<p>I am currently a Freshman at a high school in Georgia. Princeton has always been my dream, and I would love to study there. I was looking to get some advice on courses of action I could take regarding my extracurriculars and academics. Here is a little about me:
Freshman Classes:
Lit/ Comp 9th
IB Career and Technology Survey A (3, 12 week courses on education, architecture/engineering, and culinary arts)
Civics/ Economics 9th
French I
Spanish III
Adv. Physics 9th
Acc. Coordinate Geometry/ Adv. Algebra (Advanced 10th grade math)</p>
<p>My current GPA (almost a third of the way through the school year), is a 4.0 UW.</p>
<p>I'm also on track to take the two sophomore APs available next year, APUSH and AP Bio.
In junior year, I will start the IB diploma programme and take 3-4 HL classes each year.</p>
<p>I've taken a practice SAT and scored an 1870, with a M-590, CR-670, and W-610. I know those are low but I took the test over the summer before 9th grade and I think with more studying and practice I can get them up to 2250, at least. I plan on taking the official SAT and ACT soon.</p>
<p>For my extracurriculars:
Varsity XC
Model UN
Academic bowl (starter)
Mock Trial (starter)</p>
<p>I'm also in boy scouts, and should earn my eagle between 2015-2017. Will this help for Princeton?</p>
<p>One final thing, my grandfather was excommunicated from Poland for being Jewish in 68, and then invited to study at Princeton, where he earned his Ph.D. in economics. </p>
<p>I'm looking for any advice other people who have/ are attended/attending Princeton have regarding anything I should try to improve to boost my chances of getting into Princeton.
Thanks!</p>
<p>“I plan on taking the official SAT and ACT soon.” Why would you do this? You are in 9th grade.</p>
<p>My friend’s mom is a education journalist for the Atlanta Journal Constitution and she says that the people who do the best on the test have usually taken it several times, because they are psychologically prepared for the environment. Do you recommend that I not?</p>
<p>You haven’t even finished geometry. You haven’t had to churn out all those 5 paragraph essays in your high school English classes yet. You aren’t prepared to take the SAT. You will just end up with a score on your record that’s way below your real ability and later you will have to deal with whether colleges will see that score and what they will think about it. Some colleges don’t accept score choice. </p>
<p>I disagree with your friend’s mom. I think the real reason why scores tend to rise with repeated testings is that many kids “try” the SAT without having seriously prepared. They get a score they don’t like, then they prepare, then they do better. Personally, I think that’s a waste of time and money. They can get a good idea where they are weak just using practice tests. Practicing the material definitely helps and learning to pace yourself is important. Also make sure you understand how the test is scored. I would suggest to any student, start preparing <em>at least</em> several months in advance. Expensive test prep classes aren’t necessary. Self-discipline is. Get one or two SAT prep books and work through them, and take timed tests to get used to the timing. </p>
<p>If you take the SAT in October (or December) of your junior year, that gives you time for at least two retakes if necessary. If you prepared well, you may not have to retake and you will be glad of that when you are preparing for your other spring exams. But if you’re really anxious about it and want a practice sitting, I suggest you take it in the spring of your sophomore year and use the results over the summer to prepare for a retake. </p>
<p>I told my own daughter, prepare well, do it once and be done with it. She worked her way through Barrons in her spare time during the summers after freshman and sophomore years and took the SAT as a junior in the fall. It worked very well for her. She started early enough to prep without stress or panic in easily manageable sessions (usually 1 hour or less). We didn’t even discuss the SAT or colleges until after freshman year, because I feel that kids are stressing way too much about these things for way too long and I wanted her to enjoy high school without worrying about colleges. Probably not the norm on this forum though.</p>
<p>You will (I hope) be a far different person by the time you have to apply for colleges, compared with who you are today. Four years is a really, really long time. Even between my HS senior fall and senior spring, I changed a lot, I grew a lot, and my desires and goals changed dramatically. </p>
<p>I would suggest that any freshman who says “I would love to study [at Princeton]” cannot actually know if that’s true. Not yet, anyway. It might be true! But it’s way too early to say.</p>
<p>Sorry, I don’t mean to belittle you. But, as a current Princeton senior, I would say, ease off on the college-prep and focus on enjoying high school instead. Study hard, figure out what you like, get the most out of your classes and extracurriculars. Turn this energy towards things that you can do NOW, instead of working towards Princeton as some mythical goal. I know it’s not helpful and that’s pretty cliched advice. Sorry!</p>
<p>Also, avoid this forum. Come back as a junior, maybe, or a senior. :P</p>
<p>I think colleges look favorably on Eagle Scouts but I think the organization’s reputation has been tarnished a bit recently…
(Starter) doesn’t mean anything; you should be able to demonstrate your passion/ability for/at an extracurricular with your essays and any awards/leadership positions you earn.</p>
<p>Also you might want to look up what ‘excommunicate’ means. You don’t get excommunicated from Poland</p>
<p>General advice:</p>
<p>-Study for sophomore PSATs
-Look into selective summer programs that interest you
-Plan out your high school course load trajectories
-Consider self-studying APs
-Plan out which SAT IIs you think you would take (e.g. You have an awesome Chem teacher, so you think you’ll be prepared well for the SAT II)
-As you explore ECs and narrow them down, think of which ones will give you most room to grow in and excel. Don’t just focus on the position you can get - focus on the accolades you can accomplish.
-Don’t do everything for the Common App. Spend some time exploring outside interests to make your life more interesting and meaningful.
-If you can get the 97 without forgoing meaningful commitment to an EC you love and are great at, go for it. If not, the 94 or 95 is fine. Colleges care less about marginal differences in GPA than they do about actual character and demonstrated accomplishments.</p>