Harvard Chances?

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

Hello!
I was considering on applying to Harvard in a couple of months (you never know unless you don’t try). As a youngster I always wanted to attend Harvard, being that I’m the first generation (besides my older sibling) who is going to college. Some consider me as a minority (I guess) coming from the south side of Europe. My education experience started off excellent then eventually it went completely downhill, and when I say downhill, literally downhill… I know reading this so far makes you think, “no you’re a no go for ivy league.” I thought the same thing myself; I have faced the most crucial/stressful years of my education facing Depression. As of right now, I am pushing myself top notch to get to where I need/want to be.
Don’t get frightened by the stats:
From the top of my head I roughly have:
Unweighted GPA: About 2.7
Weighted:2.8 almost 2.9
(I am working on it)
More stuff regarding tests:
SAT: 2200 ( I don’t know if I want to retake it or not…)
ACT: 27 (re-taking it soon)
(In general, I took these 2 tests once, and it was till the end of Junior year)

Extracurriculars:
Editor of Newspaper
Member of Academic Team/Fencing/Principal Advisory Council
Eventually will get into Newspaper Honor Society (Hopefully become president)
*But other than that, these are all the extracurriculars I can handle, most clubs meet on the same days so what I have is steady.

I have completed over 120 hours of volunteering (this helped me with the “I can’t stay at home situation” I had)

The #1 strength I have in regards to academics is writing, that is something I have excelled at over the years, so I feel that my college essays will give out a significant roar to the Admissions Committee.

Senior year schedule:
AP Chemistry
AP European History
Avid IIII
Pre-Calculus H
AP Literature
World Religions
Journalism

Online Classes:
AP Human Geo and finishing up my second semester of Alg 2 H

To summon up what I wrote, I believe that I can make it somewhere, I don’t know if it will be Harvard, but I will accept the rejection as an accomplishment.

If it is possible to anyone who is viewing this, I would appreciate advice, I am very open to other opinions and suggestions :slight_smile:
Thank you!

Oh and if there are any known miracle stories about Harvard acceptances, feel free to submit them, I like reading them!

2

With that GPA, you would need a miracle, in addition to stunning essays. Somewhere between 0 and 5 Harvard students get admitted with a GPA in that range each year. You can assume they are recruited athletes or similar.

Did you make a mistake calculating it?

3

Well, I am just referring to what my unofficial transcript says, which I received about a week and a half ago. I don’t refer to myself as someone who is recruited for Athletics, or the child of a legacy blah blah, I certainly don’t have $$$$ lying around either. I don’t know what else to say really, I feel that the essays I will write will paint a picture of who I really am and what I stand for. At this point, it’s all a matter of luck really, either I get in or I don’t, whatever happens, happens.

The one thing I am trying to do is to remain positive about all of this.

4

What other schools are you considering?

5

If your primary question is whether you stand a chance for admission at Harvard, sorry to say, it’s almost nil with the current GPA. You have solid test scores, and that can make up some ground at other schools, but not at a place like Harvard. The good news is that other schools will take an interest in you…

6

Boston Area in general. I’m from Florida and I could apply to universities here it’s just the North attracts me more. But back to Boston, I always had BU and Northeastern in my mind, sometimes even Suffolk, but not so much. There are also some colleges in New York like Bard and Vassar that seem nice also, and UChicago… and that’s basically it for “reach” schools…

I asked one of my teachers for their opinion… From what they have said, it seems that I would have a greater chance to apply to Harvard for grad school, I have another 4 years basically to step my game up… but it is all depended.

7

@boolaHI You don’t take holistic admissions into consideration?

8

Not with that GPA.

Underrepresented minorities are generally: African american, latin-american, native-american, pacific islander. Not European.

9

@“aunt bea” “generally”
I get where you are coming from but the Southern part of Europe can be classified as a minority.
You can see there is a good percentage of Latin-Americans that attend prestigious schools and also African-American, but some one who is Balkan-American that is certainly a small percentage as is.

10

@ape073 Well, it’s not so much whether I support holistic admissions (I do), but rather how much emphasis H places on that feature. That said, it is my experience that they do integrate a holistic process to admissions, but one should recognize that it is relative to the incredibly diverse and uber qualified applicant pool from which they select.

If I’m reading correctly your GPA is a B minus or about 2.7 or so. And with all due respect that should be afforded to you, but almost 98-99% of the applicants will have a higher GPA, with the average admitted student at close to 4.0 so, while they have some flex, its very unlikely they will drop down over a whole grade point.

11

For federal aid purposes, it’s the ones I’ve listed. You cannot pick and choose which minorities you think are funded by the federal government.

Balkan is unique, but not considered as a federally classified underrepresented minority.

12

@boolaHI There are tons and tons of applicants who are highly qualified for Harvard, basically they have everything what Harvard considers, but yet they don’t accepted, that is why I basically narrowed it down to just applying and seeing if it is a yes or no.

@“aunt bea” I agree upon the federal aid idea, but generally speaking, Harvard is not the only school but they look for a more diverse group, I might have more of a background coming from a Southern country than someone who comes from the Southern America area (just to give an idea). I do appreciate your opinion though.

Basically, where I am at now, and if I do apply, the worst thing that can happen is that they can just say “no” and it’s not such a shameful moment, at least for me.