Should I stop online school?

Applying to College
1

PLEASE READ THIS!

I went to a public school for freshman year and did my classes online for sophomore and junior year. My weighted GPA is a 4.3 out of 5 and my unweighted GPA is a 3.92 out of 4. I am applying to schools like University of Southern California, Georgetown, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, University of North Carolina, University of Georgia, etc. My dream/reach schools are Yale, UPenn, and Dartmouth.

I KNOW THERE ARE MANY OTHER ASPECTS OF YOUR APPLICATION, BUT RIGHT NOW PLEASE JUST CONSIDER MY TRANSCRIPT.

I did online school for health reasons. It is called Georgia Virtual School- completely accredited, created by the GA Department of Education, used in hundreds of public schools, and provides official transcripts. I have assignments, lessons, quizzes, tests, projects, and final exams just like regular public school students.

Most likely, my classes from Georgia Virtual will be transcribed into my public school transcript, so the college won’t be able to see that I did online school.
My public school offers IB diploma, 14 APs, and 22 honors classes. Georgia Virtual offers 30 APs, no honors, no IB, and hundreds of “on-level” courses.

I am able to go back to my physical school for senior year if I want to. Will this hurt me or help me?

If I stay at online school:

  • more control over classes/GPA
  • no class rank
  • no reference for transcript rigor from Georgia Virtual (just a catalog of available courses, no set prerequisites for classes or restrictions like public school)
  • virtual teachers/advisors so not as strong recommendation letters

If I go back to public school:

  • may not get classes I want
  • my transcript/rank probably won’t look as strong compared to people in my class doing IB diploma (I did not even qualify due to the language requirements)

Freshman Year (Physical School):

Honors 9th Literature
Honors Geometry
Honors Biology
AP Government
Spanish I
Introduction to Art
Introduction to Business
Health/Personal Fitness

Sophomore Year (Online School):

10th Literature (no honors option online)
Advanced Algebra II
AP Environmental Science
Physics (no honors option online)
AP World History
Latin I

Junior Year (Online School):

AP English Language
Precalculus
Chemistry
AP Microeconomics (half year)
AP Macroeconomics (half year)
AP US History
Latin II

2

I don’t see any clear right or wrong choice. Both have decisions pros and cons as you describe.

I guess if you won’t be able to take or get into the classes that interest you, this tips the scale for online.

Re LORs: If you go back senior year, I’m not your senior year teachers will be able to give you strong LORs. So I don’t see this as a tipping point.

Can you talk with the HS GC about your concerns. This reminds me of a senior year transfer. Maybe it’s not best to have the online classes transcribed on to your HS transcript versus treated like a separate transcript.

3

So you are a junior and want to consider this for next year? Or you want to transfer back now?

Your list is entirely comprised of high reaches., except U Georgia. As long as you will be happy to attend, you don’t need other schools I guess. It might be wise to add some schools that are more realistic. Do you need to apply to 8 reaches?

All of the highly selective schools you plan to apply to will care primarily about grades, course rigor, and test scores. Some might even consider teacher recs to be nearly as important as those things. Going back to regular school might help you reconnect with old teachers who can give you good recs. I don’t think it matters that you aren’t doing IB. Not everyone wants to. You have plenty of AP courses and they are rigorous.

If you are doing school online for health reasons, are you now healthy enough to go to regular school? You don’t want your grades to drop if you go back to regular school. In your shoes, I’d probably do whatever will enable me to keep the grades high and allow you to get good teacher recs. If that means continuing school online, I suggest you reach out to your online teachers and ask questions, etc…about course material so they can get to know you better.