Transfer Opportuniy

Colleges and Universities A-Z Georgetown University
1

@ArchibaldTuttle I know you give good feedback on transfer applications, so I was just wondering what you thought of my own chances. I am looking to transfer from George Washington University as a sophomore transfer. I am an International Affairs major and will be applying to SFS. I will summarize my application details in the most organized way possible so it is easier for you to read. Thank you in advance if you decide on doing a critique of my chances.

College GPA is 3.74 for Fall 2014 Semester (15 Credits)

High School GPA is 3.78 (I completed the IB Program and received college credit for two courses)

Will take the SAT this March (called the admissions office and they approved this test date)
Critical Reading: N/A
Math: N/A
Writing: N/A

Will be sending in SAT Subject Tests (called and they do receive subject tests)
Spanish 800
Italian 770
French 650

Recommendations are, in my humble and honest opinion, strong.

Essays remain to be written for now.

Awards:
Presidential Academic Scholarship 2014-2015, The George Washington University
Outstanding Delegate, Security Council, International Conference of the Americas Model UN, 2013
4-Year Consecutive Academic Honors, High School, 2010-2014

Extracurriculars (can only list 6 in total on application):

High School:
-Model UN Team, Head Delegate & Academic Advisor
-DECA Social Entrepreneurship Club, Co-Founder & Chief Financial Officer

College:
-GW Model UN Team, Freshman Board Member
-GW International Affairs Society, Member
-GW Program for International Education, Full-Time Tutor
-National Society of Collegiate Scholars, Member

Work Experience (can only list 2 on application):
-Dominican Republic Human Rights Council, Youth Department Intern, Summer 2013
-Central Bank of the Dominican Republic, Economic History Research Intern, Summer 2014

(Details: I am Hispanic and live in the Dominican Republic, which makes me an international student)

2

Bump. What does anybody think of my chances please?

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@chrismartinezl‌ Sorry it took me so long to get around to this. I’ve had a pretty rough past couple of weeks. Such is Georgetown.

For general advice, my opinion on college admissions is that it’s about not giving the adcom a single reason to reject you, and as many reasons as possible to accept you. An applicant to any selective college with the average accepted SAT/ACT score, average GPA, average essays, and average letters of rec will not get in, they will get rejected. You’ve got to make every single one at least average, and knock as many out of the park as you can. When applying, make your application a fucking work of art. There aren’t a lot of times in one’s life that matter more than this one. So don’t fuck it up (I did exactly that my first time around).

As for your app, I’ll give you a play-by-play.

College GPA: Assuming your GPA stays steady into next semester, you’re just about where I was GPA wise when I applied. It’s worth asking, however, exactly what levels of courses you’ve been taking. The higher the level the better, of course.

High school GPA: You seem to be more or less fine on that front; if you don’t get in, it won’t be because your HS GPA was bringing you down. Of course, you couldn’t change it even if you wanted to. So don’t stress about it.

SAT (ACT?): Being that you’re a current GW student, I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that you’ve taken either the SAT or the ACT at least once before; could you give me an idea what those scores are? If not, what do you expect to get on your SAT? Also, I would recommend taking the ACT; I did far, far better on that than I did on my SAT, so much so that I didn’t even submit my SAT to most schools.

Recommendations: Well you best hope they are. FYI, Georgetown will accept two letters of rec from professors, even though the website/app calls for only one. I had one written by a high-up tenured professor who knew me reasonably well, and the other by a lowly associate professor I was pretty close with (we’re still friends, actually). Consider that strategy as well.

Essays: I don’t know what the essays are like for SFS kids, but for Georgetown College it was the standard “why do you want to do the major you’re applying for” fare. To this I emphatically tell you: do your homework. Pull the old graduate-student trick and talk specifically about Georgetown professors in the field you’d be excited to work with. Know what they specialize in. Take a sentence or two in your essay to mention it. Let the adcom know you’re hungry. As for the all-applicants essay, don’t talk about community service or traveling abroad. Don’t talk about how you want to change the world. The adcom sees a million of those essays every year, and having one attached to your application is just another reason for them not to accept you. So get a great hook, get a small subject matter, and write the damn thing so tight that Charles Dickens would be impressed. There is no reason you should not knock your essay out of the park.

Awards: Cool. Don’t brag about them in your essays. Let them sit there.

Extracurriculars: Sounds like you’re an MUN junkie. Consider making one of your essays about MUN, but only if you’re 100% confident it won’t sound like every other essay an MUN kid is going to submit. In general, strong. Extracurriculars will be something that are going to make you stand out, so don’t stress.

Work Experience: I didn’t submit much of anything in the way of work experience, except my experience working in oil fields (not exactly what they’re looking for), so I don’t think they care that much about work experience. After all, people go to college to make that part of their resume better.

Let me know if you have more questions.

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@ArchibaldTuttle‌ Thanks a lot for your feedback. This is comming from somebody that really appreciates it. A little question I have though, when you say “Assuming your GPA stays steady into next semester” does this mean that Georgetown asks for second semester grades? Where you asked to submit your second semester grades? If so, I did not know this. I thought that due to obvious lack of time we only had to send our Fall grades since Spring grades dont come out until mid to late May. Thanks beforehand for answering this question of mine. It would be really helpfull to have this clarified.

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@chrismartinezl‌ They will ask for second-semester grades if you get waitlisted or accepted. My grades actually got slightly better (3.7 to a 3.8) second semester, so of course I wasn’t stressing about it. If you end up getting waitlisted second-semester grades will matter more; if you get in straight away they only matter if they suck.

6

You really seem to know what you’re talking about, so I’d like to ask you directly about my chances.
I’m a second semester Freshman, for reference

College GPA: 3.938 at the University of Delaware (top 75 or thereabout state school)
HS GPA: 3.12
SAT: 1330

HS ECs: Senior editor of school paper, Debate Team, Varsity XC, lots of volunteer work with local nature conservancy

College ECs: VP of College Republicans, Treasurer of Formula SAE Race Team, Director of Business Operations for a small design startup, FM Radio DJ twice a week

Work Experience: 4 years during HS working for parent’s small Real Estate Business (Which I write about in my “why I want to study business essay”), doing handyman work, and as an admin Junior and Senior year.

Recs are decent, but I only had large sections for classes, I spent a lot of time with one in particular during office hours twice and week, and I hope he recognized my effort in his course.

Do you think I have a chance?

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@Shackleton‌ That’s an awfully high GPA from a great school (I actually race you guys in lightweight crew). Other than that, though, I see that your other fields could be wanting. SAT scores and HS GPA, although weighted less in transfer apps, could be higher. But of course you can’t change that (unless you want to retake the SAT, which I would consider).

EC’s are decent, but keep in mind the application isn’t weighted towards intensity of participation as much as it is towards volume; I’m sure you’ve looked at it. Work experience didn’t matter much at all in my application, but then again I wasn’t applying to the business school either.

Recs: Make sure whoever writes them is in your field, or close (for example, an econ professor would be preferable to a Lit professor).

As for essays, see above. Make them focused, make them spare, make them stand out.

As for chancing you, I would say you’ve got a chance of getting in, but your application has a few reasons why the adcom ought not to accept you. What it’ll come down to is how focused you come off in the application and in the essays. Georgetown is a bit of a reach for you; I would consider applying to GW if you want to go to DC.

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@ArchibaldTuttle‌ Im assuming you took AP or IB courses in high school. If so, did you send your AP/IB scores before the deadline, or after you were accepted for transfer credit evaluation? Thank you.

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@chrismartinezl‌ I had them sent in before the deadline, or at least I attempted to. It takes a while for those scores to get sent because AP scores (I didn’t do IB) aren’t as snappy as SAT/ACT scores. But they do want them initially, not just for transfer credit.

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@ArchibaldTuttle Hey, would you mind chancing me? I am a freshman right now, applying as an incoming sophomore to McDonough School of Business.

College GPA: 4.0
H.S GPA: 3.6(unweighted) 4.0(weighted)
ACT: 30

H.S. EC: Created my own charity ( won President Gold Award Recipient for it), financial internship at tech start-up, Varsity tennis, treasurer for World Food Program club

College: internship at accounting firm, president of business society, treasurer for accounting society, Honor Society, paid math tutor

Solid Recs from head of business department, and calc II professor

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks