<p>Hi,
Well I found out that I am not top 10% at my high school (I'm probably around 15%). To give you perspective, our HS is ranked in the top 75 by US News Rankings, so it's very competitive. I have a 3.86 GPA after my Junior year and a weighted of 4.34; that is good for top 15%. My counselor will probably be marking "most rigorous" for my schedule difficulty.</p>
<p>Now, I am applying to reach schools like Duke, Cornell, Penn, and Northwestern in the fall and I know they take HS reputation/rigor into account, but also that 90% of their students are in the top 10 percentile of their graduating class. Am I doomed for these schools because my class rank % isn't in the top 10? </p>
<p>I'm really worried right now, I doubt I may even get into any of those schools even with Early Decision.</p>
<p>I’m in the same boat, my Highschool was ranked in the top 40 by US News Rankings and the top 30% of my class has a 4.2+ weighted. I fall in to the top 40% so I’m curious to see the responses…</p>
<p>Chicago, we’re in such similar situations, it’s almost scary haha. </p>
<p>^Our school is very well respected and around top 60 or so in those rankings, but I feel like it doesn’t make up enough for the fact that around 85-90% of their matriculating freshmen are top 10%. It’s hard to look past that glaring >10% when admissions officers are trying to make a case for your acceptance.</p>
<p>I hate to break it to everyone, but ranking is not as serious as most people think.</p>
<p>People always say, “GPA with a rank is useless” - well a “rank without a GPA” is also useless.</p>
<p>My point being, the rank is merely a tool to figure out competitive your school was.</p>
<p>Not being ranked in the top ten doesn’t change the fact that you have tremendous stats, it just means that there are other people smarter than you at your school.</p>
<p>I’m in the top 40% and that decile doesn’t seem promising when you compare it to the fact that many “high level schools” are accepting almost exclusively those in the top 10%… Meep.</p>
<p>Chicago – being at a top ranked school definitely makes a difference. For example, I believe one highly ranked high school in New York City had over 60 acceptances from Cornell alone.</p>
<p>This being said – if you’re in an excellent High School, your guidance counselor should be able to help you assess your chances and develop a list. Also, if you have Naviance, it’s a great tool.</p>
<p>So are you saying that the people outside of the top 10% who were admitted weren’t just the lucky bottom that got in, but the ones who went to highly competitive schools that messed with their class rank a bit?</p>
<p>It really depends… Most cases if your not in the top 10 percent your not getting into a top school. 98 percent of penns class was in the top 10 percent. Unless your an amazingly well known prep school that admissions just knows about… You can tell based on admits… does your school usually send like 40-50 kids to top schools? if so ur fine… if they only take like 5-6 it prob wont happen.</p>
<p>Here on CC, many people look at raw numbers relating to HS grades and Rankings. We’ll see someone has a 3.7 at school A and assume (sometimes fairly forcefully) that this is better than a 3.8 at school B. Or in your case someone is top 15% at School A vs top 10% at school B.</p>
<p>However, if you look at the occasional posts from admissions officers, it’s just not this simple. School A may just have a stricter grading system. Or School A may be a brighter student body (for whatever reason that may be). The admissions officers learn about the reputations of each school (and let’s be honest, they get applications every year, so they have a fairly good database) and I believe that they take this into account.</p>
<p>(Not quite the same as saying a competitive school messed up rank – but rather that a student at such a school would likely have a higher rank elsewhere.) This is also the justification for SAT/ACT – it provides a common source for data.</p>
<p>This is also one of my big problems with “Chance Me” threads. In close cases, when we see a GPA, we really don’t know about the school’s grading policy or academic reputation. More importantly, we don’t know how an admissions office views this.</p>
<p>They’re all good fun – though a student can get a more informed opinion of their chances from any college guide. My concern is that some student doesn’t apply to a dream school where they have a shot because a group of people (us) with less information than they have tell them that they can’t get in.</p>
<p>Getting back to your question – It’s actually one of the good ones, where a board like this can be useful. You see your rank top 15% and that the schools you want predominantly accept students in the top 10% and are asking whether your mitigating factor is relevant.</p>
<p>So, getting back to my advice – I think that the fact that you go to a super-competitive HS is very relevant. However, different schools may have different standards. As I said, your guidance counselor should be able to tell you the tier of school that accepts students from your HS with stats similar to yours. Alternatively, if your school subscribes to Naviance you can get a lot of this information yourself.</p>
<p>Yes, being outside the Top 10% will hurt you somewhat in college admissions at the most selective schools, but it doesn’t mean you don’t have a shot at them, depending on how good your SAT/ACT scores are.</p>
<p>Generally, the most competitive high schools don’t rank. Some of those outside the Top 10% that are accepted at the most selective schools will be those from competitive high schools that rank (and probably with quite high standardized test scores), and some of them probably have some hook (e.g. recruited athlete, URM). </p>
<p>At the range of schools just below the tippy top, being outside the Top 10% won’t hurt you as much. So, don’t worry, you will be able to get into a very good school, having a high GPA with a rigorous schedule at a competitive HS. </p>
<p>Do you know if your HS ranks using unweighted or weighted GPA?</p>
<p>Crazy. Look at the Ivies that show rank distribution and see how many of their kids came from schools that don’t even rank. When they say x % kids were in the top ten percent, that includes hs where it’s ridiculously easy to get into the tippy top percent. </p>
<p>Adcoms don’t just look at your school profile and get a sense from past apps- they actually travel extensively through their regions, get to know GCs and principals, learn about courses offered, learn about socio-economics (ie, advantages or disadvantages) in those areas, etc. What they don’t learn from that or the profiles is also available in reference indexes (you can even google for that info.) </p>
<p>Btw, not all readers examine rank. They are far more concerned with the transcript and the rigor and determination it shows. More concerned about what you convey through your essays and your involvement in ECs. And, especially at a very competitive hs, they will look to see how your LoRs pull for you. Adcoms know that some hs rank includes ceramics and gym, some is based on weighted, etc. </p>
<p>Next time someone hits you with the “sorry, bub, no chance” thing, try to remember what zephyr wrote. </p>
<p>ps. Cornell is still considered, in part, a state school- so what happens with state residents doesn’t always accurately represent trends at other top schools.</p>
<p>That is great advice and I think I speak for many worried applicants who go to top public HSes (and know they aren’t a 10% to Ivy type Prep School) and are a bit out of the top 10%. It would certainly be alarming for them to see that the numbers drop nine-fold when you’re outside of that magic 10%. Hopefully they are able to see this and feel a bit better.</p>
<p>I don’t know if the quote worked since I’m on my phone… but I also go to a very competitive public high school, which I happen to only fall in the top 15% with a fairly high GPA as well. By any means, I do not think that the 14% of my class that have a better rank are smarter than me, it just means that they DID better than me.</p>
<p>A class rank doesn’t mean a whole lot if someone lower ranked had taken more challenging courses. It’s easier to get all A’s in non AP or Honor courses because AP courses are college level courses. Unfortunately, some HS based their class rankings on just grades of the students rather than the rigor of the courses. For example, a student with an “A” in a regular Bio course is a 4.0W/UW, while someone with a “B” in an AP Bio is a 4.0W/3.0UW. I’ve heard of students who have taken AP classes and got B’s and C’s because they want to be challenged, while some of their peers took regular classes and got A’s. So the question is who should rank higher?</p>
<p>Sigh… well, I’m ranked 70/ ~400 students with that 4.34. I feel like killing myself and deleting all my Duke application materials. I had a tough freshman year and did terrible in middle school (many others brought up their MS weighted classes), which I didn’t think would affect me but it’s pretty much the reason I’m not in the top 10%. </p>
<p>I talked with my counselor about it and I don’t know how much he’s willing to ‘lobby’ for me with regards to the rank, but he said I could talk about it in my common app additional info area. He said I took a lot of classes (especially business ones) that interested me instead of the honors that would have bumped me up more, but I don’t want to seem like I’m making excuses for myself. Should I follow my counselor’s advice?</p>
<p>Any thoughts? I’ve taken 6 aps through junior year and taking 6 senior year. Will colleges understand base on rigor of classes and schoOl? It’s interesting that I took most rigorous classes and yet people in the top 10% have lower unweighteds than my 3.86</p>
<p>Apply to the schools you want to attend. If you’re concerned about rank, add a couple of additional applications for schools that you feel are clearly matches, and make sure you have at least one sure-fire safety school.</p>
<p>I don’t know whether or not your rank will kill your chances – not applying surely will.</p>
I feel like this rank is gonna kill me, no matter what people say.</p>