<p>The country i'm living in doesn't offer APs..
and my high school doesn't offer honors or IB courses..</p>
<p>If i don't have APs, is that a straight reject from general(high and low) colleges???</p>
<p>First of all: you will be fine.</p>
<p>Most countries have a standardized curriculum that does not include honors classes (not to mention APs... why should other countries follow the American system?). If you are in the general college-prep track in your country, you are a good candidate for most American colleges.</p>
<p>Now ask yourself: how do you compare to others in your class? If you are at least in the top 25%, you should have a shot at selective colleges. If you are among the best in your country, you should have a shot at top colleges and universities (Ivies etc).</p>
<p>Thanks for the comment! :) We don't have college-prep courses as such i dont' think. My school doesn't even encourage students to get ahead. I did year 10 math when i was in year 8, but when i when in year 9, they made me do year 9 math.. i asked them if i could do a higher level, and they said no!! </p>
<p>It was quite frustrating. I was told that i would be in top 10% ish of my schoolyear although it's very hard to tell because we don't have GPAs and do not rank..!! it's a relief that i still might have a chance with no AP.</p>
<p>After graduating from your high school, can you attend a university in your own country? If so, you are in a college-prep track :)</p>
<p>About having no AP's: Worry less. If you were in this country going to visit the campuses, you'd hear over and over again, the Admissions Officers saying, "We seek students who make the most of their available curriculum; take the most rigorous courses available to them, makes the most of their resources and environment."</p>
<p>In the U.S. there is a great difference among the wealthy and poor school districts as to how many AP's are offered. Five years ago we lived in a poor rural community that offered only one AP. Then we moved to a well-to-do suburb that offers more than 15. The very tough schools in the middle of some American cities offer NO Ap's. ANd yet, every year, people get in from all 3 kinds of these schools, to colleges and universities representing every level of difficulty. </p>
<p>Logically, if it were required that you have AP's, that would be on the application. But it's NOT. It's there on the transcript if you have it. It's understood as a headstart for having credits completed before you get to the college, and sometimes gets you out of a prerequisite course in a department, since it was college level.</p>
<p>It is NOT held against you if your school offers no or few AP's. What's a bad idea is to go to a school full of AP's and decide not to take them, then try for top schools. That would sound like an uninspired student.</p>
<p>If you want to demonstrate your academic skill in a way to be compared with other students in the US or around the globe, take the SAT-I's and SAT-II's which are standardized tests. Gooogle up College Board. THESE are required, but not AP's!!
If you can't get to an SAT, you can instead take ACT exams for most, if not all, schools these days. </p>
<p>As for not having GPA or rank, again, don't worry. You have a transcript of courses with grades, right? If it says "A" the college or uni will apply a number to it, "B" and so forth. FOr ranking, you might see if a teacher or head-of-school would write in a letter, "Our school doesn't rank but if we did, this student would be in the top X% of his class; or she'd be in the Top l0 or Top 20 studeents..." </p>
<p>Sometimes there are situations here where class rank is impossible. For example, there are some students who study at home. Homeschoolers are always #1, LOL. Or, my S skipped 11th grade, so even though his school ranks, they wouldn't rank him because of the skip. It actuallly worked to his advantage, since he wouldn't have ranked so high anyway. He was basically in a hurry to get on with his life :) He did fine and got in where he wanted the most. I was told to have the school's counselor to attach a note saying WHY he wasn't ranked, but simply forgot. I think that would have been wiser to explain why it wasn't there instead of just leaving out "class rank." Still, he got into the university he was most interested for his major. </p>
<p>Your situation sounds unique, so please concentrate on writing excellent and personal essays to describe what your schooling WAS. Don't be concerned what was NOT. Focus on who you are and write with a postive writer's voice so they can envision you, your situation, and what you did to get the best possible education within those limitaitons and opportunities. And let your individual personality shine through the words of the essay. They want to know what kind of person you are. Students aren't machines, after all! </p>
<p>Worry less. Good luck!</p>
<p>^^timed out,
a small number of colleges do not even require SAT's but instead analyze your grades, essays and teacher letters of recommendation to determine if you sound like a good fit for their campus.</p>
<p>I say that in case youi're in a place that doesn't have SAT's for you to take.
Old CC threads on Parents Forum mention "SAT-optional schools."</p>
<p>My hope is that you can go somewhere to take the SAT's or ACT's, however; you'll have more choices that way. Try to take SAT-II's also; some schools require them, but even if they don't you can report the scores if they turn out well or find a place to mention them in a short-answer question or "is there anything else you'd like to tell us" question on your application :) Only mention SAT-II scores if they're GOOD, otherwise you don't have to report them. If you're only in 10th or 11th grade this year, there's still time to take SAT=II's, while the information is fresh at the end of each course you think you do well.</p>
<p>The SAT-II's are on specific academic subject areas (Chemistry, Calculus, History, specific Languages, etc), unlike SAT-I's (Reading, Math, Writing). I bet you already knew this. I'm writing too long.
Good night and good luck!</p>
<p>b@r!um : oh so high school level is a college-prep track?? I thought it meant when students are actually doing college level papers when they are in high school!! hahaha silly me~ still lots to learn! thanks for the comment!</p>
<p>paying3tuitions: Thanks for your detailed and kind reply.
I feel less panicky now that i know key to admission isn't a set formulae. I just felt a little pressured to see everyone taking AP courses, and felt that i'm prepared as they are. Well, i guess i'm not, but oh well, like you said, i guess i'll have to do the best i can do within my situation!!hehe. </p>
<p>Since there is no higher classes or things like AP offered at our school, i guess i could say that i made the best i could do with my workload? I don't know. I took 5 subjects, when some people chose to do 3 or 4.. lol would such things count??</p>
<p>with SAT scores, what score would you consider GOOD or average?? i know it'll depend on the college level that i apply, but in general?? i've only decided to try out for American Colleges early this year, so i didn't have a lot of time to prepare. I've done SAT I twice, and SAT II test once... but scompared to all these Ivy League Dreamers, my scores are very very low. Too embarassed to say, but yeah. I wish i can reflect who i am on the essay realy well. lol enough chat. thanks again for your information. really appreciate it. :)</p>
<p>your paragraph 2 above, YES. That's exactly the idea; say you took 5 classes when the norm was 3 or 4. If your guidance counselor (or anyone from the school) can say that also, very good information. Either way.</p>
<p>Your paragraph 3: there are a lot of hyper-overly-competitive students obsessing about scores on these threads. It can make someone feel terrible and discourage them. In fact, there is a VERY wide range of colleges and universities in America. I understand that the "average" SAT score (for ALL colleges/unis, not Ivies) is around 500. To find out what EACH school wants, look it up by name on the Princeton Review website and focus on their median range of acccepted students. Some schools will show between 25-75% come in with combined scores of l840 ( this is so at my youngest one's university) while others put their midrange higher at around 2000 (my older 2 kids) meaning the combined 3 scores from SAT-I.</p>
<p>My parents were professors at a humble college where 500 was around the norm. I guess that was Tier III. </p>
<p>My D went to a Liberal Arts College around #25 on the list by USNewsWorldReports and she had 570 in Math (bad for them) but 750 in Critical Reading and 720 in WRiting (just fine there, even a bit high-ish, so balanced that 570 in Math. They understood her as a "gappy" applicant but took her anyway. Gappy means the maths and languages are very different; that happens sometimes, or you get a math strength that can't write or analyze reading very well. </p>
<p>Others around her had 620's but some up to the 750's. Her schools was around #26 on the USNEws list of Liberal Arts Colleges. Most often she met people with 600-700 there, but others like her kept it quiet they had something in the high 500's. Then she'd bump into someone with 750 or even 800 on a score. </p>
<p>There are plenty of options here for schools where something like scores in the high 500's or low 600's are perfectly fine, and they are worthy schools. You'll see this by reading Princeton Review and their inidividual websites.</p>
<p>If your scores are very much lower than 450, I don't know how to advise you. </p>
<p>Remember that midrange means they ALSO take some who are lower, some higher than their midrange, so you shouldn't look at these as "cut-offs" but just an estimate. </p>
<p>Looking at this data is a good way to develop a list of "safety, match, and reach" schools. If your scores fall in their midrange you're obviously a match on THAT statistic, anywyay, although essays, grades, letters, Extracurricular activities all play a role, too, with a different rubric by each college. </p>
<p>Be aware that there are candidates with 3 800's who nonetheless get turned down because something in their application sounded unpleasant, or the schools just had too many people from their geographic area and want some diversity. </p>
<p>I could get shot down for writing this, but to me, it seems sensible to say:
if your scores average at 500's, aim for the Tier 3 or Tier 4 schools. If you get
something like 620-680 (very roughly), start looking up into Tier 2 or even Tier 1, especially if you have some other great nion-academic strengths to describe in your essay like sports, well-developed musical instrument to play in tehir orchestra, or speak many languages, have some great community expereicne the other students wouldn't have but you could be part of the diverse global community to share your background and perceptions.
If you find yourself with numbers over 700's, start looking at the top Ivy League and top Liberal Arts Colleges,,,but REMEMBER: nobody is guaranteed into those schools even if they boast 3 near-800's, simply because they are famous and have many more applications than spots to offer.</p>
<p>Many American kids put in around 6-8 applications with safety, match and reach schools.</p>
<p>It is VERY foolish to only apply to all-Ivy's even with great statistics, simply because if they have too many from your geographic area, or too many tuba players in the orchestra, they'll say you're qualified but we just don't have a spot for 6 tubas this year with all 800's. </p>
<p>For a BRILLIANT website, read AdmissionsAdvice.com by CC's counselor named Carolyn. I especially like her "Building a List from the Bottom UP' essay but it's a great primer for understanding many basic questions.</p>
<p>The CC and chances posts are enough to make grown men cry, and you're not even grown up yet. These are NOT representative students, they are in general very competitive and driven students. </p>
<p>I hope this helps. It is hard enough from here, I can only imagine from overseas.
Good luck.</p>
<p>EDIT: If your native language is other than English, I would think/hope they'd consider that regarding your Critical Reading and WRtiing sections of the SAT-I's. I can't quantify how much they excuse "English as a Second Language" but it would obviously be recognized in some way that I can't quantify. I've heard it mentioned often here; it's a "consideration" not a complete excuse. You have to read and write in the courses using English, but I think they could accept if you're from another country that the WRiting score is 580, while it might be more like 680 in your own language.</p>
<p>The thing about Ivy League is, most people aiming there have something in the 700's and even one or two 800's to talk about! But that's not the majority of students in Americna colleges and universities, by any means. Don't let the Ivy discussion on CC impact you if you are aiming for other universities and colleges. The real fact is, if someone applied with 750's to a Tier 2 or Tier 3 school (see USNEws and World Reports for these Tiers..) then they might not even get an acceptance because the school would assume they'd decoline and go to a better school! </p>
<p>So look where you feel the "right fit" re: median range of SAT scores, and also apply a bit above and below those places, too. Everyone needs some safety, match and reach schools to make a balanced list and ensure at least ONE yes. You can only go to one place, anyway :)</p>