<p>Hello everyone
I am a father of 16yo who entered in Jr High this year. He is aiming to go to one of the good business school and I have been looking at all the chools between Wharton and Rutgers (we are from NJ). I honestly want him to go to one of the top 10 business school and I have following colleges in my mind.... UPenn-Wharton, Carnegie Mellon-Tepper, Conell-Dyson, NYU-Stern, Virginia-McIntire.</p>
<p>He is attending SAT prep classes and I seriously hope he get at least 2200, if not more. His weighted GPA for last 7 semester is 3.555 (South Brunswich High School) and I am pushing him hard to improvise. He is going to volunteer this year in local library or hospital. As far as other acitvities goes, he is currently First Degree black belt in Tae-Kwon-Do and has attended few clubs in school during high school years so far. He will be joining couple more this year. His grade 11 subject includes AP Economics, Academic Personal Finance and Mgt, Honors Global Studies, Trig and Algebric functions, Business Org Mgt.</p>
<p>Provided he slightly improve in all above, what are his chances of getting into any one of the above business schools? Any feedback or suggestions will be very helpful.</p>
<p>What is his unweighted GPA? His weighted GPA seems too low for all of the schools you have listed even with great SAT or ACT scores. Plus his EC’s seem rather weak and mundane.</p>
<p>@viphan: HE wants to do business. This was a choice he made after we had a discussion about various careers in computer science, medicine, bio-tech, law etc.</p>
<p>@Amarmistry: If your son’s ultimate goal is business school (ie MBA) then having an undergraduate degree in business is rather useless. It is better to have an undergrad degree in a scientific or engineering field and then get the MBA. Having said this, here are some brutal facts:</p>
<ul>
<li>Your son’s GPA is low for all of these schools. Most schools are looking a loads of kid with perfect 4.0 and will reject most of them.</li>
<li>Your son’s ECs seem rather lackluster. Need to show some business related activities. Nothing of international or national caliber that would catch an Adcom’s attention</li>
<li>2220 SAT is actually low for Wharton, and probably a few others. He will need to have each of the subscores > 750 range to be taken seriously as an Asian
– Course rigor appears to be weak. Why isn’t your son taking AP calculus this year? The schools will assume he is weak in math (Wharton is a very heavy quantitative school).</li>
</ul>
<p>Take a look at some of the sticky threads in this forum – especially on ECs. Once the SAT/grades thresholds are met, the difference between acceptance and reject is often based upon the quality of the ECs.</p>
<p>Sorry if this came across harshly, just trying to paint a realistic picture.</p>
<p>@sgopal2: Reality is reality. Thanks for your honest feedback. I will look at this forum for list of ECs. However, its going to be too late anyway to be piling up on ECs. </p>
<p>I understand what you mean by having to do undergrad in scientific, engineering or computer field, but he isn’t interested in any of those. I did discuss it with him but I do not want him to feel forced either. He hasn’t taken any core subjects related to science as well, except Honors Chem. More I discuss on these forums, more I feel that he is going to find himself in a not so favorable place when it comes to undergrad/major.</p>
<p>Now I am just wondering what direction can I turn him to :-(</p>
<p>I think he is doing fine and he will fine a good fit school for him later on. To aim at the top 10 business school would be difficult even for many students with excellent stat. He may definitely include a couple or more reach schools on the list as long as he has enough matching schools and at least a safety. Most important is to find out if the school is affordable and what kind of school he likes: large or small, city or suburb, etc. Doing volunteer is good, but do not just find something to fill the hours. Try to find out where his passion is. Hospital and library are two very different environment and the kind of volunteering would differ a lot. That’s my 2 cents.</p>
<p>@billcsho Thank you for your response. He is very much interested in Economics and he keeps stressing on the fact that he will be very much satisfied to do undergrad at Rutgers Business School. He wants to work there after and then pursue his masters at good schools like NYU-Stern or something similar.
I still feel he should be able to do much better than Rutgers. </p>
<p>Sounds like your son hasn’t found the spark. He needs to have a single unifying passion that totally enthralls him. Have you considered a gap year or PG at a boarding school instead of college?</p>