In desparate need of college advice

Applying to College
1

<p>I attend a small public high school in southwestern Virginia. The grades that I have made so far in high school have been (horribly) low. Keep in mind that while these classes don't look tough, they are the hardest that I could possibly take.</p>

<p>Freshman Year:<br>
Advanced English-B
Keyboarding-B
Spanish II-B
(Spanish I in 8th Grade)
World History to 1500-A
PE-A
Geometry-B
Earth Science-B
*Also World Geography in 8th Grade, but I'm not sure if these credits go into high school GPA</p>

<p>Sophomore Year:
Biology-A
Appalachian Studies-A
Dual Enrollment Accounting-B
Spanish III-B
Advanced English 10-B
PE and Driver's Ed-B
Algebra II-B</p>

<p>Junior Year (This is what I'm on track to make)
Chemistry-A
French I-A
Horticulture-A
Dual Enrollment Pre-Calculus-A
Office Administration-A
Advanced US History-A
Advanced English-A</p>

<p>SAT I-Hopefully over 2000 (just took the May test), my goal is to get 2200 when I take it next October
SAT Subject Tests in US History and Literature (I have no clue how well I will do on them).</p>

<p>Extra Curriculars: Hi-Y Freshman year, Academic Teams (as many as I can be on) Sophomore, Junior, and Senior years, VHSL Schoolastic Bowl junior and senior years, FBLA junior and senior, planning to run for class office next year and do cross-country and track.</p>

<p>*Also, I can get AP credits for some of these classes, but I'm not sure which ones. I need to talk to our (practically useless) guidance counselor.</p>

<p>*For my senior year, I will make straight A's as well (I obviously have no choice if I am to get into a good school). The highest GPA that I can get is something like 3.6 :(, which is not nearly high enough.</p>

<p>What could account for the sudden change? I really don't know. I guess before I just didn't really like school, I wasn't thinking about college. I decided that I wanted to get into a good school, and I'm trying my absolute hardest to do so.</p>

<p>Along this way I've discovered that I have some talents that I didn't know about. Namely my ability to write, but I'm especially nerdy when it comes to all social sciences. I plan to major in Political science, since I have a love for politics and debate. I plan to apply ED at William and Mary, so what is my chance of getting in, and what other schools should I consider?</p>

<p>Thank you (and sorry for my horrendous lack of briefness).</p>

2

<p>The 3.6 GPA is unweighted, in case that is in question. Weighted I can get something like 4.1 or 4.2, but I’ve taken as many advanced weighted classes as I could</p>

3

<p>The fact that you have an upward trend should definitely help you. And Bs aren’t that bad. I think you should talk about what you’ve written with your guidance counsellor and at the very least he/she can stress in their letter how much you’ve matured and started to take school seriously, etc. If you write a fabulous essay you should be able to get into good schools. I’m not familiar with William and Mary so I can’t comment on that aspect.</p>

4

<p>An unweighted GPA of 3.6 really isn’t that bad at all, especially when considered in tandem with a 2000+ SAT score. You shouldn’t be too worried. :slight_smile: I don’t know much about William and Mary either, but if you give us more criteria with which to match you to a school, I’m sure we’d be able to give you plenty of suggestions for places you could get into.</p>

5

<p>Thanks for the response. Oh, and a correction on what I have above… my weighted GPA would be more like 3.8, I was in a hurry when I typed the response. I guess I need to get my guidance counselor to give me a transcript, that would be helpful. And I’m not currently in the top 20% of my class, but surely I can get there with my 2nd semester grades and next year’s grades.</p>

<p>Anyway, I’m really just looking into a lot of schools with great political science programs anywhere in the Eastern US (although I would prefer closer to Virginia, and there are a lot of great schools in my general area). With my stats there is surely no way I would get into an Ivy, but I want to try to push it as far as I can because I feel like I can do the work and be successful in college, but there will be a lot of people with much better stats than me.</p>

<p>So, any suggestions?</p>

6

<p>No problem! :)</p>

<p>Well, first of all, I think you might want to put the breaks on the college search until you get your SAT score back because there is a huge difference between a 2000 and a 2200. But assuming you get at least a 2000, some schools you might want to consider for political science are George Washington University and American University–both in DC, which is obviously the best place to be if you want to study politics. If you can get your score up to 2200, you might have a shot at Georgetown too. ^_^</p>

7

<p>Eiffel, thanks for the good suggestions. Georgetown is a great school, and I’m considering it I can get my scores that high.</p>

<p>And I just realized that I spelled “desperate” wrong on the title, haha.
Correction: “desperate”.</p>