<p>I'm a senior applying to selective schools, with a 4.0 W GPA and a 2020 (640M-640CR-740W) SAT score.</p>
<p>I have solid EC's, recs, essays, etc. There's only one thing I'm worried about: my junior year workload.</p>
<p>Junior year, I made the mistake of not challenging myself; in a school that offers many AP's, I chose to only do two honors classes. Needless to say, I received all A+'s first semester. Thus, I truly didn't challenge myself.</p>
<p>This year, things are much different. I've learned from my mistake, and am in 3 AP + 1 honors classes. I'm doing great in all of them.</p>
<p>How would this look to a college? On one hand, I didn't challenge myself junior year and had 6 A+'s to prove it...but on the other hand, I'm doing great now with a heavy workload!</p>
<p>How would you see this? How would this affect my chances at selective schools (not Harvard per se, but other great ones)?</p>
<p>If you were on admissions, what would you think? I mean, the whole point of honors/AP classes is to truly show your potential, and thats what I'm doing now.</p>
<p>Well… was there any particular reason you didn’t take a heavier courseload during junior year?
Perhaps you were out of focus and you lost interest in academics…I’ve had that once
(eventually I got motivated and hard-working again)
If that is the case, talk about how and why you wandered off…any interesting thoughts you had then?
Even if you were just feeling lazy or overly grade conscious or slacking off,
as long as you have a well-told story to go with it, I think you should be fine.</p>
<p>Your junior year courseload may come back to bite you in the a$$ with top colleges. Or, to answer your question more directly, it doesn’t look good.</p>
<p>There is a mistaken assumption that colleges are looking to see what you can do and what your potential is. What the top colleges are looking for is simple: kids who have taken the hardest course loads throughout high school and done consistently well. They want mostly As in the hardest classes your school offered.</p>
<p>If your counselor is not able to check the box that says you took your school’s most challenging load, you will not be a serious candidate at any college ranked near Harvard.</p>
<p>And on a related note, with this course load it doesn’t sound possible that your rank could be in range for top schools.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies, although they aren’t exactly as upbeat as I’d hoped. I’d love to hear more advice/anecdotes on this situation, if anyone has any! </p>
<p>Everything you’ve heard so far is true. Most schools want to see you challenge yourself in school (80% of the state flagships rate rigor of schedule as very important). You did not.</p>
<p>OP - This issue goes away if you create a well-balanced list of safeties, matches, and reaches. Given your (stated) focus on selective schools, a balanced list is even more important for you than for the typical student. </p>
<p>BTW, how much improvement are you anticipate when you retake the SATs? (You do know that most selective schools ignore the W score, right?)</p>