Match Me: HS Graduate with no idea what to do (I took a gap year)

Chance Me / Match Me!
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Demographics
US Citizen
FL resident
Indian Male

Took a Gap year when I moved from India to US, I will apply in this cycle for Fall 2023.

Intended Majors
Computer Science

Test Scores
(Completed High School in India so its CBSE)
9th Internal: 80%
10th CBSE Board: 89%
11th Internal: 90%
12th CBSE Board: 79%

SAT Scores: 1500 (took it once, may take it again if needed)
720 Reading/Writing, 780 Math

AP Scores: (My school doesn’t offer courses so it’s only test scores)
AP Literature : 4, AP Chemisty: 3, AP Physics Mechanics: 3

Extracurriculars

Founded Computer Science Club: 11,12 (We got industry veterans to talk to students in our school about what they did connected them with students)

Java, Jscript, React JS, Python certified. Good at other CS stuff like HTML, CSS, C, MYSQL. Likely to start a junior programmer job next week. I have another front end internship in October, I will get an AWS Certification then.

Essays/LORs
LORs: Comp Sci teacher, English teacher and Chemistry teacher, They should be very positive. Essays should be strong.

Cost Constraints / Budget
I qualify for the Pell Grant and have high demonstrated need. I don’t have any budget yet because I will be paying through financial aid and student loans.

Schools
I don’t have a school counselor, so I have no idea where to apply, but USF and UF are my safety schools. I want to get into Georgia Tech but my profile isn’t as strong as I would like it to be. I want to know what my target schools would be

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I don’t understand internal and CSBD Board.

How would you relate on a 4 point scale ?

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Use the net price calculator on each college’s web site to get an estimate of financial aid and net price.

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Board Exams are the final year national exams where the government decides your final grades.
Internal is where the School decides your final grades based on how you performed throughout the school year.
The percentages are the average of all the grades we received in each course.

This website says that I got a 3.33 GPA in 9th and 12th, and a 4.0 GPA in 10th and 11th, I don’t know how accurate it is though.

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I’d talk to an admission person at UF. UF likely not a safety if those are your #s.

Lots of strong CS Schools.

Talk to Bama. Big merit for that GPA but not sure how they’d look at it.

You could try a Bama (cheap), get in with the merit and then you have in your back pocket and then stick to Florida publics and meets need schools. Ga Tech isn’t one you can afford so take it off. A school like Troy you could get free tuition and room but a lot depends on how they translate your scores.

Here are your list of meets needs schools. Additionally schools like W&L, American, SMU, and more have full rides but I would talk to admissions at those type of schools to see how you’d be looked at.

You don’t want loans if possible and as it is you can only borrow $27k over 4 years. I would be calling schools-see where you stand with that grading system - not just for admissions but merit (at a Bama, UAH, Troy) and Florida schools.

Good luck.

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As an Indian male (that recently lived in India) does campus and community diversity matter to you? Georgia Tech with 21% of its students being Asian would certainly check that box. Conversely some other schools that might work financially like University of Alabama where less than 600 kids self describe themselves as Asian amongst a community of more than 38,000 would not.

Not sure if it matters and or if you have considered it for your in state options. Good luck!

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I would recommend that you get very familiar with this site, as Florida has many additional grant opportunities for its residents: Home - Florida Student Scholarship & Grant Programs (though this website might at give you a better idea of which programs to apply to from the official website linked above).

Also, in addition to running the Net Price Calculators, for Florida privates, reach out to their financial aid offices to see if their NPCs include all the financial aid that might be available to you as a Florida, Pell Grant-eligible student, as Florida does seem to have additional aid available for students attending private schools in its state.

U. of Florida has become very competitive, even for in-state applicants. There were students with similarly high SATs and higher GPAs who did not receive acceptances this past year. That’s not to say you shouldn’t apply, but it definitely is not a safety.

I would strongly urge you to start your list by looking for places where you are extremely likely to be admitted, extremely likely to be able to afford, and that you would happily attend. These are some of the Florida publics I’d look into for that category (as UF is not an extremely likely admittance and although I’d think you’re a likely admit at Florida State, with a 37% admittance rate from 2021 I wouldn’t classify it as extremely likely).

  • Florida Polytechnic, much smaller than the others outside of New College, but really specializes in the tech fields)
  • Florida Atlantic
  • U. of Central Florida
  • U. of South Florida
  • New College of Florida (public)…CS may not be what they’re known for, but I believe they may cover the remainder of the COA for Pell-eligible students…but obviously double-check this.
  • A 4-year Florida public university offering CS that you could commute to from home (again, financial safety)

Some private schools that may turn out to be more affordable than one might expect (due to the Florida grants) are:

  • Florida Institute of Technology
  • U. of Miami
  • Embry-Riddle -Daytona Beach

Apart from an affordable school, do you have any preferences about the kind of school you would like to attend? Large, medium, small? Urban, suburban, rural? How do you feel about lots of attention on sports of Greek life? Are there certain types of experiences you would like to have in college? Is there a certain distance away from home you want to target (minimum or maximum)? It’s not to say that all of these may be possible to get in an affordable package, but it might help us provide suggestions of places that are likely to meet as many of your wishes as possible.

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I would think your in-state schools would be most affordable. Maybe UCF? Lots of companies moving to Florida so plenty of internships.

You’ll probably have to look at schools that meet need. I don’t think Georgia Tech will fit that category. They offer Stamps and a few other scholarships but they are hyper competitive. Mostly used to steal kids from attending MIT or similar.

Good luck.

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I think below is the big issue - how do schools compute it. Until OP contacts them and knows, it’s hard to predict where to apply. He gave us what the web shows but each college is likely to look at it differently.

Test Scores
(Completed High School in India so its CBSE)
9th Internal: 80%
10th CBSE Board: 89%
11th Internal: 90%
12th CBSE Board: 79%

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