Reach School or Safety School?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Boston College
1

<p>Hi I’m going to become a junior this following school year, and I’ve been looking at Boston College. In my high school, I’m about 29 out of 367, which is like top 8% or something. This coming year I’ll be taking AP Calculus AB, APUSH, AP english, AP music theory, honors chemistry, american law studies (honors level), band, and advanced gym 3. </p>

<p>Freshman Year- Classes: Honors Environmental Science, Honors English 1, Honors Algebra 2, Honors World History, College Prep Spanish 1, Band, Gym</p>

<p>Sophomore Year- Honors Biology, Honors Precalculus, Honors Geometry, Honors English 2, Honors US History 1, Band, Advanced Gym 2, and College Prep Spanish 2.</p>

<p>EC’s- Football Team freshman and sophomore year, Wrestling Team for both years, Concert Band (trumpet), jazz band (bassist), member of my school’s brass ensemble, bassist for 3 school plays and 2 summer school plays, trumpet lessons every week, bass lessons every week, giving lessons on trumpet, member of a band composed of all adults except for I, groundskeeper for a hotel, handyman for a local preschool, Frequent Volunteer at Library, member of Youth Group at my church, and usher at my church. I also have a black belt in Taekwondo, and have won national and state level competitions for point sparring. I participated in a 5K as well. </p>

<p>So I am wondering if Boston College is possible for me. I was thinking of the following options: 1) double major in pre-law and music, or 2) marine biology w/ music. PLease give me your thoughts as to which tier of schools I might be best suited for.</p>

2

<p>Before we get into your chances, I think you have to look for schools that actually have the major you are looking for. BC has no pre-law major (and even if you did find a school with one it’s not worth your time), and no marine biology major.</p>

3

<p>It’s hard to do a full chances without information concerning you junior year/senior schedule, but at this point I would encourage you to keep working hard in your studies and not to worry about admissions quite yet. You’ve taken challenging classes the last two years, but this year will be particularly ambitious with four AP classes. I think junior year might be your defining moment in what school you’ll be best at. The way you cope with 4 APs simultaneously as well as SATs as well as excelling in your ECs will pretty much be an indicator for yourself of what you can handle and are capable of. </p>

<p>Until then, keep doing what you’re doing. The rank looks really good as well as some unique activities and deep involvement in band. Perhaps between junior and senior year you can think about a unique experience that you’d like to partake in, and now is the perfect time to start thinking about that. Perhaps service might be a passion of yours and you can do a missions trip abroad. Perhaps you want to think about getting involved in marine research at a lab over that summer. Or perhaps you’d like to join a band that would tour abroad. Think about participating in an activity that will enrich and broaden your perspective of the world. I personally I gone on two service trip abroad as well as participated in Cornell University Summer College. If you have any interesting maybe studying music over the summer at a college or service trips, I can give you plenty of advice in those areas also. Whatever you choose though, do it first and foremost because you want to, not because it will look good.</p>

<p>Finally, looking at you ideas for majors, I would urge you to consider strong music schools if that is really your passion. Concerning pre-law, there is no major for that. My dad is a lawyer who was a music major undergrad, and he is excellent at what he does. So if that is your core desire, pursuit it now before getting all serious.</p>

<p>For BC, I think you’re on the right track, and I wish you the best of luck for your last two years of high school as well as college admissions.</p>