<p>So I am a student with fairly high ACT scores (35-36 ish), great SAT II (mostly above 780) with 5 AP classes as a junior. I have taken practice AP tests and scored 5s on almost every single one multiple times. My extra curricular is often deemed by numerous parents, teachers and peers as absolutely amazing with state and national officer distinctions. I even gained public recognition from the state government and have won national award competitions. I am even on my way to applying for UPenn's M&TSI program and I believe that I am extremely ambitious.</p>
<p>My biggest worry is that my overall unweighted GPA is 3.188 while my academic is around 3.0. I am currently a high school junior with numerous AP classes and doing well this semester. I am even challenging myself to redeem my C's on my transcript by taking those classes (spanish) at a local community college and going even further and taking additional college classes along with my high school classes. </p>
<p>As far as my counselor says, my high school GPA cannot be effected by my community college GPA but the community college GPA will be separate and some schools may calculate it only under weighted GPA.</p>
<p>I have to face the truth to say that my grades SUCK. I'm wondering if getting a 4.0 for 2nd semester junior year and senior year (which at max will still be 3.4 unweighted) is enough to show an extremely sharp upward trend along with my additional college classes that I am serious about education and learning.</p>
<p>Is my only future to be destined for state universities? I've heard of miracle stories some students making it to amazing colleges but I dunno if that could be me. </p>
<p>My dream was UPenn and it still is, but that dream seems to be far, far away now. I am still aiming toward Duke, UChicago and Emory and if not those three then hopefully NYU, University of Southern California and possibly UCSD/UCLA.</p>
<p>I guess this is kind of a chance post at the same time a feedback/desperate last minute call post? What can I do to possibly redeem myself? Am i TOO LATE?</p>
<p>There is not much you can do now to redeem the GPA. Perhaps explain in an essay how you have matured and realize the imporance of hard work, yada yada.</p>
<p>Are you a recruitable athlete or URM? If your EC is as amazing asyou claim, it might hold weight for Chic., Emory or NYU.</p>
<p>I would guess that UPenn, Duke, & Chicago will all be reaches for you. Emory has also gotten very competitive. Nothing wrong with the UCs or USC. If you do extremely well, you could apply to Upenn for grad school.</p>
<p>Sometimes a truly excellent EC can trump classroom grades. Your EC might be big enough. It might not. But at this point, you can’t do anything about your not-so-good old grades, you can just go forward.</p>
<p>You need to sit down and ask yourself if spending all of your time on your EC is the reason why your grades aren’t as good as you’d like. Have you been neglecting your schoolwork? Have you overloaded yourself, and just don’t have enough hours in the day? Is your EC so much more interesting and compelling that you’d rather do that than your homework? Perhaps instead of overloading yourself even more right now with your HS classes, CC classes, and EC commitments, you’d be better off re-organizing your life so that you can focus on that EC. In other words, determine which classes would support that activity, and re-arrange your academic schedule around the EC. Shifting to a Home School model could be the way to go.</p>
<p>Another question that you should explore with your guidance counselor is whether or not you have un-diagnosed ADD. Really good test scores, and the ability to hyper-focus on projects that are compelling to you, but lack-luster classroom performance is practically a diagnosis for ADD. Should you determine that this is part of your personal neurological make up, your guidance counselor and school psychologist can help you master better time-management and organizational tools that will help you do better on the not-so-compelling parts of your schoolwork.</p>