I am more than likely going to be an incoming freshman at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. I am currently a high school senior.
HS Academic Stats:
Unweighted GPA: 3.5455
Weighted GPA: 3.9727
Rank: 48/372.
At the end of my high school career, I will have taken seven AP classes.
AP Classes- junior year: AP Lang, APUSH, AP Gov and Politics
AP Classes- freshman year: AP Lit, AP Psych, AP Euro, AP Comp Sci Principles.
AP Scores:
APUSH: 4
AP Gov and Politics: 3
AP Lang: 2
So as you see, my high school stats are not good enough for the elite schools. In fact, I just got deferred from Bowdoin College as a candidate for the ED II Program.
I am aware that competitive schools look at the high school transcript when the admissions office reviews your app.
My question:
How much weight does your high school transcript carry if you apply during your sophomore year in college as an incoming college junior?
I ask because I am considering reapplying to top schools as a college sophomore for my junior year in college.
@Gpa348 the more college classes you take, the less high-school grades are looked at. It depends on the school too, but with 60 credits the majority of schools won’t look at your high school grades.
So, you said that it depends on the school. I will be planning on reapplying to some elite schools. I don’t have a complete list yet, but these schools will be on my list:
Vanderbilt university
Princeton university
Yale University
Dartmouth College
Cornell University
Washington University in St. Louis
Williams College
Notre Dame
Bowdoin College
Georgetown University
Northwestern
Do you think these schools will place some emphasis on high school grades? Thanks in advance!!
Look into the schools’ transfer information yourself as it should all be readily available. Also, see if it’s better/easier to go to community college first to increase your chances of transferring successfully.
What interests you about the places on that list other than that they are “top”? They are very different from each other. Are you looking at a specific major that they happen to be well-known for?
Applying as a transfer is different than applying as a freshman. By that time you should know a lot more about what you want from your college education, and you should be very focused on your major. It is quite possible that not one of your current targets will even be on your list then.
One is what @happymomof1 brings up: You have a list in Post #8 of famous top schools that have little in common other than they are famous and elite.
A second concern is that with an unweighted GPA of 3.5 it seems like a bad idea to want to attend a university where the average GPA of incoming students is way higher – do you really want to be the least prepared incoming student in the entire university? Highly ranked universities do not have any special way to teach students. If they have any academic difference with respect to other schools it is that classes go faster with more homework and more difficult homework and more difficult tests which are graded harder. Students who come in with an unweighted 4.0 GPA can find these schools challenging.
Also, the University of Tennessee at Knoxville is a very good university and is a good match for your academic results up to now. You could do very well there, and could do very well with a degree from there. However, if you go there intending to transfer out, then you might be reluctant to make friends and join activities, which could make your stay there less than it could otherwise be.
I think that you should go to University of Tennessee at Knoxville, expect to work hard, plan to get a GPA that is significantly higher than your high school GPA, and expect to do very well there.
Thanks. The only reason I even want to transfer is because I want to be an investment banker. I want to work for a Wall Street firm. However, it seems to be that Wall Street firms look exclusively at top schools, and I really don’t want to wait until graduate school to have a shot, assuming that I actually do well academically. I know that I could be an investment banker in the Southeast or work harder to get work on Wall St, but I don’t want to have to work harder to get recognized just because I will not be attending a target school(HYPSM, Duke, Northwestern, etc). My career aspiration is the reason I want to major in Econ.
The only people who will be able to tell you if your high school grades will matter should you apply for transfer two years from now, will be the people who actually sit on the transfer admissions committees at that time. You can get a general notion of what they might think, by asking the current transfer admissions teams whether or not high school grades matter (and if so how much) this year.
You should assume that your high school grades will be looked at. What the committee(s) will make of them, will be up to them. Your current grades are not likely to be an absolute barrier to transfer, as the committee(s) will also be looking at your college record. Your college GPA and the courses you earn that GPA in will be more important than your high school grades, as they are clear indicators of how you handle college-level material.
Most of what your make of life is indeed up to you. A degree from UTK will not mean you have less of a future than a degree from one of the “top” places you currently have on your list. UTK is on your application list for a reason. You must have liked it enough to see yourself there if you weren’t admitted anywhere that you liked better and that was more affordable. If you end up at UTK this fall, plan to stay. Dig in. Find friends and classes, and make an effort to thrive there. Revisit the whole notion of transferring elsewhere no sooner than this time two years from now. By then you will know if you can achieve your goals at UTK, or if indeed you must transfer out. But by investing yourself in your life at UTK, you will have taken advantage of all it has to offer, you will know what is really missing from your academic program, and your professors will be able to write the strong, honest LORs that you will need for admission elsewhere.
@happymomof1 Thanks, I understand. I just have a question.
If my future UTK degree will not limit me, then why is that most Wall Street ceos/bankers come from top schools? I’d assume that Wall Streeters tend to hire those who have a similar background, since success on Wall Street comes from not only merits but actual connections. For example, the CEO of Goldman Sachs is a graduate of Harvard, and the CEO of J.P. Morgan is a graduate of Tufts university.
Two of the most successful and well-known I-bankers both hail from well-known schools. How coincidental!
Most employers hire people who look exactly like themselves. So yes, if you are hell-bent on a Wall Street career, there are advantages in studying at a place that is known to be a feeder. But please note your use of the word “most”. That means that some folks from other places do get hired. Contact the career center at UTK, and ask them where the Econ grads end up.
the answer to your question: usually, when applying as a junior transfer, colleges look at your first two years’ grades at the school in which you are currently enrolled, so your high school stats don’t matter (standardized test scores, high school gpa, etc.).
here’s my $0.02: if you are serious about transferring, you need to do more research. bowdoin and williams are absolutely and completely different than vanderbilt and notre dame. you also need to keep in mind that, at least for yale and princeton, transfer applicant acceptance rates are usually lower than regular decision applicant acceptance rates. some schools, like cornell, may have high transfer rates, but that’s because they may offer a specific program to kids of alumni (like USCali) or simply to kids they didn’t want to outright reject.
wait until you receive all of your decisions then go from there.
@kalons As you may have seen, I got deferred from Bowdoin.
Just so you know, I did not send my ACT/SAT scores to Bowdoin.
With my stats, as you may have seen, what should I do to increase my chances of being accepted out of deferral? Also, what percentage of ED II deferred students get accepted out of deferral for Bowdoin?