I feel like I need to broaden my search a little bit. I am currently a junior. I plan on studying either political science or political communication when I go to college.
GPA (weighted): 4.1
SAT Score (I do plan on taking it again):1270
AP Courses: AP US History (5), AP European History (5), currently taking AP U.S. Government and Politics and AP Seminar, will take AP Literature and Composition, AP Research, and possibly AP Art History next year.
Am currently dual enrolled at Penn State, finished my first class with a 96.5%. Plan on applying to take economics at my local liberal arts school next year through another dual enrollment plan.
Extracurricular: Girl Scouts (working on Gold Award), school newspaper, NHS (currently recording secretary), NEHS, Model UN, and my school’s Shakespeare acting troupe. I am also my school’s acoustic music club’s vice president, and founded my own community service organization, which works closely with the local YWCA and other groups on different projects.
Geographic requirements: Just somewhere with internship possibilities, and within U.S. borders. I’ll travel the whole U.S. if it’s the right fit
Financial requirements: places that cost less than $30,000/year, OR if they are more than that, places that give nicely sized financial aid packages (preferably at least 90% of need met, I can make up the rest in private scholarships available through my school or other places)
Unweighted is 3.7, so not great but it goes up every semester (I had a rough year in 2017 but it’s climbing up, was 3.6 at the end of sophomore year).
Financial requirements: see above
For clarification on my GPA: at my school, unweighted only goes up to 4.0, and weighted goes to 4.5. Does not change much about appearances but I figured I would add that in. I wish I could edit the original post.
You could look into schools in DC because perhaps it could give you more career opportunities in the field you’re looking at. For example, schools like American University and GWU are great schools in DC that have a lot of offer when it comes to politics.
Agree American and GWU are the two most obvious choices for those majors, and internship opportunities in DC are amazing. Would certainly suggest you apply to both. Neither have a reputation for particularly generous financial aid though, so you may need to broaden your search a bit further too. Generally, you’ll get more merit aid the further down the rankings table you go. Re private scholarships, research by college, some will reduce the amount of aid they give you by the amount of any outside scholarship.
But I’d suggest you do a lot of research especially into American’s financial aid, because it is a huge advantage to apply ED there, and if it remains your #1 choice then ED will be a very good chance for you to get an offer. I know they do have some generous financial packages but don’t know enough to know if your stats will get them, or if they’ll be enough to meet your need.