<p>I’m not sure this is an awful semester. You had a tough schedule, and you got B’s and above. Try not to be quite so hard on yourself.</p>
<p>Do you have access to a good guidance/college counselor at school? Make an appointment to talk with her or him. </p>
<p>This may sound elementary, and perhaps you have started this already… You’ll want to make a list of colleges that you think you are interested in. Take the SAT or ACT as soon as possible so at least you have a base line indication of where you fall. You can then try to improve it if necessary. Look at the admissions stats for the schools you are interested in. Two of the most important statistics are the middle 50% range (the range between the 25th percentile and 75th percentile) of the SAT/ACT scores of admitted students, and the same for their GPAs. Be honest about where your scores fit in there.</p>
<p>Divide your list into “Matches,” where your scores/grades fall roughly in, or very close to, that middle 50%; “Reaches” where your scores are not as high as that middle 50%; and then “safeties,” where your scores put you in the first or second quartile of those admitted.</p>
<p>Once you have done this, do your research on scholarships. Be very aware that there are 2 types of aid, need-based and merit-based. Generally speaking, need-based aid may result in incurring at least some debt (often a combination of work-study, loans and grants), whereas merit-based may be in the form of grants. You need to educate yourself on this and talk frankly with your family about it. Learn to read the Common Data Set for each school you are interested in, and that will tell you a lot about how they give aid and who tends to get it. If you have access to Naviance their scatter graphs will give you an indication of similar students who have been admitted/denied. Full ride merit scholarships tend to be pretty rare, and very, very competitive.</p>
<p>I know of several students with GPA stats similar to yours, and ACTs in the 27/28/29 range, who have received very generous merit aid from liberal arts colleges outside the northeast. These aren’t necessarily household names outside of their region, but you can get an outstanding education there. The more interest you can show in a school (by going to college fairs, visiting, etc.), the more likely that they will become interested in you. And the key to sleeping well at night once you have applied, is to apply to a range of the reaches/matches/safeties that you like, so you can be confident that you will have some choices. Best of luck in your search @semharmekonnen .</p>