<p>Hi guys, </p>
<p>I'm a high school sophomore and for a long time my dream school has been Columbia University. I know that Columbia is a extremely hard college to get into, but I really have the drive and desire to try and be accepted. The only problem? I'm afraid that it's already too late. My first semester my GPA was 3.5 because of a fluke in physics ( I have a terrible teacher and I ended up with a C+ in the class through fault of the teacher and myself). In every other class I preformed very well. My high school is an IB school by the way. I fully intend to boost my GPA way higher than 3.5 for the second semester, but I'm afraid despite that I'm already out of the running. I know that acceptance also depends on SAT/ACT scores and EC activities. I play soccer, run track and field, play piano, participate in both debate club and knowledge bowl. I am also in consideration for a summer program at Princeton university. My volunteer work is a little lacking, but I plan to work on that over the summer and during my 11th grade year. I really want to not just to make it into Columbia, but other colleges of my choice (Princeton, UVA, Boston College, NYU, Penn State etc.) , I'm a hard-working driven student who's willing to put in a lot of work, but I'm so afraid I've already messed up with my first semester fluke. And the career that I'm thinking of going into (crisis management) requires the best of the best. My mum says that I shouldn't worry about it, but I tend to disagree. I wanted to come on this forum to see if you guys could help me. I would really appreciate it. Thank you :)</p>