Not very accurate at all and I don’t appreciate for condescending tone.
Do you know how Georgia calculates the GPA that it reports? Does it include all classes, select classes.
My point was that your comment “Zero chance for UGA with these numbers. Not in-state, not out-of-state” was based on zero analysis on your part and is factually incorrect.
Since she is only a junior, if it were my daughter, I would really want to improve that test score.
I suggest finding a tutor via Skype to seriously work on raising that score because a 1080 suggests to me that there are some fundamental English and math concepts that she still needs to learn. Improving score to over 1200 would demonstrate a more solid knowledge base, improve her college options, improve her ability to earn better grades in her classes, and improve her odds for graduating from college.
Once she has a stronger base in English and math, then she should have an easier time improving her class grades.
jmho
I didn’t find Hanna’s answer to be condescending. The 25th percentile is a 3.88 GPA. Often the 25th percentile or lower is reserved for people with greater obstacles to college–this could be a first-generation college student or an underrepented minority. It could be a person who had a serious or chronic illness in high school and their grades suffered, or other extenuating circumstances. For private colleges, it could also be for legacy students, but for public schools this is generally not the case. What was your daughter’s barrier to college?
But here is the other half of the problem. If your daughter did defy the odds and get in–she would be with a bunch of kids who are academic heavyweights. Most classes will be very challenging. For classes with a curve, she could be in real trouble. The traditional college experience may include a sorority and parties. She is going to have to learn to say no, at least some of the time, to fun. Is that how she envisions her four years?
By the way–did you look at Boise State yet?
I’m not arguing that D would or would not get in and agree she would likely be in over her head. Naviance data for her HS shows an average GPA of 3.63. My point is that I don;t think the GPA information from the Common Data Set is very reliable since each school seems to calculate differently.
Have not looked at Boise State but thanks for the suggestion. I suspect it will be too cold for D but I will suggest she take a look.
UGA recalculates all GPAs submitted by first-year applicants. In their calculation, they use only academic classes (no band/ PE/etc.) It’s all on their web site:
https://www.admissions.uga.edu/prospective-students/first-year/admissions-criteria
And before anyone says “but there’s no way they can recalculate all those GPAs” - yes, they DO recalculate, for all 25,000 applicants. I have friends who have worked in UGA admissions and they can corroborate.
FWIW, my 4.0 UW junior (1210 PSAT-did a practice test the night before ) is looking at Boise State as a safety. We’re on the east coast now near Maryland, but previously lived in Boise. Boise is a very nice small city (and getting bigger every year). As for the weather - it’s really not that different than the DC area. I actually think it’s better in Boise because of the lack of humidity and the longer hours of daylight in the Spring-Fall months. We’re thinking of retiring there.
But if your daughter is looking for places that are warmer than where she lives now, then yes, Boise is probably not for her.
I didn’t mean to sound condescending, and I’m sorry for that.
I did mean to sound blunt. My analysis was explicit: she’s way, way under the numbers for UGA. The college will handle the dirty work of saying no, but there’s a child involved, and I hoped to avert some needless disappointment.
Ok…Coastal Carolina is about 10,000 students. Bigger than I thought. The school has a lot of sports teams…including football. Great student support services…and this school seems to me to be a good target for this student with her stats.
Has anyone mentioned U Delaware, close to home but still far enough for that away at college feel.
@nw2this We have family outside Philadelphia so we drove through the campus on our way back from Christmas and she seemed to like the campus. We will probably try to do an official campus tour next time we are headed up that way.
The hard thing about state schools is that sometimes the standards are higher for OOS than in-state (since that’s their main target). For OOS I would say stats are low for UofSC (below 25%) Coastal could be good option, but not in walking distance to town - between Conway and Myrtle Beach - if that matters. But does have the sports. Appalachian and ECU have sports and students love Appalachian, but town not large. Ole Miss is where some students I know were very happy and got in when didn’t get in UofSC and Clemson as in-state students.
Now UofSC has just expanded their Gateway program to OOS students (stay on USC campus with access to lots of benefits but take first year classes at tech school, full admission guaranteed after successful freshman year). Not sure how they choose these students. May be something to ask about. Or check to see how they would calculate her GPA on their scale - could ask if good grades can offset low test score. I truly don’t know answer to this.
Check out Ole Miss Summer college for high schoolers for this coming summer. It’ll be a great sample of the south and she’ll earn six college credits. My son attended this past summer (he is class of 2018) and studied engineering and coding. It was a great experience and they gave him a full scholarship for summer and he qualifies for the same if he chose to attend there next year. Fun town and school.
http://www.udel.edu/apply/undergraduate-admissions/first-year-students/admissions-requirements/
Scroll down the page – mid-50% is 1220-1390. That said, they have football, we know kids who have gone there and liked it, it’s an easier admit than UMD. We drive through Newark pretty regularly and it’s a nice college town.
Down the page is a fairly current list of test-optional schools – note that Salisbury and McDaniel (state schools) are on the list. I would check the website of any college she’s considering to verify their position on testing.
Thumper mentioned Coastal Carolina – I looked up College of Charleston, 77% acceptance rate, 25%tile is 1100. I have a friend whose D went there and was very happy. It’s warm and Southern (sports, but no football)!
If she wants a large public college, SATs/ACTs are an important part of the eval process. Hate that kids with good grades and scores that don’t match their academic performance have a hard time finding schools that are a good match, but if she can pick up 100-150 points, a flood of schools become possibilities. What math is she taking now? A lot of kids in HS have scores go up just as part of getting through another year of math (including one of mine).
@CountingDown Thank you for the helpful response. She is currently in Algebra II so we are hoping by the end of the year her math scores will increase a bit. We also have a private tutor working with her so we are hopeful that she will see some increase, hoping to get her score up to 1200 by the end of her junior year.
Ok, apparently the link I included was verboten. Ooops. Didn’t even think about that.
There are a lot of questions that involve Alg II on the SAT. That should help her improve her scores right there. Do you have a sense of what kinds of questions she’s missing on the reading? My kids took the SAT when it was the 2400 scale, so we could figure out whether they were having trouble analyzing a reading sample, needed to develop vocabulary (reading newspapers and content-driven magazines are great for this), needed to know a specific grammar rule, etc. Pet peeve: grammar is not taught much any more! It’s all “by ear” and sometimes kids need to know the general rule that applies…which to me is one of the best parts of learning a foreign language – it forces you to learn grammar in both the language and English. One of my kids just too certification to teach English as a second language. He said it was quite the grammar workout!
Another way to help improve scores is to get the Big Blue Book of practice SAT tests and work on one section at a time. S2 did this – mainly for math. Part of this is to have her learn what kinds of questions they are asking and to get familiar with the wording and the intent. Mastering the type of test can be just as important as mastering content. This kind of approach helped me with college math.
S2 also did the SAT question of the day – he subscribed online (free) through College Board. Google it and there are iPhone apps, College Board links, etc. EASY EASY way to get some painless practice!
Update on our progress. D received her March SAT score and saw a nice increase. She scored a 1290 up from 1080. She is taking again in May thanks to a free voucher from her school. Hoping for an increase in the 610 reading score and a super score over 1300.
Hoping that maybe some of the reach schools might now be a bit less of a reach.
We have tours coming up at UMBC, Towson, McDaniel, JMU and Delaware.
Also plan to do a self guided tour over Easter at West Chester, Temple and Drexel since we will be in the area.
@DCNatFan great job for your D on the huge improvement in her score!
Please give feedback on the places you tour - several of those are on my son’s list. Kind of annoyed I didn’t think sooner to schedule a tour today of Towson. S19 is off school today and I’ll be up in Baltimore picking younger son’s h.s. carpool up this afternoon so could have dragged S19 with me, gone up to Towson early, done a tour and then picked up younger son afterward. Alas, no more tours available today.
We did the Temple tour in February. A little too urban for S19, though he did say he liked the school, but I liked it more than I thought I would. I went to a school in similar urban environment, except that my school had a more defined campus. I had hoped to stop at Delaware on the way back, at least for a quick drive through, but ran out of time. D17 has a couple of friends who are freshmen at UDEL and they love it so far.