I am a senior at a private high school in VA.
I have pretty good ECs, a good essay, and a 35 ACT. My GPA weighted (out of 4.3 scale on a 6 point grading scale, where you get .6 bump up for honors classes and 1.0 bump up for AP classes) is a 4.0 (unweighted is about a 3.4 i believe)
I have taken 11 APs throughout highschool and also have good leadership positions.
I’m looking for a school that has a good academic reputation and business school, but I would also prefer it to have a good football or basketball team and for life there to be fun and not just a pressure cooker. For the size, I don’t want a school over 30k, and would prefer the school to be about 8-20k students.
My current list right now is:
Cornell (i don’t know if this is too out of reach)
UVA
Miami
UNC Chapel Hill (too far out of reach?)
U of Georgia
U of Richmond
Virginia Tech
CU Boulder
Tulane
Villanova
My ACT is much stronger than my GPA and I feel this is holding me back from getting more scholarships or getting into certain schools. Although, my GPA junior year was a 4.55, my freshman year was lower at a 3.5 so I have upward trajectory but still. If you guys have any suggestions for other schools or any tips in general please let me know!
I can only speak to one of the schools on your list: Villanova. Fantastic business school (#1 undergrad business school in the U.S. right now) and with your grades, I think you can get enough financial aid to get the tuition within your price range. Their basketball team won the NCAA championship last year, and while academic standards are high, it isn’t a “high pressure” environment. Everyone is a high achiever, but it’s not cut-throat. They have a strong music and activities program that provides plenty of balance when you want to let loose, and the school is well funded by their loyal alumni. The neighborhood is safe, and they now have their own on-campus police force. It’s a great school. Best of luck to you!
Villanova is definitely very high on my list I have yet to see it though. I’m a huge sports fan so the basketball team would be sweet, but having Villanova be close to Philly was/is definitely a concern for me since I don’t know the area well. I just don’t want a school like Wake Forest/William and Mary that is known for being super competitive/cutthroat while the kids are just stressed out having no fun
Villanova is not “walking distance close” to Philadelphia. It’s accessible by car and Train/bus. The Area that Villanova is in is one of the most wealthy residential areas in the country. Smack dab in the middle of the Main line. The campus has an old money feel to it. It’s proximity to Philadelphia is a benefit and a positive thing. Not sure what your concern is with Philadelphia?
Villanova is definitely in more of a busy suburban setting than a city though.
I can’t speak to the academic atmosphere at Nova, and there are reasons I might choose somewhere else if I were picking a school, but proximity to philadelphia would not worry me.
UNC Chapel Hill shouldn’t be too out of reach for someone of your ACT and involvement. They have great facilities, sports teams and plenty of academic opportunities. They also have about 18,000 undergrads which is right in your range.
I would love to go to UNC but I think my GPA is too low to have a shot of getting in but who knows. In a book I bought it says they value ACT > GPA which is good
Do your parents live in NC?
If not, UNC being a public university designed to serve its state residents, your odds are very low as an OOS applicant. There’s a cap (18% max OOS students) that includes athletes and legacies, who get first dibs. The few remaining spots are hyper competitive.
Have you run the NPC’s?
Do you have two safeties or is that your full list?
Villanova is unlikely to give you enough scholarships for that COA would be under 40K.
Is Miami UMiami or Miami-Oh? Miami OH would definitely give you a lot of merit, UMiami is an academic match but not sure it’d be affordable.
VTech is a good match and would likely offer some merit that’d make it the school to beat.
URichmond is a good match but I don’t know whether it’ll be affordable.
Tulane is a high match, they’ll like your test scores and curriculum rigor, but again not sure it’ll be affordable.
CUBoulder is an academic safety but they offer very little merit.
You need to find more universities with merit for your stats
Look at Ole Miss, UVermont, Ithaca, SUNY Geneseo?
Your weighted GPA+ACT mean a near full tuition scholarship at UAlabama, which sounds like the type of school you want: the academics in the honors college are excellent and there’s equally excellent athletics.
No I am not a NC resident and I definitely agree that it is a huge stretch.
I have a few safeties other than this that weren’t worth mentioning.
Miami is the Florida one, hopefully I can get a scholarship to that or Nova although its unlikely.
I heard Tulane was in a nasty area.
I don’t really wanna go out as far away from the East Coast as Colorado but it is a nice campus with great sports.
Alabama is one of my safeties, but I recently visited and it’s way too redneck for me which I didn’t get the same vibe for at UGA. I also don’t really want to have to join a frat to make friends which it seems is the case at Bama and possibly UGA.
Alabama isn’t redneck at all. What are you talking about? You visited the campus and somehow thought it was redneck? That isn’t even possible. The school is full of OOS students and typically middle/uppermiddle and affluent kids.
Your criteria are what they are, but rethink taking a school like Alabama or UGA off the list due to greek life. They seem dominate but even at those schools the number of greek life students is around 34% ( I checked UA). A smart person can figure out that therefore 66% are not - at a big school there are plenty of non-greek kids. There are a few schools where the percentage is very high and then it would be hard to be a non- greek but not a large school.
And FWIW - greek life is mainly social. Academically, you will meet and be in class with extremely smart kids that are in frats and sororities.
Tulane is not in a “nasty area”. It is a very nice neighborhood, especially the main entrance area which is right across the street from a beautiful park, and right on the St. Charles street car line. A very exclusive private street (I heard that Saints quarterback Drew Brees lives there) is right next to campus. However, in New Orleans you do have to be aware of what’s going on around you and be careful about which neighborhoods you travel in.
It’s not just based off that. My brother goes to Alabama and he agrees that it’s much harder to make friends when you’re not a Greek there, he only talks to kids in his fraternity.
No I thought it was pretty redneck, and I’ve visited more than once and my brother goes there. The kids are preppy redneck from my perspective, and the majority of people at tailgates and at the game were very Southern as it is the deep South. Nothing wrong with that just not really my scene.
Tulane’s undergrad campus is in Uptown Nola which is 5 miles from downtown and the French quarter. Uptown is an upscale residential neighborhood that is quite lovely. Saints qb Drew Brees does live in a swanky mansion about one block from campus. it is a cool location for a college. My kid loved it there.