years of high school. I decided to send my Livret Scolaire. It has all the info needed, your annual grade in each subject compared to your class from Premiere and Terminale, ratings of your skills and teacher’s comments. Plus the table form is short, easy to read and understand.
But since you’re not done with Term… I think you will need to send Seconde grades (annuels or trimestriels doesn’t really matter, so pick what’s looks best for you). I don’t know if you could get away with sending only your grades of Premi</p>
<p>Actually let me rephrase that : transcripts from 9th grade are mandatory. So that means from Troisi</p>
<p>Oh des fran</p>
<p>Hey! Yup you’re not the only one!!
T’envoies tes dossiers dans quels unis si ce n’est pas indiscret? :)</p>
<p>Yeah that’s great! 
Alors Harvard, Uchic, Columbia, Vassar, Williams, Hopkins!
And from what I’ve seen you’re applying to NYUAD? Bonne chance avec le 0,9 prct d’admission de l’an dernier m</p>
<p>C’est trop gentil!! Merci beaucoup! On verra si j’arrive </p>
<p>Use English. Seriously. </p>
<p>My guess is that via PM, it’s fine, but the forum posts are for everyone to see. Since this is a predominantly American forum, English is the language to be used.</p>
<hr>
<p>I only wanted to point out that Vassar is not a safety. For anyone. Let alone, international students…</p>
<p>Don’t dismiss liberal arts colleges as “less selective” or “easier to get into.” Your mileage may vary, but just about every the small liberal arts college I’ve looked into places a lot of value on “fit.” That is, “why is this school the right one for you?”, “what is it about us that makes you WANT to be here?”, “what can you contribute to our COMMUNITY?”, and so forth.</p>
<p>I suppose that would apply for all colleges which don’t conduct admissions on the basis of numbers alone. Do consider that liberal arts colleges generally have a much smaller student body, and I’d imagine that because of that, “fit” would indeed be very important.</p>
<p>@Sombre : Sorry about the French-writing, won’t happen again.</p>
<p>I asked Frenchissima if Vassar was her safety because of all the schools he/she is applying to, Vassar is by far the least selective one. It has a 22% admission rate, compared to Williams’ 17% or Harvard 8% or so. So if you JUST look at the numbers, Vassar is “easier” to get into than Williams, UChicago or Columbia. </p>
<p>Well I don’t particularly think LACs are easier to get into, you still have to be an excellent well rounded student to go the top tier ones. However, COMPARED to the Ivies, your chances are much higher. Plus, smaller colleges are often looking for a multicultural student body: for their school reputation, and for the whole diversity theme it would bring to their campus. I know Sarah Lawrence has a 22% international student body and is looking for good international students. I don’t know much about Vassar though… Bigger, world-renoun colleges already have that diversity. People from all over the world know about Harvard and Yale, and are applying to Harvard and Yale. They can raise the bar as high as they want. So I would say it’s harder for an international to get into those top universities cause you are really competiting with the best-est-est students of the world for a max of 10% international student body. Tough.</p>
<p>And btw, ALMOST ALL colleges/universities want their students to be a “fit” for them. Especially the good colleges/unis. The point is to see who’s really interested in attending that particular campus. And of course, with the same stats, the one who’s passionate for the college will be chosen. Every supplement will ask the question “Why X?”. It’s your job to adjust your response for every school, particularly if you’re applying to many. And either way, why would I apply somewhere I really don’t want to go? Doesn’t make sense.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s as cut and dry as “with the same stats, the one who’s most passionate will be chosen.” At the top colleges, you really can’t tell. Maybe they DON’T want more people who badly want to be there. Diversity and what have you. I don’t buy it.</p>
<p>Acceptance rates for international students are LOW at all of these schools. Can’t find the exact post, but I think it was b@r!um who had read a magazine which had the acceptance rates for international students as well. Even without that, if one looks hard enough for the numbers and computes them, one will find that acceptance rates for international students are indeed lower than the overall ones.</p>
<p>I think more research is in order. Thousands of qualified international students apply to the same list of globally-known universities. That creates a lot of frustrated students, who may be qualified, but don’t get admitted because there simply is too much competition. There are some highly-rated LACs that give financial aid to International students and are seeking out international students. Those schools want a mix of international students. But, as Sombre wrote, they are going to be much more interested to know why you want to attend their school, and what you will contribute to the school. It isn’t enough to change a few lines on your why I want to go to __________ essay. And, they may want to know why you want to be a lawyer in NYC. Why is that your dream? I don’t think simple ambition is going to be enough. Your response about Vassar shows that you need to do more research - Vassar is nobody’s safety school. It’s not just based an statistics.</p>
<p>Without reading the whole discussion, I wanted to second Sombre’s statement that international admission rates at LACs with financial aid for international students are generally lower than the overall admission rate. Peterson’s used to publish international admission rates separately, but unfortunately not any longer. Here are a couple numbers I posted on this forum in 2008. The format is overall admission rate, domestic admission rate, international admission rate.</p>
<p>Universities
Harvard: 9% 9% 5%
MIT: 12% 14% 4%
John Hopkins: 24% 25% 12%
Emory: 27% 27% 28%
NYU: 37% 38% 28%
BU: 58% 60% 39%</p>
<p>LACs
Williams: 17% 19% 9%
Swarthmore: 17% 19% 6%
Haverford: 25% 26% 12%
Colby: 31% 35% 14%
Bryn Mawr: 45% 52% 12%
Berea: 28% 40% 4%</p>
<p>Within the international pool, you have to distinguish between international financial aid applicants and full-paying applicants. An admissions representative from Colby posted the following piece of information on CC a few years ago:</p>
<p>The previous year, Colby received about 1,000 applications from international students, 90% of them seeking financial aid. They only had funding for 10 international students though. </p>
<p>That year Colby accepted most of its full-paying international applicants and only a handful of its aid-seeking international applicants. That appears to be typical for LACs. Notice for example Berea’s international admission rate. It’s so low because every international applicant at Berea is asking for financial aid. The international admission rates at other LACs are higher because they are an average of the aid-seeking admission rate (probably just as low as Berea’s) and the full-paying admission rate (probably fairly high).</p>
<p>Berea College is not in the same class of colleges as the others on your list. It’s mission is different, and it is not well-known in the US. All LACs do not have the same rules for international applicants. Some are not need blind, but they do commit to meeting the demonstrated financial need of admitted international students. Macalester College is in that category. Few US colleges are need blind in admissions - especially for international students. Other colleges seek out international students who can pay full tuition.</p>
<p>I never made a statement to the contrary. What is it that you are trying to say? </p>
<p>My point was the following: the admission rates for aid-seeking international applicants are low everywhere. Berea’s international admission rate reflects this directly. Other colleges’ international admission rates are a weighted average of the aid-seeking and non-aid-seeking admission rates, and one has to be more careful interpreting the numbers. </p>
<p>By the way, no liberal arts college is well-known in the US. The average American hasn’t heard of any of them.</p>