Iffy GPA- Please chance me for top schools

Chance Me / Match Me!
1

<p>Hi! First of all, I want to thank you for taking the time to read this and chance me. I am a rising senior at a competitive private school on the East Coast. I know that my GPA is the weakest part of my application, but I'm hoping that my strengths will help me a bit. Please chance me for Yale, Stanford, Swarthmore, Brown, Dartmouth & UPenn. Thanks! </p>

<p>UW GPA: 3.6 [9th: 3.4, 10th: 3.5, 11th: 4.0, 12th: 4.0!]
*Note that I attended a very poorly-ranked public school for my first 2 years of high school. In addition, I was dealing with serious familial and social problems which negatively affected my health and in turn, my academics.</p>

<p>My school does not weight or rank, but I am estimated to be #11 out of 73 students. The highest UW cumulative GPA at my school on a 100-point scale is a 94.</p>

<p>SAT I: 2310 M:710 CR:800 W:800
Subjects: Bio:800, Literature:800, Spanish:760
APs: Enviro:5, Psych:5, USHist:5 English Lang:5 </p>

<p>EC's:
-Leadership at an environmental NGO (11, 12)
-Apart of a young delegate program [I was the youngest] connected to NGO, in which I spoke at the U.N and climate change delegations around the nation as well as at Earth Summits in foreign countries (11, 12)
-Founder & Chair of Environmental Youth Corps (11, 12)
-Unpaid intern with city's waste/recycling department (10, 11, 12)
-I developed a composting program utilized by all city public schools, aided recycling campaign, did lab research & made public aware about a water issue which was causing cancer, etc..
-Environmental Club/Green Team (9, 10, 11, 12) President (12)
-Literary Magazine (10, 11, 12) [there are no staff positions]
-Photography Club (11, 12) President (12)</p>

<p>Volunteerism:
Work with autistic child for 3 years (10, 11, 12)
Loads of local environmental volunteer work (10, 11, 12)</p>

<p>Work:
Photojournalist
Freelance writer [published in numerous magazines]
Waitress
Babysitter</p>

<p>Awards:
I have won/placed in state, regional, national & international science/environmental competitions and have won local, state, regional and national writing and photography competitions.</p>

2

<p>The only thing that I could see significantly hurting you is that you attended a poor public school but did not do well there. While you may have had health issues and an upward trend, schools want to see you excel in the face of adversity. If you explain it well enough, you could still have a decent shot. Everything else looks good though!</p>

3

<p>Although the school is poorly-ranked, I took difficult classes and the students within these classes were quite competitive. Considering the circumstances, I feel that a B+ average was very good. How would I go about explaining my situation? Thank you for replying!</p>

4

<p>It is impossible to chance these kinds of situations. Even students with the same record as you except they have, say, a 3.85+, cannot be told they have a better than 10-20% chance at the Ivies and similar schools. The admit % shows that; while certainly there are students that apply to Harvard, et. al. that have no business applying, most that get turned down are excellent students that simply drew the short straw, so to speak.</p>

<p>Your GPA is an issue, absolutely. I have to also tell you that there are numerous students that do poorly for a year, sometimes two, and have the same story as you. You actually didn’t even do poorly, just not as well as last year and not Ivy standards. I am not trying to belittle your reasons, nor be overly cynical. But you will need more than just your word about these issues, such as support documents from doctors and/or mental health professionals. That is simply the reality of the situation, harsh as it may seem.</p>

<p>Be sure you have substantive back-up schools in case you get rejected by all of the ones you mention. I completely understand having the dream of attending a highly prestigious school, whether it is for the prestige itself (bad reason) or because these are really great schools with really smart people there (good reason). But assuming it is the latter, trust me when I say there are lots of schools that have that situation where you can definitely (or almost definitely) get an acceptance. You don’t need the Yale name to get a great education and do well in the next step of your life, whatever you currently plan for that to be.</p>

5

<p>I see a psychologist and have seen quite a few therapists over the years… Hopefully, this will serve as evidence enough of my problems.</p>

<p>I completely understand and am aware of what you are talking about. I realize that my grades unfortunately have diminished my chances at top universities. I am working on compiling a list of ‘match’ and ‘safety’ schools. By the way, I’m aiming for top schools because I want to be surrounded by intelligent people, taught by amazing professors and simply learn in the best environment.</p>

6

<p>Can I please also be chanced for Carnegie Mellon, Tufts, Vassar, Bard, and Middlebury?</p>

<p>Oh, and in terms of my major, I’m thinking about pursuing Environmental Studies/Science or Journalism.</p>

7

<p>You can find motivated, bright students at any university.</p>

8

<p>I know, but top schools have a challenging, stimulating learning environment which is what I desire.</p>

9

<p>You certainly can try for them, although your latest list is as much of a reach as the first, except for CMU. Better shot there. Very tough at this point for you. Like I said, it isn’t like you did really poorly or anything, so with a little luck you can get a break at one of them. Your SAT’s, combined with your imrovement and supporting documentation about your early issues will potentially cause one of them to put you over the top.</p>

<p>Otherwise you might want to look at the next tier of schools like Vandy, Emory, USC, Tulane, Wake Forest, etc. where you might get in for some and will get in for others and still get a challenging learning environment. Then if you do well and still think the other schools suit you better, you can look to transfer. Not always easy, but it can be done in some cases.</p>

10

<p>I suggest you deal with whatever issues you faced directly in the application as you need to explain the low GPA in 9th and 10th grade. Also, I would suggest getting an additional recommendation from someone who can corroborate and speak to the difficulties you faced - this will add more weight to your essay. </p>

<p>I would be hesitant to overdue the therapist aspect as I think some admissions people might see this as a red flag - you don’t want them thinking you have serious mental health issues. </p>

<p>Overall, I think your best hope for the really top schools is if you’ve won some prestigious national/international competitions - you say you have. This could overcome the lower GPA. So, if you could expand on the awards you’ve won, I probably could give you a better sense of where you stand.</p>

11

<p>Thank you for your reply, Cubsfan. Where in my application would I mention the issues that I faced? As for my recommendation, I’m not quite sure what kind of person would write this… any ideas?</p>

<p>Yes, I completely understand. It’s just that, as someone already mentioned, I don’t want them to think that i’m over-dramatizing my issues… I’m not sure what to do.</p>

<p>Some of the more prestigious awards I’ve won are the Gold National Scholastic awards in poetry and photography, NCTE Creative Nonfiction writing award, 2nd place in the international Volvo Adventure competiton, 4th place Intel ISEF [as a team] and my smaller awards include 1st place in local writing contests, 1st place in state photography contests, and 1st place at state and regional science fairs.</p>

12

<p>You could mention it your common app essay or in the school supplement. (I think most of the Ivy supplements will let you write about anything you want in the supplemental essay).</p>

<p>I can’t really speak to who to ask - you would know better than me. (Possibly your guidance counselor could address it if he/she is aware of the situation).</p>

<p>It’s your call about how to handle the therapist. My gut tells me that it’s probably best just to present the situation, how it impacted you, and how you overcame it - with the stress being on how you overcame it. I think the facts of what happened will speak for themselves. (But I am not a professional. You might want to approach your school college counselor, or even a private college couselor, about this and get more professional advice.)</p>

<p>Those are some nice awards.</p>

<p>Also, for the schools that have score choice, I would just send the SAT IIs that are an 800.</p>

13

<p>You may be right about just presenting the situation. As I intimated earlier though, the sad truth is many kids try to excuse poor freshman or even freshman/sophomore years by saying they had XYZ issue, when in fact they just had no discipline. Again, let me be clear that I am not saying that I think that is the case here. What I am saying is that admissions people hear it all the time, and so I would be afraid that without corroberation they might just sigh and say, oh not another one. But I don’t really know, either. I think you are right that if the guidance counselor is aware of the situation, they should mention it in their rec. I don’t believe most admissions people hold having this kind of an issue against people.</p>

14

<p>Thanks a lot, both of you. The thing is that since I was dealing with these obstacles at my old school, my guidance counselor at my private school is unaware of my past problems. Should I tell her?</p>

15

<p>Without first hand knowledge on the part of the current guidance counselor, it won’t sound credible. I think you should just move forward with your apps, because like I said your GPA isn’t really that bad. If it holds you back at the most select schools, so be it. There really is no going back, what’s done is done. You will get into a number of fine schools anyway, and perhaps you will be fortunate enough to get into one of the dream schools. You could try one approach at some schools, where you provide supporting evidence from a therapist or whomever, and some where you just go for it based on your record. Otherwise short of getting expert advice from a real admissions counselor at a university, or a retired one, I am not sure what else you can do.</p>

16

<p>Thanks so much. You’re right…I’m just going to go for it.</p>

17

<p>It just seems to me that you’re the profile of the type of student that Princeton wants to admit. I’m a parent and new to the application process, but I recently was reading Princeton’s admission’s site and they described the kind of person who has a passion for something and has acted on it. In your case it’s your track record on environmental issues. You stand out because of the things that you initiated, such as founding and chairing environmental youth corps and developing a city-wide composting program. I know for a fact that a student from my son’s very competitive public school was admitted to Princeton with a 3.33 gpa so they definitely don’t require a minimum gpa when there are other overriding favorables. Your SATs, subject tests and AP scores are enviable and clearly enhance your profile and your EC’s make you stand out. Good Luck!</p>

<p>PS: Like I said, I’m new to this but one other suggestion is that you dont’ apologize or explain away your GPA, focus the attention on your many accomplishments which set you apart from many, if not most, high school students.</p>

18

<p>Aren’t you the same person who posted numerous chance threads under the usernames mariella28, OneLoveOneLife, bookwormer, natalie93x and ctgirl628? All of your stats are either similar or identical to hers. If you’re not, then I apologize. The vast similarities just seem suspicious.</p>

<p>mariella28: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/941022-what-my-chances-yale-brown-stanford-others.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/941022-what-my-chances-yale-brown-stanford-others.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>natalie93x: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/yale-university/946075-please-chance-me-my-dream-school-i-can-handle-truth.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/yale-university/946075-please-chance-me-my-dream-school-i-can-handle-truth.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>OneLoveOneLife: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/933624-please-chance-me-princeton-upenn-uva-dartmouth-others.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/933624-please-chance-me-princeton-upenn-uva-dartmouth-others.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>bookwormer: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/939006-chance-me-variety-top-schools.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/what-my-chances/939006-chance-me-variety-top-schools.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

19

<p>Penname: Wow, thank you! I’ll take your advice of putting an emphasis on my achievements instead of trying to explain my mistakes.</p>

<p>Swimstar: Sorry, but I just found out about CC last week… I don’t know who that is but it isn’t me, although our stats are quite similar.</p>

20

<p>I say the are the same. Chances posted within weeks of each other; very similar academic statistics, ECs and writing styles (two or three of them write the number of national and international awards after elaborating on each EC).</p>