Urgent - Not a good sign

Applying to College
1

<p>Okay so I live in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. And my school's not a private school. And it doesn't offer any AP courses. And just to make my application process worse, most academic-subject teachers mark hard and don't really care about how that number will affect students' life - saying "you're more than numbers" occasionally.</p>

<p>Sounds like a whiny rant? Here's more: my guidance counselor couldn't care less about my application to the States.</p>

<p>I'm currently a junior and I took my SAT1 twice (superscore 2120) and SAT2 Math level 2 (740). I'm planning to take SAT 1 again in October after studying my head off in summer and SAT2 Literature in June, hoping for 720+. I'm looking into Stanford (haha, not even funny, right), U of Southern Calif., Emory, Boston C, NYU, etc. for criminology (I believe many colleges have this program under sociology) and journalism. (or maybe criminology and creative writing.)</p>

<p>I don't think my guidance really knows about US universities AND my course choice sheet is due pretty soon so I'm pretty desperate in finding answers from CC... so here are my questions.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>After all that rant... you probably figured that my school isn't competitive or famous for something. It's just another public high school in the suburb of Toronto. Would this hurt my chances?</p></li>
<li><p>How important are teacher & guidance recommendations? Is it anywhere close to the significance of my essays, etc? (This question is really important to me because I'm pretty sure my guidance still doesn't know my name after all those "guidance counselling" sessions.)</p></li>
<li><p>Are there any high school prerequisites for criminology (sociology) and journalism? I'm planning to take these courses in my senior year:</p>

<ul>
<li>English</li>
<li>Writer's Craft</li>
<li>Interdisciplinary Studies</li>
<li>Instrumental Music - Band (my personal passion :D)</li>
<li>Challenges and Changes in Society</li>
<li>(possibly) Studies in Literature</li>
<li>(possibly) Analyzing Current Economic Issues</li>
<li>(possibly) Canadian and World Studies: A Geographic Analysis</li>
<li>(possibly) French</li>
<li>(possibly) Instrumental Music - Strings (personal love for music as you can see :P)</li>
</ul></li>
</ol>

<p>Are there any courses that you would recommend? (Perhaps from the (possibly)-labeled courses?)</p>

<p>Thank you so much in advance :)</p>

2

<p>No, you don’t need the 12 APs others have. Everything is looked at in the context of your school. So if there are no AP classes, you won’t be knicked for having no AP classes.</p>

<p>There are generally no prerequisites alone for majors, except for engineering or science. And I’ll assume you’ve met or exceeded their requirements for highschool credits.</p>

3

<p>Well yeah I’ll have no problem with meeting the requirements of high school alone… just wanted to know some courses that would help me :)</p>

4

<p>Well if your school offers a psychology course I’d recommend that for criminology. Other than that, you seem to have the writing part down well enough.</p>

5

<p>Challenges and Changes in Society is a sociology course and I’m taking Intro to Anthro, Psych, and Sociology right now :slight_smile:
Thanks for your advice!</p>