<p>I am 14 turning 15 in May and am considering getting a G.E.D, because I am home schooled. I know the younger I am when I get it the better. I also have heard that the G.E.D is frowned upon by Universities... I want to get into the top tier Universities (Ivy's Cambridge etc) so I don't want to do anything that will hurt my chances... The reason for getting my G.E.D is because, I am planning on starting my Associates at the local community college asap. So I was wondering if any one could give me any insight to the way Universities look at people with G.E.Ds especially younger people like myself.</p>
<p>I’m not familiar with how colleges consider GEDs, particularly for younger students, you might have better luck asking on the Homeschooling forum. </p>
<p>I do however have a comment. I would be concerned that taking college courses AFTER your GED might cause schools to consider you a transfer rather than a fr applicant. Taking college coursework during HS is not a problem for fr admissions, but post-HS college courses can be. Colleges have different definitions of who is a fr and who is a transfer applicant. Being classified as a transfer applicant can range from taking a single post-HS college class (eg. GWU) to anything less than a full year of post-HS coursework (eg. Yale).</p>
<p>Selective colleges have low acceptance rates for fr applicants, and many have even lower rates for transfers (eg. about 8 and 2%, respectively for Yale), and some do not accept transfers at all (eg. Princeton, Middlebury some years).</p>
<p>So what if instead of starting off at the local community college, I went straight to applying to the big universities? If so I have some more questions.
1 what does fr stand for, freshman right?
2 Instead of G.E.D i should just stick to Sat… (because of my homeschooling are there any other test you recommend taking? if not don’t worry about it I’m going to repost this in the homeschool section…)
Also thanks for posting 
i didn’t think any one would…</p>
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<p>What I am saying is that if you choose to get your GED and then take college courses, you need to understand how those courses impact your admissions status because transfer admissions tend to be tougher than fr admissions at selective colleges.</p>
<ol>
<li>Yes.</li>
<li>SAT and/or ACT; SAT Subject tests; AP tests. As I said, I’m not familiar with home schooling, but I would guess that standardized testing would be very important for a home schooled applicant since they don’t have traditional gpa and ranking.</li>
</ol>
<p>ok. I definitely have a much better understanding, thank you so much!!</p>
<p>You’re welcome. Consider reading some books about college admissions. One I like is Admission Matters by Sally Springer, it’s up to date and practical. I found it at our local library.</p>
<p>For selective schools, being particularly younger is not an advantage. It’s about “fit” and the ability to be part of the “community”. Many serious applicants to those schools probably fulfilled their states’ minimum requirements for HS graduation at 15 pr 16 as well but stayed to milk their high schools of top and rigorous offerings. That may or may not be done at the community college. Getting an associates degree will put you into being a potential transfer – a very bad position if you’re serious about attending a selective school (almost impossible admit rates)</p>
<p>ok. So continue with studying for those tests, taking the tests, and building my Ecs… Ill definitely have to get some books. @T26E4 do you think I would be better off waiting until I am older to apply to these Universities? When would you say would be a good age to apply? (I know I will not be applying in the NEAR future because, the only test Ive taken is the accuplacer… Still need SAT etc)</p>