Growing up in a failing school district...

<p>Will it affect my chances of gaining admission at all (applied ED to Columbia) if I come from a failing high school (we don't meet the required state testing scores and we don't have enough kids graduating either). My school district sends out letters saying that the state (Idaho) will pay all fees associated with transferring to a passing school, but there are NO passing schools within a 110 mile radius. So will this explain my crappy standardized test scores (2000 SAT, 30 ACT), or will it somehow harm me that I didn't try to "overcome the failure that is my high school?"</p>

<p>Colleges get a school profile at lists all of the school's information and statistics. They should be able to see that in there, but don't start expecting that reason alone to work to your advantage or gain you admission. Did you take the toughest available course load?</p>

<p>r u ranked high in ur school?</p>

<p>I'm not too worried about the vigor of courses. I took all three AP's that were available, and even will graduate from the local community college with 3 associates degrees next semester. I was just wondering if my crappy high school was going to be compared to an elite private school during the admissions process...</p>

<p>I am ranked 20 out of 460 kids, but they don't weight the ranking GPA's. I have a 3.99 UW, and like a 4.1 W, but all of the kids in front of me have just been taking potery and art classes to boost their GPA.</p>

<p>It won't be compared with private schools, trust me. They also know that your rank is based off of UW GPA, so I still think you should not believe your school will hurt you. I think all the community college work you did will definitely be a huge boost.</p>

<p>2000 and 30 are 'crappy'? Haha! I'm pretty sure that colleges will be wayyy more impressed with your ALREADY-SUPERB test scores considering the quality of your education, but I'm not sure about anything else.</p>

<p>I know they aren't crappy (I think all of this CC forum watching has indocternated me into thinking that if any test score has more than 1,000 people who achieved it, then it's just average). I'm just glad that this stress will be over with soon.</p>