Hello, I fear my freshman year has ruined me. My current dream school is Brown University, and I know of the thousands and thousands of top students who get rejected. Would my terrible freshman grades take away any of my chances of getting accepted already? This is solely based on my academics.
Courses I took this year:
Economics/Personal Finance- Final grade in economics: 94 // Final grade in Personal Finance: 96
Spanish 2- Final grade: 94
Physical Education/Health- Final grade in PE: 96 // Final grade in Health: 98
Honors Biology- Final grade: 79 (I know, extremely bad. I had an 83 but failed the final which dropped my grade 4 points at the last minute. Anything related to science has always been my weakest subject).
Algebra 1- Final grade: 90
Honors Social Studies- Final grade: 88
Honors ELA- Final grade: 89 (Pissed at myself for this one. I had about a 92 or 93, but finals screwed me over at the last minute like biology).
Public Speaking/Modes of Writing- Final grade in Public Speaking: 92 // Final grade in Modes of Writing: 90
The only honors/AP course(s) offered in my grade that I didn’t take (not including electives) were Spanish 2 Honors and AP Biology.
I know it’s impossible to really tell if my freshman year will make it impossible for me to get accepted to Brown since you have no knowledge of my grades during the next few years, but I just need to know if my freshman grades are so bad that there’s no real chance for me at all anymore. I slacked off this year big time. If I were to be ranked this year with my other peers, I would end up around the top 15-20% which makes me feel so discouraged since over 90% of Brown students ended up in the top 10% of their class. I plan to make a steep upward trend for the rest of high school. Please excuse any grammatical mistakes or spelling mistakes. I hope I receive some feedback and feel free to ask about any more information. Thank you.
Many top colleges will tell you that 9th grade is not a big factor in their review of your records, unless you start out strong and then tank. The big years the majority of schools will be looking at will be sophomore, junior, and the first half of your senior year.
That being said, the odds against Brown (or any Ivy) are so great that finding other dreams for your post high school years is probably a good idea. You need other reasons to motivate yourself to do well in the years ahead.
I know “there are lots of great colleges out there” is a cliche, and right now you may believe there is no place more awesome than Brown, but the happiest seniors are the ones who can post, “I had ten great options on my list, and I got accepted to six of them. Help me decide!!!”
Thanks for your response! I do have other places I would love to attend, but Brown is just my number one choice right now even though it’s nearly impossible to get accepted.
Assuming you are a freshman – Stop thinking about college. Enjoy high school and your classes for reasons other than what elite school you can get into.
@fireandrain Stop thinking about college? I’m going to be a sophomore after this summer and it’s only going to be about two years until I apply early to somewhere. Time is going to fly by. And as you assumed in your comment that I’m focusing all of my time to get into an elite school, I’m just stressed about my current stats and speaking about one of my many top choices. To me, the main idea of high school is preparing me for college. If I “stop thinking about college” and just “enjoy high school”, what’s the point really? Besides, I never said the sole thing I’m focusing on is college in high school. I spend a lot of time with my friends, join clubs, and enjoy the general environment, but college is my main priority like it should be.
@phantomtroupe — your experiences in high school should prepare you for college. Learning to learn, not just getting grades, will prepare you for college. Getting good grades helps, but the effort required to get those grades can vary tremendously from school to school and student to student. If you’re not also learning how to learn, and think, and developing all the skills you will actually need to be IN college, then you’ll have wasted your time. FOCUSING excessively on a single school, when you likely know little about the vast array of excellent schools out there, is unhealthy and, in the case of a school with an overall acceptance rate below 10%, unwise. Enjoying the time you are in high school, as @fireandrain suggested, does not mean you shouldn’t prepare for college. But if you never live in the present then you won’t really enjoy the fruits of your hard work, even if you do get into your “dream school” down the road. What then? Get into a great college and begin worrying about grad school? As a parent who’s watched a lot of high schoolers go through an extreme degree of stress about the college application process beginning ever earlier in their high school careers, I think @fireandrain’s advice is about right.
There’s no sense in being stressed about something two years in advance. Stress can really affect someone.
Nobody can chance you at this point, either, so nobody can ease your stress. You are 33% done with the classes you’ll have at the time of application; you are a year or two away from PSAT, SAT, ACT. All you can do is your best. If you don’t feel like you did your best this year, fine, do better / work harder. But picking a school two years early does you no favors. Work hard, pursue interests that you enjoy, and choose schools based on three years of effort, not one.
Seriously, we see so many freshmen (AND MIDDLE SCHOOLERS) overcome with stress about college admissions years too early. They come back with question after question, all asking the same type of thing. Am I screwed? Will I ever get in? Help me plan my next four years down to the minute?
Thank you, listenmissy and bodangles, for explaining my point.
Here’s how it is supposed to work – you take a challenging curriculum, you study hard, you get involved in activities you love and contribute to your community, you take standardized tests – and then, based on the resulting GPA and rank and test scores and resume, you look for colleges that make sense based on your accomplishments. Forget about dream schools as a freshman.
You don’t apply to college for another 2 and half years. Do you remember what it was like to be in the middle of seventh grade? Does that seem like a long time ago? Have you changed a lot in the last 2 1/2 years? Well, you are going to change as much in the next 2 1/2 years.
I just think it’s sad that you are already thinking so much about college that you are stressing out about your freshman year grades. It’s so so sad that you think that you are “ruined.”
@fireandrain @bodangles @listenmissy I understand what you guys are saying and it’s a good point, but you guys missed a part of my response. I clearly said college isn’t the SOLE thing I’m focusing on but one of my main ideas. I still spend plenty of time with extracurriculars, friends, and learning as one of you mentioned is important. And as I said before (AGAIN), Brown isn’t the only place I’m focusing on. I was “speaking about one of my many top choices”. I’m not totally obsessed and thinking about it 24/7. Of course, I would be overjoyed if I did happen to get in in the future, but I wouldn’t be too worked up over not since there’s plenty of other schools I would love to attend. Brown is just the most prestigious school by far that I want to go to which is why I was curious to know if my freshman year has ruined that. I would be perfectly fine attending one of my less competitive college choices, but I just wanted to see my position after freshman year. Maybe I exaggerated about being ruined and all that and I apologize. Sressed was the wrong word to use for me, but it just nagged me and made me nervous that my chances may have decreased after this year. I know it’s the next few years that matter the most, but I was just curious.
Sorry, I meant to say, “I wouldn’t be too worked up over it”.
Not sure what you would do with the information.
Would you work less hard as a soph if in fact you had “ruined” your chances at Brown ?
I would hope not, you should work hard to get good grades from here on out, every year you are in school.
Slacking off is never good, but if you end it here, you can recover and be successful, maybe at Brown,
maybe elsewhere.
If you do the great things other Brown admits do, from this point forward, you have some chance IMO.
High grades going forward, high SAT, and meaningful EC (something you love and can excel at).
@blevine Thank you for your response! Before posting this thread, I did know that the amount of information I provided was too little but I just posted it anyway out of curiosity. And to answer your question, of course not! Like I mentioned before, Brown was just the most prestigious out of my many choices. I would love to go to plenty of other colleges, but I simply wanted to know any feedback on Brown because it’s the most competitive. Although it won’t be easy since my courses will get consistently harder each year, I hope to maintain a steep upward trend. I slacked off this year and learned my lesson after taking a look at my final grades. I appreciate your feedback and advice.
Courses will be harder for all your classmates too.
Don’t psych yourself out now. Do your best in class,
and do something to stand out, outside the classroom.
Find something you enjoy and can get recognition for the
work involved in that activity. Grades alone will not get you
into the ivies.
@blevine Yeah, but it’s pretty hard being able to stand out with so many people applying to the same college. I’ll just stick to what I enjoy doing.This year, I got a poem and an essay published in a book from an online writing website although it’s not too competitive (I believe 49% get published). I love writing and especially poetry. One of the clubs I joined this year was the poetry club and it was one of my favorite places to be at in school. Hopefully, this helps me a little bit when I’m in the admissions process. May I ask if you’re in college right now?
If you haven’t checked it out yet: Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. Dang cool if you move from regional to national level and win there.
Parent here, graduated long ago.
I went to school in New England, did have some friends
from Brown, but not my school.
Just finished this process with 2 kids though.
Both were not stellar, grade wise, freshman year of HS.
Both took hard classes anyway, soph and beyond.
Both did much better soph and beyond.
Both had substantive EC related to their passions.
Both got into very competitive colleges, one
an ivy, the other a top engineering school.
So I speak from experience, a mediocre freshman year
will not kill you.
@bodangles Thanks for your suggestion! I’ll check it out and find out more information about that.
@blevine For some reason I didn’t see your comment yesterday. Congrats to your kids! And thanks for the feedback. I feel a lot better about my scores from this year.
@phantomtroupe I am the parent of a student who was accepted to Brown. I really think you need to let go of your worries about your freshman year “ruining” your chances for ANYwhere. Or bolstering them, for that matter. You might find this blog post, from the MIT Admissions Office. Note especially the comment that, “There is nothing, literally nothing, that in and of itself will get you in to MIT.” All of it could just as easily apply to any highly selective school.
http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/applying_sideways
Also a tip: posting your stats and asking for chances is an exercise in futility and a good way to garner completely inappropriate and inaccurate replies, often from fellow high-school students who have literally no clue about the inner workings of college admissions offices.