<p>Fastsauce, your grades are terrific and I think it might help if your GC mentions what you were going through. I didn’t respond to your initial post because I wasn’t quite sure how to respond, not knowing what your grades are. (I actually started to write a response when you first posted, but then delete my response because I really didn’t know the situation, and didn’t think what I was writing would be helpful).</p>
<p>When it comes to grades, here’s a delicate balance between offering an explanation and trying to make excuses, and if you had C’s and D’s that would have been understandable under the circumstances, but at the same time tougher to explain. That’s the part that I was having a hard time writing. (How to say that to a kid who has lost a parent without sounding callous and mean? I didn’t think I could pull that off). </p>
<p>Don’t make the mistake of writing an essay that comes off as really tragic. If you want to write about your loss of one parent and the struggle with the other fighting a life-threatening disease, you need to find a way to put a positive spin on it – that is, use it to illustrate how you became more mature or self-sufficient, or how it made you appreciate what is truly important in life. If it’s too painful or feels insincere to write that sort of essay, then simply ask your g.c. to mention it on the apps, both to give context to your early grades and whatever EC’s (or lack of EC’s) you had during that time frame – and focus on something else in your essay or personal statement. Even if nothing is mentioned, you’ve got a rising trend in your grades – colleges love that – and they were pretty good to start, so you should be fine.</p>
