<p>I'm a freshman attending UCLA and almost finished the first quarter. I took 3 courses this quarter and got letter grades of A+,A+, and a B+. I've been somewhat disturbingly worried that this one B+ could harm me in the application process. I took this very tough course with a quite infamous professor, and with heavy reading and competing against sophomores, juniors, and even some seniors! Anyway, GPA for the quarter comes down to 3.75ish, and the next quarter ends around March 21st, which means the grades for the second quarter would be sent after the submission of my application. I'm confident that I can get solid As for all 3~4 classes I'll be taking next quarter, but the late arrival of the grades wouldn't affect the decision that significantly. </p>
<p>For essays, I have very specific reasons, both academically and socially, to transfer to top tier schools with certain majors, so I think essays can only help my application.</p>
<p>Given my academic backgrounds (3.8+ HS GPA, 2200+ SAT1, 2 800 SATs) and decent involvements in the college ECs, how much would it hurt my application for the top schools I'm planning to apply? (It seems like the range for the threshold for impressive college GPA is 3.7~3.8, but mine doesn't reach 3.8!)</p>
<p>Columbia
Penn (not Wharton)
Northwestern
Chicago
Brown
Cornell</p>
<p>Thanks for reading, and I would appreciate advice!</p>
<p>I think you have a decent shot, but you know they’re all competitive schools. Your HS scores were pretty good and your college GPA is great (even with the B+) from a good school. You should add in a couple that have a little higher acceptance rate–maybe Vanderbilt, Virginia, UNC, Wash U, etc. Do you have a relationship with a professor who will write a good recommendation for you?</p>
<p>Thanks! I have a great relationship with a professor who gave me an A+ and I’m trying build a relationship with another professor. I know those schools are all very competitive schools, but as long as I have decent chance for those schools, I think it’s worth a shot.</p>
<p>Adcoms are busy with fr admissions until April. When wt. qt. finishes, immediately submit an unofficial grade report or official transcript if it doesn’t take too long. You might as well submit anything that helps you and they are likely to use all information that they have on hand when making the decision.</p>
<p>How do you already know your grades for this quarter? Did all of your classes have a final paper/project instead of a final test? I know there are some classes that just had their final this past week, but I don’t know what the deal is with that…</p>
<p>These are projected scores and I still have 2 finals to go, but the grades are pretty much determined as I’ve been top 3~4% of the other 2 classes and the finals, or at least mock finals are very easy. For the problematic one, it may be a B, B+ or even A- at best depending on how well/bad classmates and I do on the final, but B+ is most likely unless things turn out quite favorably for me and yield an A-.</p>
<p>I was planning to double-major in economics and another social science, which UCLA doesn’t offer, so I’m currently enrolled in UCLA with econ-poli sci double major. But I wouldn’t reveal my intended major for sake of confidentiality. I didn’t take econ class first quarter because I’m exempt from basic econ courses with AP credits and, sophomores, juniors, and seniors were given prior opportunities for enrollment of more advanced classes.
This problematic poli sci class was the one on which I wrote AP exam on and acquired very solid 5… well I learned a good lesson how college works and how responsible each student is for getting the most out of the school resources him or herself.</p>