The school has club teams, but he wants to have a team that completes against the higher level teams, like UCLA.
OP, how about if you set the goal for yourself of having a high GPA in college, and stop worrying about this? Someone with a 3.1 in HS should probably be focused on the academic side to make sure you can get a job or get into grad school after college. The last thing you should be thinking about is making the leap to Rhodes Scholar.
@intparent My gpa doesn’t determine my intelligence. It’s a reflection of my work ethic which I base off of rational. Most work in Highschool, I feel, is discretionary. The fixed aspect of college gives me motivation to do more. My goal of the Rhodes scholarship is to give me an intellectual challenge. Highschool wasn’t challenging enough so I settled for Bs with no studying involved. I also rechecked my gpa this year and it was a 3.7 weighted 3.2 unweighted (still not good, but just an update)
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@twoinanddone I’m confused on what your saying. Are you saying that UCSC can’t have a rowing team that can compete against other schools or are you saying it’s unlikely?
You GPA may not reflect what you think your intelligence is, but it does reflect the work you did as well as your study habits. Unfortunately, all that matters is what proof you have. So, for the Rhodes to even be a possibility you’d have to do something quite different from founding a competitive team. You’d have to set small goals and meet them, in the service of that larger goal. Having one far-away goal doesn’t work in terms of achievement. Having one overarching goal with lots of small, detailed goalposts, is what works.
Why the Rhodes, BTW?
Founding a club won’t replace what you must have, before they even look at the rest of your application: stellar grades, consistently, accross all subjects. So, your first goal should be to get an Honors Program-worthy GPA by the end of first semester. That means you work to get an A and get help from tutors/office hours as soon as you don’t have one (and I’m not saying “complain this grade doesn’t reflect what you think it should be”: everything you do, 100% of the time, must be stellar. Aim for 100% 100% of the time. And keep in mind that a 60% may be an average grade in some science classes.)
Like most very smart students who never did anything in high school, you’ll discover a frustrating truth: work habits are learned, too, and you’re starting well-behind compared to others. Intelligence alone doesn’t suffice and work habits are primordial to getting A’s and B’s. (Yes, because if you do what you did in HS, you will get grades of C and below).
You’ll be struggling to establish your study schedule and stick to it. At times you’ll fall off the wagon and return to your HS habits. It’ll make it ten times harder than you’d expect to get the grades you can get. You’ll be mad because “if I’d done this I’d have had an A”, except you didn’t. “It was just silly mistakes” except those with an A didn’t do the silly mistakes because they practiced till they made none several times in a row. In one class, you’ll get an early A and decide this whole college thing was overblown, and thus that you can relax - only to find that your next grade isn’t an A and that you’ll have to work much harder to get it back to where you need it to be.
All of these are very common for freshmen who are smart and used their intelligence to coast through HS.
Discovering intelligence is not enough is also painful and takes a while to adjust to.
So, your first semester should be dedicated to your grades.
If the idea of founding a club or a varsity team (at a D3 college, ie., you would NOT be competing with UCLA), still holds appeal in the Spring, then work during your second semester in building fund raising skills and networking. Expect to devote at least the next two years to establishing the grounds for your project, so that by senior year you may have permission to found a varsity team in kayaking (it’d bring lots of high level European athletes to the school) or rowing.Are you the son/daughter of a millionaire who’d be willing to fund that team? Because that would help, although it’d probably not speed up the timeline.
However, that project is so time-intensive that it’s likely to lead you to spending hours and hours fundraising and training, at the expense of your studying and thus grades. And if you aren’t the top student UCSC has seen in a while, your odds for the Rhodes are nil. Keep in mind that you’ll have to prove yourself smarter, more dedicated, more intellectually versatile, more inquisitive, than all the students admitted into Engineering and in the Honors Program. That alone is going to be a huge task. Don’t miss the forest for the trees: getting a 3.8+ in college is going to keep you very busy already.
UCSC is currently deciding if it will have ANY teams competing at the NCAA D3 level.
UCSC has a club:
What are you proposing that is different than this club? Where will you find students to fill your team? How will you pay for the team if you aren’t going through the athletic department? Are there any teams at any schools that are organized as you are proposing? I don’t understand what you are envisioning, so if you have an example of a club team that competes against a school sponsored/sanctioned team like UCLA or Cal, please name it and then maybe we’d understand what you are planning.
@twoinanddone Okay I think its because Iḿ not completely familiar with how the sports side of college works. So the club that it has right now is fairly dedicated, they just don´t seem to compete. What I want to do is change what they are now to what UCLA is. So a sponsored/sanction team like UCLA or Cal. Like moving the club up from a tier III club to a organized team through the athletic department.
@MYOS1634 First off, I just want to say thank you for that comment, it was really constructive and offered a lot. The thing about grades is, UCSC has already invited me into their writing honors courses (I think this decision was based off of my personal statements as it was the only thing that got me into colleges). They also invited me into some honors courses that have something to do with Poly Sci, I don´t really remember (this was because I went to a lawyers convention in Beverly Hills and ran into people that were very helpful, ie networking). Basically, getting into the honors courses should not be a problem for me. Im also entering college as a sophomore so I’m already ahead of the game in terms of credits (I passed every AP course I took with a 4, not sure if credits mean anything for the rhode scholar).
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As for the millionaire comment, Im actually extremely poor being an independant. I do, although, because of the clubs I was apart of and my networking, have close connections to various millionaires that would invest in rowing if their was potential for recognition (rich white politicians want to get a pat on the back).
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As for competing against UCLA or teams of that rank, I was under the assumption that crew was not ranked under divisions. I though their was just a broad criteria. I do not know, but when I looked at the UCLA team, they had no division label, they were just good. If that makes sense?
- Thanks again!
Enroll in all the Honors classes you have access to. Focus on your classes and grades.
An option may be to try and get really good grades including in Honors classes and try to transfer to UCB or UCLA, where your odds would be better for Rhodes. On the other hand, UCI Honors is a great program that you could try for.
I don’t think that what you’re proposing for rowing is possible.
@MYOS1634 Lets say I get a 4.0 at ucsc my first year and decide to transfer out? (painting a perfect picture, lets also say im president of student government, if thats a thing, and Im also president of like 2 clubs and am captain of the rowing club ;P) what are my odds for UCI, UCSD, UCLA, UCB? (i got waitlisted to UCSD)
You won’t be president/captain of anything as a freshman. 
You’ll have to earn everything. EC’s won’t matter as much as in HS for admissions, but you’ll have to show you contributed to campus life (made an impact through your freshman hall programming commitee, participated in rowing club, etc.)
Honors classes may be the only ones where a professor will know you so they’ll be the ones writing your letters of recommendation, thus 100% positive contribution is necessary in each and every class.
3.8 GPA in college is already a very ambitious goal to have. You should have no more than 2 “hard” classes and 2 “medium/normal” classes, although 2 hard, 1 medium, 2 “easy” classes offers better balance.
You’d have to transfer the semester after you reach 60 credits, and thus apply BEFORE that semester (it may be in November!)
No one can evaluate your odds for transferring. They’re always low and you need to have a good reason to transfer (“I want to try and get a Rhodes Scholarship and UCSC hasn’t produced a winner in forever” isn’t a good reason. “I want to row competitively and they only have a club” isn’t a good reason. "UCB/UCLA are more prestigious isn’t a good reason. A good reason would be “I want to major in AI applications to … and the department at UCSC doesn’t offer that concentration”, “I want to work on Aramaeic texts and only UCLA has such documents and professors”, etc = something academic and fairly specialized that your current college doesn’t have, but the college you want to transfer to, does have.)
There are lots of outlets for intellectual challenge. Picking a Rhodes Scholarship for that outlet is pretty random.
Scholarship committees and future employers aren’t interested in highly intelligent people who act like a prima donna and cherry pick what they like to do and ignore the rest because it’s beneath their intelligence or interest. They want people who suck it up and deliver, period.
It’s unlikely you will have a 4.0 at UCSC, because discipline doesn’t suddenly happen.
It’s also unlikely that any of those leadership roles will happen because you’re not committed to any of those activities; you just want the title.
Bottom line is you have not demonstrated the willingness to earn anything. U just expect people to be wow’d by your under-recognized superior intellect & prowess, and go straight to the reward. You would be better served by focusing on your maturity and your grades, and less on the delusional Rhodes Scholarship.
I went to school with a guy who had the goal of being a Rhodes Scholar, and that was in the days when athletics was considered. He wasn’t a college athlete, but had been a high school one and ‘hoped’ that would count. I know he graduated with a 4.0, with all the recommendations he needed, but was not selected as a Rhodes scholar.
@GMTplus7 You’re assuming I have no discipline. You forget that I choose to do things that challenge me. I placed in the top 5% of 5 different video games. All of which have a competitive audience (over millions of players). I didn’t get these ranks by sitting around and playing for fun, or “skating by” on the computer. I worked hard at being the best and I became within the range of elite. You think you can read me based off of my gpa and remarks, but you have no idea. I was a river ambassador, recognized by 4 district senators. I’ve done things that require hard work. Thats why I chose the Rhodes Scholarship, because it challenges me.
On the note of employers cherry picking… thats the difference between me and you. You see your self working for someone. I see my self hiring people like you. People who take their role in society like the sheep they are while the wolf takes the top. I cherry pick because I succeed without effort.
Maturity? I’ve had to, on my own, take care of my brother and sister as an independent for 3 years ever since adversity hit.
My intelligence is not under recognized, hence my networking within various law firms.
@twoinanddone Yeah that sucks. Thats the thing though, what people commenting right now don’t understand is; I’m using the Rhodes Scholarship as motivation to succeed. Without rational I have no basis for work. So even if I don’t get selected, I would have still succeeded with high merit - which would help for my post graduate pursuits.
Thats also a reason I need something involving athletics, I need to stand out.
Then a school that doesn’t have an athletic department at all might not be the best choice for you, and it’s a good possibility that UCSC will have no athletics except club level soon.
I don’t think you’ll achieve your goal at UCSC.
@twoinanddone The results are out already (unless im reading a false article). It says that they are keeping their sports program. (the results were revealed around may 26th)
I think UCSC students already voted (yes=63%) on the Division III funding: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20160524/NEWS/160529872
@HyeKye not to be rude but it is pretty simple to read you just based off of your GPA. It tells me that you aren’t willing to commit the time and effort to what is important, I’m not saying other things such as video games aren’t important but you should at least be considering school pretty high up on your list. I can also tell that based on your remarks you think much to highly of yourself, find some humility. You should listen to what @GMTplus7 said, they gave you some pretty good advice.
@Undecided3494 If “sucking it up” is good advice than their our a lot of blind followers on this forum. It’s easy to sit here behind my computer and prove that I’m better, which disregards your humility comment. As for not committing to important things, I didn’t game for fun. I placed in the top 5% as a job. Taking care of my brother and sister alone, and no job, was obviously rough so I needed a source of income. I used gaming as my financial outlet and thats what helped pay for rent, pay for the phone bill. Just pay for things that we needed. If you want me to put in effort to change my 85% average to a 90%+ average, then you’re asking me to take away time that could have been used to take care of my family. So you tell me, did I organize my list right?
I want to the people who work for me to produce through mundane and exciting tasks. I had a poster once. “Some people dream of success. Others get up early and work hard at it.”
What about the goal of summa cum laude? That’s a lot more challenging than you think, particularly given your HS GPA.